Monday, July 13, 2009

The Ugly FlashBack - Episode II

August 12th 2006:

At Bangalore much new people to meet around young men and women(..??) from kolkata.. Hyderabad and far, though the place is good(for sleeping ..apart from training), it stretches from 9 morning to evening 6 and the bangalore traffic is like hell..!!
I did a little shoppin, electric-iron, lashy sports shoes, socks and couple of other items.

And I could assume to know about how things are at other offices , but a lot of people smoke at my office.
Like recently we had this meeting and the guy sitting to my right started smoking . And I am thinking "Sigh . All a part of work ." Then the guy to my left lights up a stick and I am thinking "Cough Cough . An oxygen mask should be on my next shopping list ."

We had a break after a demo-project, Within a short time , 4 ( and we had a total of 7 guys in that meeting ) are blowing around smoke and I am thinking "What number do we dial for the fire brigade ?".
When the meeting ended , I ran out , took in huge lung fills of non-polluted air, and thanked mother nature for trees and emission norms.

Being a non smoker ( to say the truth i have tasted once Long Long time Ago OUT OF CURIOSITY.) but i am being here is like being a mickey mouse in a pub full of rough leather clad bikers.(True, it was shocking to watch a couple of ladies among the smoke).
Infact a lot of outsiders expect me to smoke since I work at a software company, seems to be a mandatory requirement for being a Software engineer....!!
(Somewhere i read SMOKING IS INJURIOUS TO HEALTH, and oh yeah it was on the cigarette carton!!)

Anyway, in other, not so smoky events, I purchased an electric iron recently .
I went to a home appliances shop to do that . I walk to the guy behind the counter and say "You got electric irons ? " .
The guy stares at my face for what seemed the duration of a test match and grunts something in kannada, Sensing a little communication gap , I start making huge horizontal swipes with my right arm to depict a typical cloth ironing action, his eyes light up and he promptly leads to me a counter selling teflon coated non stick kitchenware to a couple of overfed housewives,
It is embarassing for any 22 year old to be found in the teflon coated non stick kitchenware section of a home appliances shop with a couple of heavy women and a kannadiga shop keeper, It was like a moment of realisation for me, which passed soon enough anyway.
After touring four shops and being shown a lot of things from juice dispensers to stoves to music players, I finally bought a little electric iron .
I guess my domestication process from a who-cares-guy-in-college to a single-chap-living-alone-at-other-end-of-country is reflected well by the type of things I am buying these days

but..!! ...DO really people die if they smoke..???

Anyway.. who cares.. . I haven't begun to suffer from nightmares involving dead people chasing me while electric-pole sized cigarettes fly around in the background. But yeah , as a personal choice , I don't support smoking .
I don't smoke and won't want my kids to smoke , unless If i work for a Cigarette company..!!



~ Insane's Insanely Insane Notes
(Ripped it off from: Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes )