I would like to express my transition from real freedom to assumed freedom. I am here talking about my transition from my college to the booming industry. I would like to pour my first few months’ experience of the so called glamorous and fun filled industry.
We used to wander those spacious heat filled open grounds and dirty class rooms with just 50/-Rs. in pocket and plan the whole week with that budget. But now we wander along the well cleaned, fully air-conditioned corridors with about five to six credit cards in our pocket planning where to swipe the cards. Credit cards eagerly waiting to eat up next month's salary. I can't believe that it was just few months before that the 50/-Rs. seemed to be thousands and now thousands seem to be nothing.
College canteen, Tea shops were the favorite hot spots where we spent hours together, having a hearty chat with our buddies forgetting the whole world. But now Cafe Day, Quickies, Baristas have taken those places. What a coffee cost 5/-Rs few months back has now gone up to 50/-Rs a cup.
Those precious days where we used to laugh for nothing, while chatting or while playing or even when you fail in your paper because you have got 30 marks for an empty paper. But now you rarely smile except the smile for the forward you just received or the tailored smile to your PM to impress him.
Hatred and Ego were the words you haven't heard in those days. You smash or hit your friend for some reason and the next moment you walk along him with hands on his shoulders. But now you don’t like the guy sitting beside you because he's getting a salary 10k greater than you or he's always being appreciated by your PM (Project Manager). True friends are hard to find here.In college if someone is talking badly about your college you can find your blood boiling inside even though you don't like your principal. But here loyalty is the lost word; whenever someone is talking badly about your company you join them to criticize your company. You join the company with the resignation day in the mind, is this loyalty. Don't mind I have also planned my resignation date.
You have seen the late nights only on the eve of the exam, where you rely on your friend to wake him/ her at night 1 or 2. And how can we forget those last minute tensions in exam, you remember that only just before entering the exam you find that you have forgotten to revise an important question that your friend suggested that it will surely appear on this exam. You rush back and flip those Xeroxed pages with tension. But today you work at least 2 days a week till 1 or 2 in the night to deliver something to your unknown client who is at US or UK. You are aimlessly typing at the useless word document that your PM asked you to finish with his tailor made smile. Loads of tension with calls from home, with your eye lids eager to kiss each other and you promise them to allow it a little later and all the time cursing Bill Gates for inventing MS Office.
Writing all these to celebrate my first salary in this field. It seems I have been in my own desert where I have realized that I am moving from the warmth of the Oasis to chase a mirage. A mirage that promises a lot of things but is still a mirage. When I turn back I can find thousands chasing that mirage with an ID card around their neck. I wish all the best for them.
From:
A Fresher! (Once)
Kunal Kuntalam
