Killer Lift's

Greetings to all.........

How many of you would like to watch a horror movie? Its all a personal choice, but my company doesn't give that choice to many of the employees working in floors above the first.

A daily routine for me would be like parking my bike at the basement of my office after having my regular squabble at the gate with the security guards over the trivial issue of whether he should open the gate before or after taking down my bike reg. number. I have a usual spot for parking my bike. It is the closest to the entrance of the door to the lifts. But I prefer the stairs due to my 'out of shape' physic. But that doesn't mean that I'm not handsome, see, look at me. And as everyone knows, change is never inevitable and so have I changed, just a little. :-)

Even 3 floors would take a panting through the stairs. But I feel more pained when I hear the squeaking and whining of the lifts in my building. So I've decided to give it a break from my 15 kg overweight body mass. But, its not practical for many of the associates to feel sorry for the lift and clamber up to their own respective floors.

Our company is very concerned about its 'out of shape' associates that they have made arrangements to facilitate regular use of the stairs so that the 'out of shape' be 'in shape'. One of the many arrangements have been providing a 'scary lift' inside the office itself. Look how nice the company is towards its associates. They don't charge a penny for this service even when people are ready to pay more that Rs. 200 at theaters to watch horrible horror movies or Rs. 500 at some theme park to get the thrill in a sharply dropping roller coaster. The company render this service to its associates through the 'Lift' at our office which can do both, horrify its passengers and drop dead in between its ascend or descend.

'ThomsonKrupp', the manufacturers of the lift, I'm sure, are suppliers of roller coasters as well as acoustic engineers in theaters. The amount of sound effects their lifts are capable of producing would be exceedingly shocking to even sound directors in Hollywood movies. I have personal statements from many of my colleagues about their experience at the 'Killer' lift's. Not one but 4 of them are available at the disposal of the associates working in this office. There have been incidents when the people trapped inside had to call colleagues of theirs asking them to inform the 'alert' lift mechanics of the building to do something about the situation. The lift stops in the middle of nowhere providing no means to raise any kind of alarms, in complete darkness with a eerie silence settling in for initial few seconds after which people respond in various unpredictable styles.

I had a personal experience when I took the lift to the basement. On its way, I could hear creaking sound which later on grew into louder noises which stopped in a last metal breaking one as the lift made its drop at the basement. I was scared, the villain in the horror movie was scared. I couldn't believe it, man. Anyways, making my own movie could possibly involve lesser risks as compared to the risk that every associate is made to endure through an experience in the lifts in our office.

Following will be mandatory instructions for anyone ready to take the plunge in the lift:

1. All Team Members should be accompanied by either their Module Lead, Project Lead or their Group Lead.

2. Don't confuse the lift by pressing buttons while it is in motion.

3. In any kind of emergency, please use your personal phone as there are no phone available in the lift.

4. Any sound from the lift while its operation is for the entertainment of the passengers.

5. In case of any failure of help to come within 1 hour, you can try to open the door yourself. Until then you are required to converse with the people in the lift. It might after all be your golden opportunity to start off with someone you may be interested in the lift. But, if you are alone, you better try to sleep.

6. Full air circulation is ensured by the twin exhaust fans on the top of the lift.

7. The alarm button should be pressed only in case of any emergency. Note: No buttons would work if the lift stops working.

8. Under no circumstances should anyone try to jump off from the lift as we cant ensure that the lift always breaks down at the basement.

9. There will be no lights in the lift during a break down. You can talk to anyone without any inhibitions or shyness, but stay still while you talk.

10. As a precautionary measure, we would hang an 'Out of Service' board outside the lift, therefore there would be minimum disturbance to the entrapments.

Disclaimer: All the incidents mentioned in this article are fictitious and any resemblance would be purely coincidental and thus can be ignored.

Gastronomy, art of eating or style of cooking

Disclaimer: One of the most most important necessity for me is FOOD and I'm not ready to compromise on the quality and the quantity of it. Thus anything and everything meant in the article means a lot and I do not want to hold back anyone from thinking anything other than what I would have really meant or tried to convey as ones freedom to think is an inalienable right of its own unless you move into a condition of hibernation or coma due to many reasons, particularly with respect to the current topic of discussion, FOOD. But mind you guys, I'm not a gourmet or a gourmand and this article is not written by any of the spirit, mind or body of Mr. Chacko, Saju Rajan, but by a very honest appetite in pain.

And as it seems my company or let me be more sympathetic, my building in particular, gives so much importance to their culinary products that the associates return to their cubicles with elation that they are under diet and their tummy's are gonna remain put. Also, every company would want me to believe that the green figures in their balance sheets are due to me remaining healthy.

Through the last few months in the new office, my taste buds have been tested thoroughly and I've started to realize that even if the software bubble bursts I can easily get through an alternate profession. Its been a journey through the different tastes that I wouldn't have tasted even if I would have gone all around the world, which is again slippery dream. I'd like to take you through the different culinary delights that I go through everyday, but I cannot ensure to give you the real simulation of what really happens, and this is now when I realize "There are some things that even words cant express."

8:40 AM -- Reading the Menu
8:45 AM -- Realizing that its the same menu for the last 2 months.
8:50 AM -- Someone behind the long queue says, "Dont have food from PNN on Monday, its the left overs of Friday."
9:00 AM -- Reach the counter to take coupons
9:05 AM -- Argue at the counter over change.
9:08 AM -- Give me a slip for Rs. 9/- balance.
9:10 AM -- Pray to God, "Let todays Idlis be soft and spongy".
9:15 AM -- Understand that God has not answered my prayers.
9:18 AM -- Get seated.
9:20 AM -- Try to cut the idly with the spoon.
9:22 AM -- The spoon and me surrender to the pressure of the "Hardness" of the Idly.
9:24 AM -- Stand in queue for another spoon.
9:27 AM -- Cut the spoon with the Idly.
9:30 AM -- Finish eating the spoon.
9:50 AM -- Thank God, I'm still alive.

It takes hardly 10 minutes for me to reach office from home and I retain the same freshness of spirit, mind and body after the goodnights sleep and the over-chlorinated water used to clean my body, thus this would mean that I neednt take one more bath atleast for the next 12 hours. But, no dude. It isn't gonna be that way.

I would impute 0% tolerance from my commonsense to accept certain names of Karnataka's culinary delights( or supposed to be delights) like the many (public) baths available at the canteen. I never tried my luck with them just because my internal inhibitions held me back even before my taste buds got the chance to reprimand me. But one thought that constantly nags me after the color, smell, taste, viscosity, look, feel, etc etc is the name of the final product. Why would they ever have named it the baths.

I can easily cook up a story for that!
Most probably, once the dish was tried and testing on lesser mortals available around, the "Cook", tired after an extensive and exhaustive research of how to make maximum utilization of anything and everything available in the kitchen, would have wanted to take a bath and then cuddle up in the bed. The elated owner, after seeing the imperturbability of the test victim, would be searching the cook to find out the name of the recent improvisation so that he can add one more item to the already boring stale menu.

The knock on the flimsy door by the owner would have disturbed the cook from his delightful bath, but still would have responded in Hindi as"Jaao, Jaao. 'Bath' kar raha hain"(Go, Go. I'm taking bath) and the half deaf owner would have heard it as "Chow Chow Bath". God know how the other names would have come. I'm try to give in smaller version of how similar names would have evolved.

Bise belle bath - Asked when he was "Busy" while bathing
Vangi bath - Asked when he was getting something.
Vangi in tamil and malayalm is "To Get"
Kesari bath - Asked when he was listening to "Ke Sera, Sera, Sera" song while bathing. or - Asked while describing some girl "KA SARI" while bathing.

(Its just that my sense of humor is getting affected by some of the newly found ingredients at the Center of Excellence in food and gas at the L-Center)

The story at the PNN, as I call it "Please, Never & Not" disturb sign outside the loo, is also the same. Pure 'N Natural alias PNN a.k.a "Please, Never & Not". The humdrum conversations at the counter have started to bore me. It has always been a confusion regarding which side of the counter I should be standing. On one side there would be the PNN staff wearing their incandescent green shirts and on the the other would be the associates with their company tags. These tagged people provide their sudexho or cash at the senescent machine and then would move across the counter to direct the PNN staff regarding how whatever they ordered is to be made. There can be two reasons as to why the associate is forced to assume a role of a recipe. One, the PNN guys don't know how to make or two, the PNN guys make it horribly bad.

I've heard someone asking the PNN staff as to the difference between a milk shake and an ordinary shake. In the milk shake they put ice cream and in the ordinary shake they put milk..... Anyways, that too is none of my concern. The only dish that I've ever consumed from the PNN counter is an array of depleted corn and obnoxiously black mushroom. Okay, I'm getting a little too much hyperbolic. Spare the pun.

Punchline of PNN
"Milk" is a cosmetic, also serves as a camouflage in milk shakes.

Burp........ Can’t wait for lunch.

12:30 PM -- Lunch is served.
01:34 PM -- I see the menu.
01:34 PM -- LUNCH FINISHED.
01:40 PM -- Thank god the cooler water comes free.
01:45 PM -- Bantering away through the airs of freedom.

Burp....... can't wait for tea break.

04:00 PM -- The menu screams "Today's Menu"

Sometimes I feel pity for the menu. The menu displaying the same items day over day is ready to gladly accepting the wrath of every gentleman or woman who expectantly reads the menu hoping to see new entries to list of experiments by the evening cook.

1) Asserted Samoosa's
Please excuse the canteen boys English, that was meant to be assorted.
But then, could that be a candid warning, maybe he meant assaulted.
These samoosa's alias "Killer Samoosa", come in blood shot beetroot red color and looks obnoxious, like one of those aliens that suck blood from your neck in a cheap space fiction serial or the vampire from the affluent cinemas.
The day I buy them will be to puncture my boss’s skull.

2) BU’n’S at Express Day
In fact this highly sophisticated dish makes us looks like the word made by replacing the 'n' with an 'M'. They have to go buy the buns, attach a Coffee Day Express cover to it, make it sound exotic like Shangrilla Buns and just serve them to the dumb. The rest is done by the hungry software engineer.
Plain buns they are, oops...not just any plain bun, soggy depleted "Buns"; mind that.

3) Set Dosa.
Same as the breakfast dosas.
Just that they had "SET" it up in some place nice and cozy like maybe the refrigerator or the oven.

4) Paper Plain Masala.
Special dosa in which the position of the "masala" comes after Paper and Plain.
If the name had been Masala Paper Plain then the so called masala would have been inside.

Even this variety of Dosa have been suggested to the Guniness Book of Records and to Ripleys Beleive it or Not as the thinnest dosa repeatedly made.

Chalo its 05:00 P.M and time to relive myself from this defiance of the administration of the building and the canteen.

Note: I've tried to explicate the truth in a little or more exaggerated fashion. Kindly size up your thought process to the delineation. I've tried never to be deceptive in this narration. If anything explicit is noted, kindly add it in the suggestion column. Thanks everyone.

Onam Celebrations at the ODC

Monday, Sep 4, 2006, 15:45 P.M
One day before Onam

Onam is the biggest festival of Kerala. But, there is a lot more to Onam than being just a festival. Onam reflects the faith of the people of Kerala; A belief in their legendary past, religion and power of worship. It shows the high spirit of the people who go out of the way to celebrate the festival in the prescribed manner and a grand fashion.

And some associates showed the same high spirit that send them out of the way to organise a beautiful 'Pookallam' (Flower Carpet) in front of the ODC. They are:

The preparations for organising this festival at the ODC had started some days back. And the plans were:
1. Laying the 'Pookallam' (Flower Carpet) in front of the ODC.
2. Providing Banana Chips or 'Upperi' as we call in Kerala.
3. And the best, Payasam to all.

All the plans were finalised, the type of payasam decided, responsibility deligated and at last I was free. Not exactly free, as the responsibility of drawing the structure of the 'Pookallam' rested on me. I asked Rohith to get big courier envelopes from the despatch. The idea was to make a big canvas by sticking all of them together and then draw on that canvas. This would avoid the need to draw it directly on the floor. We had 2 designs in mind. Initially we had decided to go for the easier one as none of them knew that I know how to draw. But, I took it as a challenge and went for the difficult one. Shilpa, Teena, Vaishnavee and Rohith helped to draw the design on the canvas. Once the design was done, I cut off the edges of the canvas. My job for the day was done.

The responsibility of buying the flowers were given to Mithun and Vibu. They went to Marthahalli and Madivala to buy all the flowers that we had decided to buy. The plan was to pluck the petals in the night so that it will be easier to start off with the 'Pookallam' in the morning. As an incentive for driving to far off places and carrying almost 12 kilograms of flowers, I thought I'll cook chicken for dinner. And I'd asked them to buy 'Parathas' from a Mallu restaurant as well. By 20:00 P.M they reached my house. The chicken was not yet ready. Both of them changed cloths and showered before the long night ahead of them. I served them the best Chicken curry that I'd made in my life time and both of them were very happy as it was indeed very tasty.


Tuesday, Sep 5, 2006, 02:00 A.M
Onam - Kerala New Year

We were done with plucking flowers for the night. But still, there were more than 4 kilograms of flowers yet to be plucked. All the three of us were very tired that we reached a unanimous decision that we'll retire for the day. And thus we slept.


Tuesday, Sep 5, 2006, 05:15 A.M
Vibu and his alarm

I was at onsite and it is the last day of the component testing to be done and I was supposed to provide support at onsite. I had just woke up and getting ready for office. Suddenly my phone started ringing. I picked up the phone, but still it was ringing. It was ringing and ringing and ringing and then I woke up to find that it was Vibu's stupid mobile that was disturbing my good sleep and better dream. Vibu had already woke up and had just got out of the bath. I woke up Mithun and we got ready in haste and left for office.


Tuesday, Sep 5, 2006, 06:00 A.M
'Pookallam' - The Flower Carpet

Rohith and Ruban reached office just behind us. They were supposed to bring the oil, lamp and the 'Thiri'. As prompt as they could be, they had arranged for everything. Rohith was given the responsibility for laying the flowers properly on the design. Mithun and Me went behind the GE campus to get the green leaves for using it in the flower carpet design. By the time, we reached the ODC, Rohith had started to lay the flowers over the design. I was not too keen to put the flowers as I was not confident whether I would be able to do it properly.



Tuesday, Sep 5, 2006, 07:00 A.M
Here comes the stars

'Onakodi' is the saree for this occasion for the ladies. They are saree's which are off white in color and with a golden border. By 7:00 A.M stars of the show came neatly attired themselves in typical Kerala style. Teena and Shilpa, both of them were looking stunningly beautiful in the Kerala style 'Onakodi'. But we couldn't let anything distract our work, so we included them in laying the flowers. I was feeling tense that we may not finish it before 08:00 A.M and started pushing Rohith for doing it faster. But Rohith took his own time and kept instructing Vibu, Mithun, Ruban, Shilpa and Teena while they were laying the flowers at the correct places. And to my surprise, he finished just before time.

When the other associates came in that day, they were all so happy at seeing the work that we had done and were impressed by the design and the flowers put perfectly, well, almost perfectly. We took many photos that day of the 'Pookallam' and others as well.

..
..
..

Tuesday, Sep 5, 2006, 11:00 A.M
We served 'Payasam' for all

As we had planned, Shameem had ordered for 9 liters of payasam at a restaurant near his house. We left the ODC at 11:00 A.M in Shameem's car. On the way, I understood that Shameem has started adapting to the traffic in Bangalore. We reached the restaurant by 11:20 A.M and we collected the 'Pallada Payasam' and come to office. We took the 'Payasam' to the cafeteria and poured it equally into plastic glasses. Mithun and Vibu called everyone from the ODC to the cafeteria. Once everyone had their share and more of the 'Payasam' and chips 'Uperi' they were asking for more. But alas, we made a wrong assessment of the appitite of the people at the ODC. While everyone went back, we cleaned the tables and Onam was over.

But at the end of it all, everyone was happy and I was feeling very happy and satisfied. We had planned for having a similar celebration at the ODC the previous year too, but couldn't do it because of the unfortunate demise of 2 associates in our building. But even this time, this wouldn't have happened without the support of:
1. Mithun, driving and negotiating skills.
2. Vibu, carrying the flowers and plucking the maximum amount of flowers.
3. Naveena, involved in planning and finalising.
4. Ruban, Lamp arrangement.
5. Shameem, 'Payasam' arrangement.
6. Rohith, laying the flowers in a very professional manner.
7. Shilpa, involved planning and laying the flowers in the 'Pookallam' and for looking beautiful.
8. Teena, involved planning and laying the flowers in the 'Pookallam' and for looking beautiful.
9. Me (Saju), Drawing the design.

Christmas Celebrations

Thursday, Dec 21, 2007, 22:13 P.M

'Hungry and tired yet Happy and Satisfied'
My state now can be put in the above words after the first day of decoration at the ODC. Months of preparation and the sheer enthusiasm of all helped the dream come true.

It has been one of the most comprehensively planned events in my life. It all began two months back – with a simple suggestion to celebrate Christmas in the ODC. As days passed, the hunger to make this celebration, a big one, grew. And today, when I look around, I am overwhelmed by what I see around.

We had actually started planning for Christmas long time back. We had held meetings in the conference room, at the PL’s desk and even through phone, regarding the various items to be purchased, events to be organised and other action plans that need to be executed. Many people in the ODC were actively involved in putting it all together. I’ll name them one by one:





Construction Phase
...


Friday, Dec 22, 2007, 15:30 P.M


Together we achieve more
All the celebrations were over and we came together to take a snap of all the associates in the ODC. It was of great pleasure when Shanoo Maniyar, the GL of the project, and Sanjay Sharma, BRM, joined us for the snap.





Some Heading
From left to right: Naveena, Niranjan, Saju (Me), Binayak, Sameer, Sajith, Suchitra.






Cutting the cake
Christmas Father cuts the plum cake embedded with lots of nuts and lined with soft cream and honey drops.







Enjoying the Feast

...