Friday, January 12, 2007

Formals

I saw him at Gurunath, eating maggi. He seemed to be fully preoccupied with thoughts, as he did not even lift his eyes to look at me, when I stood at his table.

I saw him walking down the road, talking to someone over a cell phone. I smiled at him, as I usually do. His eyes met mine, but they didn’t seem to recognize. He walked past, still speaking. I could see something missing.

I saw him at Tiffanys. Precariously balancing coffee in one hand and a file in the other, and walking through the maze of tables. I tried again to strike a conversation with him, but something in me warned. I heeded the warning and left.

After a few more similar events, I started thinking about him. We used to talk and chat freely all the while. Neither he nor I ever hesitated to start a conversation before. Yet, now here I am shy and hesitant.

As I started thinking more about it, many thoughts began to arise. Will he mind if I go and talk to him as usual? Or will he find it offensive, as a sign of mockery? Will he take my silence as lack of my care for him? That is the last thing I want, to be perceived as a fair weather friend. I wanted to talk to him, tell him that I am with him, hear what he wanted to say, and console him if possible. But something in me is preventing me from doing it. Is it a characteristic to this place? Or did I fail to develop intimacy with him? No, we are good friends! Lack of intimacy is not the reason. Why this stale-mate then?

I was pondering over it, when the reason dawned upon me. I was in a similar situation, times when I thought of The Fountainhead and Ayn Rand. Some of my close friends too went into silent mode during that period and almost forgot me. One day, I could not hold it up any longer and called up one of my friends, and asked him why he forgot me. He replied, “Machha don’t know how you would take it.” I am in his place now, hesitant to talk to the other one.

My dear friend, I am with you, ready to share your feelings. Please don’t take my silence for indifference, and don’t count me out. The only fact is that I lack words!

ALL THE BEST.

[Dedicated to the guy, still awaiting placement.]

Saturday, January 06, 2007

My intern story

Let me get back to the posts I promised earlier, how I got an intern, how it was non technical and how I became a binder.

As soon as the first announcement regarding internship was put up, I busied myself, trying to get fundaes from seniors regarding various interns and how to crack the interviews. It was only then did I write my resume for the first time ever. Downloaded the Insti format, the one with the table, took out my grade card and listed all the courses faithfully. It became some 4 page resume with large spaces, but I didn’t know then that it was arbit. I made extensive preparation for the first interview, which was by Reliance. I didn’t even know there is something called a shortlist, and went on to buy a dress and a pair of shoes two days ahead of the first interview.

The day finally arrived, and I felt pained to bunk classes for the interview. After the first class, I came back to my room to dress up formally and went to the placement office. Instead of the interview, there was a pre-placement talk for the seniors and we were asked to attend it. The interview was in the afternoon and a shortlist has been put up after the pre-placement talk. Some ten of us have been short-listed on the basis of CG and the interview was a mere formality. Just before the interview, I had plans of dropping out, hoping to make it to ITC. Timely intervention by a good friend of mine saved me, who explained me how difficult it was to make it to ITC. Two months later, ITC came for intern recruitment and only then did I come to know the level of difficulty involved. The interview with Reliance went on smoothly and I was selected, right in August 2005 for my intern in May 2006.

This may have given me peace of mind avoiding all the trouble my friends experienced in finding an intern, but only during the placements this year did I realize that I lost something with that early selection. I had no fundaes about a Group Discussion, nor was I used to interviews. [And as luck would have it, the people who conducted mock technical interview for me this year were also from Reliance.] And that lack of experience clearly showed up during interviews this year, all my GDs cupped.

Coming back to the intern story, the projects were assigned somewhere in March 2006, and were mostly based on company requirements. They weren’t core mechanical for they had nothing to do with Design or Technology. Instead they dealt with operations related problems of the company and I chose one related to Maintenance Management.

I reached Surat on 13th May 2006. We had a day to familiarize ourselves with the company, where we were explained about conducting ourselves in a petrochemical complex. [I have already written about my plight with the food in Surat, here.] The first two weeks slid away, without me figuring out how to go about with the project. And I knew nothing about Maintenance. So I started studying about maintenance management from the material available there, and read a few books on six sigma and lean production systems too. My mentor asked for a plan to be chalked out on how I was going to do my project, but wasn’t satisfied with my first plan. Fortunately, I found one employee there who gave me an excellent idea to carry out my project- A survey. The only thing he said was “Do it a consultant’s way!” I caught up his idea and quickly proceeded with a plan. Read various maintenance management programs and made a questionnaire.

The hardest task was getting it answered. Most managers took it as an intrusion into their authority and felt that I was cross examining them. One was even rude to me. [Here is the account.] Some delayed it indefinitely, while others wanted me to sit with them to get the thing done. There were a few good managers, who appreciated my idea and made sincere efforts in filling up the questionnaire. It took two weeks for the questionnaires to be filled up. I made a presentation and my mentor was extremely pleased. The final presentation to the management went well, despite it being the last one, after six hours of presentations by my friends. My final report was two books of 29 and 52 pages each, one for RIL and one for my Insti.

On the last day, I got the report printed from my co-mentor’s brand new colour printer. To get it bound was a different story altogether. Only the documentation centre has a binding facility, and the employee there told me plainly that he was only going to show me how to punch holes for a few sheets. I had to do the punching myself for the rest of them, put the sheets together and then use a comb binding strip. As it always happens with me, there was a correction in the report that I made for my Insti and my mentor corrected it. The writing on the printed paper looked odd, and I wanted to change the sheet. So I went back to my computer, made the correction in the page printed it and went back to the documentation centre to re-bind it. I had to be careful to see that the page was properly punched and that the alignment was right. I pulled out the already bound report and switched pages with a sense of satisfaction. Finally towards the evening, Sardie, the IITD friend of mine wanted me to help him in binding his report. He had some other work to be done and I had to bind his report too. This is how I became a BINDER. I learnt spiral and comb binding. This definitely would have been one of my options for self employment, hadn’t I been placed.

That night, at 1 pm on 15th July 2006, I took a train to Mumbai, amidst the tense atmosphere in Surat. I was supposed to take a flight to Hyderabad the next day evening from Mumbai. I missed it, and that is the story to come next.

Tuesday, January 02, 2007

Dont Quit

When things go wrong, as they sometimes will,
When the road you're trudging seems all up hill,
When the funds are low and the debts are high,
And you want to smile, but you have to sigh,
When care is pressing you down a bit,
Rest if you must, but don't you quit.

Life is queer with its twists and turns,
As everyone of us sometimes learns,
And many a failure turns about
When he might have won had he stuck it out;
Don't give up, though the pace seems slow -
You might succeed with another blow.

Often the goal is nearer than
It seems to a faint and faltering man,
Often the struggler has given up
When he might have captured the victor's cup.
And he learned too late, when the night slipped down,
How close he was to the golden crown.

Success is failure turned inside out -
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt -
And you never can tell how close you are,
It may be near when it seems afar;
So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit -
It's when things seem worst that you mustn't quit.

This poem has been the guiding light, through my years of engineering here, and will continue to be, for years to come. When my life seems to be in wrecks, when I feel low, when I feel devastated, I still look for this poem, on the wall of my room to give me the strength to keep me going.