Why wouldn’t I drive to work?

The office is shifted and I am traveling to office by bus again. I have to rush for but by 7:40am and back home by 6:30pm. The office is not that far and I could have easily taken my Dio Baby. (I had decided to name my vehicle something when I was planning to get it. I got vehicle number containing ‘EW’ so I started calling it ‘EW Baby’. Shirsha thinks the vehicle name resembles Sunny Deol so calls it ‘Sunny Deol Bike’! ) It is really hectic to get up that early in the morning after you have got used to waking up by 8:30-9am. I can still go back to my previous routine if I want to but I have lot of reasons for that.

First is that I am getting organized again. I have my cloths ironed and kept aside, veggies cut on previous night. And I get ready in the morning within 40 mins! It’s a welcome change to my otherwise lazy life you see. Some people say it is like going back to school but I say its discipline!

I am also one of those extra environment conscious people. I am one of those who would walk short distances and take BMTC bus instead of auto and preach others to do the same. Sometimes I feel guilty of buying vehicle and adding to the pollution. One of the reasons for me not buying car is that it drinks way too much petrol than a bike. Now that I already have company bus running why should I add more? The bus is enough to do that, isn’t it ?

I also hate to drive on Bangalore roads. It’s more of crawling than driving. My bike being little taller for my height it is nightmare for me. By the time I reach the destination I am so frustrated that there is no energy left to work. I never used to drive on weekends. Now I can save my driving time and energy to do stuff like reading, completing my unfinished sleep, or just watching the traffic. This one of the things I missed most while driving. I have knack for reading every poster and name plate that is displayed on the road. (That is why I know so many roads/areas in Bangalore). There were many times when I was distracted in reading the hoardings that I almost hit a vehicle or side walk. I should wait for real accident, you see!

Also I have reason to get out of office early.

Nu week Nu place

The much awaited office move is finally done and here I am blogging from my personal cubical ! This is my fourth work location in the city for same company! (And seventh if you consider overseas locations :-) ). I started with the north-west part of the city then shifted to the southern most part, then to the city centre. Now this campus is in the eastern part. I can claim that I have worked in most part of the city.

I love working in big campus so my first and previous work places were definitely not my favorite. They were in the city centre and very much accessible, alright. But it was like cramping up in small boxes. There were not enough windows and not enough natural light. The roof was so low that I will suffocate there. We had very nice cafeteria location in city office but I could never sit there because it was always noisy with roaring traffic below. Other sad part was that we had to share the building with two other companies and using elevators was big time pain in neck. There was not enough parking space, traffic was pathetic. I would have to wait for three signals just to cover 500 meters distance in front of my office. Sometimes I would feel like leaving my bike on the road and rush for the meeting. In all I had too many complains for the workplace. Though, there were some positive points also. Like I could escape office anytime I wanted. The shopping hotspots were pretty nearby. I have lost (that is spent) lot of money because of that :D.

With all these complains when it was announced that we will be moving to our own campus I was all excited. (Well I am always charged up for new things, you see!) They announced that we will be getting our own work place, good cafeteria, lawns, transport and the place is very near to my house. I was the only one in my team to be eager to shift. I have been making plans about how would I decorate my place and how will I manage my day and all.

So how do I find nu place? The cubicles are nice but the walls are to short, I can see across the floor. It gets difficult to hide from some unwanted people :-(. Half height of the outer walls has glass panels. We get nice view of green lawns and road without being bothered by the noises. And guess what, my cubical is next to one of such walls so I am more than happy. We have a huuuge terrace only on my floor. From one side we can see the top of KR Puram bridge and other side we can see planes flying past. It's the best place to have morning/evening tea, with breeze cool and fresh!
I like the cafeteria most. It's open from one side overlooking the lawns and has fountains on both sides. Fountain side is my favorite place to have lunch. We take a long stroll after lunch in the lawn. The place promises all the facilities like Coffee Day n FoodWorld outlet, Gym, Tennis and Basket Ball courts, Game room etc etc. Bottom line is, the place is designed with greater details and I like it a lot. You should also consider the fact that I have worked in a campus that is ranked amongst 10 best in India (that is true... Our Electronic City campus is ranked amongst one of the best campuses around!). So there will be obvious expectations.

There are somethings which still need to improved but I am optimistic that it will just get better with time. One of the reasons that makes me optimistic is, the way this shift was handled. It was very very systematic and everything started working fine the minute we were in office. We don't claim to be one of world's best companies to work for for no reason :-).

Other nu thing is I am back to my "run to catch bus in morning" schedule. I have to rush out of home by 7:40am. But good part is I am back to home by 6pm! Talk of advantages of having office close to office :-)!

PS: I had started writing this on Monday and could finish only today. The time restriction affects extra-curricular activities in office you see :-(

Edited later: Can't resist to post this awesome picture of the fountains

One of those bad days at work...

It's 11 o'clock in the night. You have had a long day... been working for more that 12 hours on a stupid issue which has no head or tail to analyse. You are tired, sleepy and frustrated.

Finally you decide that its time to call it a day and go home. You send update and about to enter the elevator. You get call from someone sitting merrily at home and he starts shouting at you left and right. It is so loud that your ear hurts. You don't understand what is happening. Thankfully your manager comes to your rescue but still the barking rings in your head.... 

What do you do?

I take cover of tears. I guess I am not that strong as I think for the professional life, isn't it?

There goes another one ...

Ahh.. here goes another weekend and I wait for the next one right from Monday with sleepy eyes. It takes really really long time for me to boot up on Mondays. First half is generally wasted in remembering what exactly I did last week. Have you seen the movie 'Fifty First Dates'? My situation is somewhat like the lead character. I need to learn my work with a blank mind every Monday ! I know how hard it is when my manger comes to on Monday morning and asks me something I look at his face with puzzled expressions and most of the times I cannot answer to his questions... the answer is sleeping somewhere in dark long corner in the mind and the processing speed of my mind gets terrible terribly slow. I have these Start-of-the week crisis all the time.

Tell me, do you ever have such start of week crisis in office? I mean do you ever go blank and cannot work at all? Last week, my start week crisis continued till mid-week and when it got unable to bear any more, I ran away from office. And found a perfect place to unwind... the "Crossword". There is no better way to relax one's mind than reading books. They talk to you, they teach you, amuse you, excite you, they cry with you and they sooth you... they are the perfect companions!!! I ended up adding 5 more books to my library, the count now goes to solid 25! I wanted to buy my favorite book 'Love Story' but someone tells me romantic books should be gifted and not bought. As per him, getting a romantic book as gift is always good omen to your relationships. Funny beliefs, isn't it? (But I did gift 'Pride and Prejudice' to a friend :-) )
I was browsing through the Indian author section and one thing that strikes me is there are not many Marathi people writing in English. Its not that there are no good writers back home but it seems most of them prefer to express in Marathi. I wonder what all those NRI babies are doing… And I digress!

I should not forget to describe about my weekend. Did I tell you that it’s beautiful outside? It’s neither too hot nor rainy; it’s cloudy all the day and drizzles once in a while. At nights it’s just amazing to sit in my gallery with a book in hand. I finished ‘A walk to remember’ Friday night, beautiful book in beautiful might :-). Apart from that there was mad shopping spree. I recommend what Shrisha calls as ‘retail therapy’ for all as cure of all gloomy mood types. Walk through the buzzing shopping streets, peep through nicely decorated windows, wonder though rows of racks stacked racks, try on beautiful cloths or just look at the people shopping… little girls looking at stuffed toys with saucer eyes, fat lady drooling on short skirt, wife nagging husband to buy her the new appliance in market… your bad mood will vanish in no time. And if there is little money in pocket, there isn’t greater pleasure than coming home loaded with lots of shopping bags :-D. I bought one of those Abhishek Baccha styln hair-bands... people say it looks cool !!!

There was this friend met after a long time… and it couldn’t have been better :-)

Life gets hectic in office and I already wait for next weekend!!!


PS :- I am on Technorati Profile are you there too ?

Also, Have you checked the new windows version of Apple Safari browser. Its awsome !

Coffee time gyaan

Its usual coffee time and coffee place (gallery outside ) at office. There is a mango tree and raw mangos hanging all over it.
Guy1(pointing towards it): Hey see those mangoes. They look nice. (To me) You like them?
Me: Oh yeh. I like them a lot. They taste soooo good.
Guy1 (To guy2): I can’t understand how can they eat such things, raw mangos, guavas, tamrinds, chats. (To me) You must like them a lot
Me: Like them? I love all those things. I can’t understand how you don’t like them !!!
Guy 2: Girls always like weird things.
Me: Yeah… I think that’s why they like guys !!!