I decided not to bug Autodesk for getting me placed as soon as possible. It was common for IT education institutes to promise a bright career if one goes to them for learning things. They give out well written colourful handouts with promise of job offers after 6 month training in a course. Once the money changes hands then all these promises fly out in thin air. When reminded of what they had promised, its common for them to put the blame on the candidates itself...saying that they arent upto the mark. If few of them are courageous enough to confront them, the institute conducts writte tests. Its common sense that those tests are hard and if anyone dare to complete that on time and score a full 10, then they offer a faculty position in their own institute. This trick is still in vogue.

Exactly 2 weeks after the Eureka Forbes debacle, autodesk calls back to inform me that I have been short listed for an interview at a place not far away from my house. My eyes lit up and i was ready surfing through the reading material and brushing up things. The D-day arrived and i arrived at the location, this time i knew the place well and i was there on time. A guy interviewed me with lot of sensible things and i started dreaming right there that this would be my dream job and that I could be seeing things and going places.

I was awaken by the sleep when the peon barged in with a load of files. This didnt awaken me but he stood there to get them signed. What awakened me from the dreaming state was the way he hummed a song. First of all the choice of the song was bad, yes bad, the original was sung by a famous female singer and this peon singing that song was in bad taste, second of all his humming sounded more like a noise than as a song/music, third of all, the "beedi" smell reeked in the air. This odour shook me from dream as I thought someone teargassed the place. When i woke up, the interviewer asked me to take a test where in I had to draw 2 models within 15 minutes. Since I knew things well...it took me 10 minutes to print out the required solutions. The guy was happy and told me that in a week the decision to hire would be taken.

A week to decide on hiring a drafter cum engineer? It takes a day or two to hire a rocket scientist. Exactly after a week, I heard them say that I was hired. So pleasing it was to the ears that I started to dream again. The hiring firm never told me what the salary was and me like a fool had agreed to join them. I joined the place and was shocked to know that my salary would be Rs 1000 a month, 999.95 would have been like a bata pricing. But I was happy to know it was 1 grand. Next shock was that I would be tracing things and not drafting. Blows after blows struck me and it was hard to understand what and who hit me!!! But the only silver lining was that this job was for just 6 months and after that they would move me to development department. I thought it wasnt bad a life after 180 days. So started tracing things. The first one hour was a thrill, the second hour was tiring due to burning eyes due to constant staring into the monitor (psss..Never stared at anything for so long, not even at a girl). Then there was some entertainment when one of the fellow employees was talking about his weekend to others. Since I was a drafter and not a developer, no one really cared asking my name. Its a practice in India not to speak to low caste people or to ones hired for menial work. It was amusing to see the speaker boasting of programming skills and the listeners (me not included) heaping praises on the speaker. I started to stare back at the screen, the climax was nearing and I decided enough of the work and wanted to take a break...a lunch break. I went out looking for a fast food hotel and when I was searching around..my eyes caught a familiar looking number. Yes the bus number and without much thought climbed into the bus. I went home and my gradmother and mom were surprised to see me arrive so soon. My mom always understood me well and didnt question much except for the fact that she was curious to know if I had my lunch. I sat down to lunch with my garndmother questioning everything. Everything from what the salary was and what the job profile was. I told them that I didnt like the job so i quit that, mom smiled silently and left the place. But granny was dumb struck, she started with the usual story of how my grandpa worked for 10 bucks and how my dad was happy to earn 200 bucks. She cided me for being arrogarnt and stubborn. Slowly the news of my resignation spread like wildfire and the phones started ringing. Everyone at the other end was advicing me, someone adviced me that everyone started low in the organization setup and worked up to reach top. I didnt subscribe this idea and was stubborn to go back tomorrow. Dad came home and started laughing, it was more like a comedy show for my parents. They were happy to see me stand different from the crowd.

I slept and that night never dreamt of anything. Suddenly i heard someone pulling off my sheets and nudging me to wake up. I was shocked/scared and was wondering if it was some ghost, or a thief or an earth quake. I could see a silhouette, I got up to discover it was my granny trying to get me to go to work. I slept back and never bothered to listen what she was upto. I was stubborn and stayed back at home. Granny came to know that her words were having no effect on my dumb ears, she took my mom to task for bringing me up this way. I called up Autodesk and thanked them for the job and promised them that I wouldnt return back to them. I thought they werent helpful and they thought I got a job at last. The pressure was building up within to make a move and find jannat. Aha the suspense will break in the next episode as to whether this jannat was Arlingapuram.

Ahhhh Eureka Forbes!!! Who would ever forget those Eureka Forbes guys, they just drop by every other day and try to hard sell a product. This reminds me of Archimedes' remark "Eureka". Let me get back to the date with Eureka Forbes. Got up early in the morning.... dressed in blue and trying to get out of interview blues...left in a hurry to reach the place on time. I can give you a tip, when someone in India gives you an appointment ....never ever reach on time. I reached the place and passed the first test. Didnt get it? ahhh the same old test of finding the location after walking through a maze of streets and dirt roads. The place looked more like a godown with stacks of things. Can anyone guess why the office was a godown? No marks for guessing it right....it was stacks of Eureka Forbes water filter and vacuum cleaner. I waited outside and watched those "dreaded" guys walk off with the stuff, yes, the same stuff they bring at your place for demonstration.

I think this was the first place I say a guy receptionist, I could help laughing out loud but controlled myself. A thought arose as to there are people in the world who are going through a hard time. The guy put up a brave face and carried out with the duties of answering phone calls. He asked me to wait, there was one black leather couch in the corner just near the manager's cabin. One guy came to me and asked me to wait for a few minutes as the hiring manager was busy and would take my interview later. It was like after 3 hour the manager called me in. There was no courtesy and no appologies for making me wait. As usual another guy joined and both of them had a good time pass. They started off firing questions and stared at me whenever I took time to answer. Some of the questions were vague and I bet these guys had the solution manual, I found these questions way beyond my capability. Those two crooks got tired and started to make comments like "Who taught you Engineering Graphics", "Havent you come across this word", then occasionally talking between themselves.

Finally they let me go with a piece of advice, let me quote in their own words, "Look, whatever you learn in college doesnt mean you can do everything. There are certain things known as commonsense which lacks in you, this isnt taught anywhere". I replied "Ok sir", "yes sir". I never even bothered to ask as to when the results would be known as I didnt want to work in a place which was hostile, which was a godown and which had a "Male Receptionist". To be frank, nothing in that place interested me. I cursed my stars and walked back home...heavy hearted!!

I finally graduated with a degree in Mechanical Engg. I was so happy that I could now have a name board with my name and with this two abbreviations affixed. Even now the thought of using this degree for starting a career or getting a good job never passed across in my brain. I was still in a trance, some people like me are frank enough to accept that its more of day dreaming than anything to do with trance.

Days passed by and I was bored with the routine of getting up, hanging around the house, watching meaningless TV serials, eating good food and dozing off. I felt that I need to do something, so with degree in hand I finally started applying for job. I had experience in AutoCad and had paid a pricely sum of Rs 13,000 to AutoDesk Inc to get to know how to do things. So it was their obligation to get me a job and they did give me a couple of interviews....oops 3 to be precise. The first was in koramangla and when I reached that place, the first problem was I didnt know where that company existed. I called them up only to know I had to follow the right direction through maze of streets to get to their place. Finally it took me long to figure out how to reach the place. I began to think whether this was the first "test" question.....If a candidate could reach the location right on his own then he gets an A...since I followed directions, they gave me a B. The reason for giving me a B was due to the fact that I did figure out which streets to take. You didnt get it? Come on, its too easy, there were hardly any street names at that time. Well I could have got a straight C if I had called me and asked them to pick me up from my current location.

Now when I knocked on the doors, one queer looking fellow opened the door and asked as to who I was. I explained the situation and instantly I could see a ray of light on his face, his queer looking face turned pleasant. One more of the guys joined in to grill me with traditional puzzles questions. Even to date I dont understand as to why an Autocad Drafter job profile has anything to do with puzzle solving abilities. I do agree that life is a puzzle and one has to solve it, but for this job ....it didnt make sense at all. I dont blame these guys as there was a general trend to shock candidates with puzzles ripped off silently from shankuntala devi's books.

I hear people say that companies like Infosys gives puzzles to candidates and the one who solves (a minimum set) criteria will walk out with a job offer. But what is more shocking is the fact that the questions never change and possibly re-arranged and presented to next set of candidates....only to be repeated for years. The shocker is yet to come......its a fact that few training institutes have mushroomed up to come to the aid of these candidates. The handout they pass around, which they call advertising, boasts of helping them clear the toughest of puzzles, and give out an impressive list of how many people they have placed along with their details. (psst..No one cares for privacy in India) . Did this shock you? The shocker arrives now....these people who give training had got all the puzzles which are generally asked in Infosys et al and also the solution manual to these puzzles. With this in hand and a confidence that they wouldnt possibly be caught in their act, they were outrageously publicizing that they could get anyone a job....(not anyone... ermmm..a correction, they could get an Engg Graduate a job).

Well lets get back to interviewing at the company I was sent to. The questions were like a bag is full of coloured marbles and whats the probability that a red one is picked out. Question 2: There are 3 sheep and 3 tigers, so me as the oarsman had to see to it that i put these 3 sheep and 3 tigers on the other bank. Damnit, I had applied for a draftsman job and not for an oarsman job. Last of the questions were..."Whats the basic salary you would take", "Do you have any transportation?","if no then how would you manage to stay late night and yet travel home for a night's sleep"....Aha i liked the sarcasm here....stay late night and yet have a night's sleep? I remained mum for most of the questions and occassionally replied frankly as "I dont know". So i wasnt expecting a job to be offered and anyways who wants an oarsman's job?

I went back to Autodesk and bugged them for one more chance...they put me on to Eureka Forbes. Will jump to that story in the next episode.

I am lucky to have stumbled on this place unknown to most of them. If you are curious to know under what circumstances i landed in this place, you can proceed further. Like any other person i grew up dreaming of getting big. Big in terms of name/fame and not in terms of size. As a typical middle class tamil brahmin (yes eggless-brahmin) i took up engineering as a career. Well i didnt score much as i spent most of my time day dreaming and more realtime dreaming at night. This affected my chances of taking up the medical profession. Good God that i didnt get into medical profession, this noble profession is not for my type of person who dreams. The reason is dreaming in an operation theater is forbidden under law and violation of the same would lead to disastrous consequences. But i was lucky that the state government was generous in opening many engineering colleges around the city (i am not talking of Arlingapuram yet) i lived in. I once again thanked the Gods and my stars and dreamt of getting the priced & prized engineering degree, I wasnt specific on which branch to join. All i wished was getting the privilege to use "B.E.". If you dont know where this could be useful ... let me go ahead and give you examples.

While loitering on the streets aimlessly I had noticed name plates affixed on the doors or on the compounds with the owner's name engarved along with the curious looking abbreviations like BA, MA, BE. I had also noticed the same abbreviations printed on wedding invitation cards. Since I wasnt old enough, I thought that a degree was needed for this purpose only. Never did it occur to me that this was a passport to great careers or for job prospects. You can say this was a reason as to why I wasnt particular on a specific branch. I never saw anything like BE(computer science) or BA(Economics) BSc(Physics) on name plates or on invitations. To be frank these abbreviations are good enough to be on name plates and on invitations as it carries nuisance value now a days. Things are so common that any dick or harry has a graduate degree ..thanks to infinite universities and colleges.

Oops let me continue..........Finally the dream became a reality and I was offered an admission in mechanical department. This choice was due to the fact that i had fear getting into computer science or electronics ( This is due to the fact that I lacked logical thinking and this resulted in bad performance on computer science based tests). I got admission pretty early but as usual there were some high court order on quota system, numerous orders and writ petitions delayed the first day of classes. I was excited to attend the classes and learn new things. One fine day the doors were open for new admits and the dream did come true of attending an engg classroom. Then exactly after the stipulated 4 yrs in the engg program, i finally passed/cleared all the subjects and was awarded with an Engg degree. Now the dilemma was what to do with this A4 sized thick cardboard....I made a foolish mistake of not attending campus interviews or applying for the job..i never got time, thanks to my dreaming habit.

Have patience.........I will continue the story further

Ahh the good old days at Arlingapuram is still fresh and there are something which fails to fade in my memory. This piece of work is and will be inspired by our good old Malgudi Days. I happened to watch few of the old malgudi days episode directed by Late ShankarNag. Both the book as well as the short clip were good in putting the point across to the readers/viewers. So simple yet loaded with a lot of irony, sarcasm and not to forget..a powerful message.

Inspired is a good word to use instead of "lifting/copying/replicating".

Arlingapuram is a place not far away from Amruhalli, located 12deg N & 77deg E. Well dont ever try to find this place on either the sophisticated google earth or in our good old Oxford Atlas. In simple words, this place is non-existent/fictitious, its just cooked up with an intention of vying with none other than the original R.K.Narayan.