First Impressions
The day starts early. Sometimes I wake up the Sun and sometimes the Sun wakes me up. I go the balcony to breathe in any remnants of yesterday. Mostly there are not any. I live on the sixth floor. If I stand in the balcony and look straight ahead, I can see the concrete jungle the city is. If I look down, I get a glimpse of a human zoo. This daily exercise puts a lot of things into perspective. Except for the fact that why birds are never ever bothered about anything except flying.
The company bus departs at sharp quarter past eight. I have learnt to live by the clock. Mostly. Though there are days when you will find me running after the bus shouting “Stop! Bus! Stop!” with my hands full of newspaper, handbag, bottle and an umbrella.
The rains here are of a different texture all together. It’s a fine spray … more of the aerosol variety rather than the hose. If you use a good big umbrella, you won’t get wet.
I commute for nearly three hours everyday – by buses and autos. That is my share of adventure in the otherwise routine life. I will give you a bravery medal if you travel by an auto in this city and not squeeze shut your eyes once in a while bracing yourself for imminent collision. I have had my whole life flash in front of my eyes a couple of times…and considering how interesting my life has been, it has been a good thing. Except for the fact that bones rattle too much for comfort and I might have to shop for a wig anytime soon.
On both sides of the road for nearly all the distance I travel, there are either shops or restaurants… punctuated with really huge hoardings. Most hoardings are promos for local Telegu movies. Others are about ‘sales’ happening here and there. I feel as if I am traveling through a huge super market. I have seen wholesale retail shops of pearls in Hyderabad. Yes, they are sold almost like groceries.
Every Sunday afternoon is a trip to Monda market to buy vegetables and groceries. I live with four other girls who I didn’t know before coming to Hyderabad. They also work in the same company as I. Except for this fact, there is nothing at all common between us. As a wild animal marks its territory by peeing, I have sort defined mine through silence. They don’t bother me much. Except for one time when I caught them watching my highly prized F.R.I.E.N.D.S CD on my very precious laptop without my permission. People who know me know how unreasonably possessive I am for my laptop. What happened next is not the kind of stuff to be discussed on public forums. I will just say that when these girls will be mothers, they will take my name to make their children behave.
But really, how difficult is it to remember my two syllable name? Before coming to Hyderabad, I thought I will have difficulty pronouncing the local names here. That I have, all right, but the fact that I have been addressed as ‘Samir’, ‘Uma’, ‘Sania’, ‘Sonia’ and ‘Seema’ is something which I do not understand. It is high time that people with four-word-twenty-five-characters names start practicing simple-four-letter-names as a pastime.
The past few months have flown at a speed which will put time to shame. It feels like I have been here forever. I never expected change to settle in so quickly. I feel I have spent nearly my entire life working and now… now would be a good time to retire on a rocking chair with a soft blanket and some warm poetry. But then if you are in Hyderabad, a mosquito sting invariably brings you back to reality and back to work.
As far as work goes, the only relevant problem till date is that there are a lot of times when I feel like a mosquito in the swarm of people here. The sheer number of people an IT company recruits is quite overwhelming. Anywhere you look, you can cover at least twenty people in your range of vision. Faces are similar, names are similar, dresses are similar…Sometimes, I have a feeling that I really don’t matter…that I am just a tiny bubble in an ocean, floating away to nowhere. Getting lost here is a child’s play…though becoming invisible might take some time.
By the time I reach home, it’s nine, it’s night, it’s dark, I am exhausted, I am hungry and the door is invariably locked. Jim Morrison said that there are things known and things unknown…and in between are the doors. I agree. It is just that I am always standing outside, with my head in the handbag, searching for the key, which is never there.
The company bus departs at sharp quarter past eight. I have learnt to live by the clock. Mostly. Though there are days when you will find me running after the bus shouting “Stop! Bus! Stop!” with my hands full of newspaper, handbag, bottle and an umbrella.
The rains here are of a different texture all together. It’s a fine spray … more of the aerosol variety rather than the hose. If you use a good big umbrella, you won’t get wet.
I commute for nearly three hours everyday – by buses and autos. That is my share of adventure in the otherwise routine life. I will give you a bravery medal if you travel by an auto in this city and not squeeze shut your eyes once in a while bracing yourself for imminent collision. I have had my whole life flash in front of my eyes a couple of times…and considering how interesting my life has been, it has been a good thing. Except for the fact that bones rattle too much for comfort and I might have to shop for a wig anytime soon.
On both sides of the road for nearly all the distance I travel, there are either shops or restaurants… punctuated with really huge hoardings. Most hoardings are promos for local Telegu movies. Others are about ‘sales’ happening here and there. I feel as if I am traveling through a huge super market. I have seen wholesale retail shops of pearls in Hyderabad. Yes, they are sold almost like groceries.
Every Sunday afternoon is a trip to Monda market to buy vegetables and groceries. I live with four other girls who I didn’t know before coming to Hyderabad. They also work in the same company as I. Except for this fact, there is nothing at all common between us. As a wild animal marks its territory by peeing, I have sort defined mine through silence. They don’t bother me much. Except for one time when I caught them watching my highly prized F.R.I.E.N.D.S CD on my very precious laptop without my permission. People who know me know how unreasonably possessive I am for my laptop. What happened next is not the kind of stuff to be discussed on public forums. I will just say that when these girls will be mothers, they will take my name to make their children behave.
But really, how difficult is it to remember my two syllable name? Before coming to Hyderabad, I thought I will have difficulty pronouncing the local names here. That I have, all right, but the fact that I have been addressed as ‘Samir’, ‘Uma’, ‘Sania’, ‘Sonia’ and ‘Seema’ is something which I do not understand. It is high time that people with four-word-twenty-five-characters names start practicing simple-four-letter-names as a pastime.
The past few months have flown at a speed which will put time to shame. It feels like I have been here forever. I never expected change to settle in so quickly. I feel I have spent nearly my entire life working and now… now would be a good time to retire on a rocking chair with a soft blanket and some warm poetry. But then if you are in Hyderabad, a mosquito sting invariably brings you back to reality and back to work.
As far as work goes, the only relevant problem till date is that there are a lot of times when I feel like a mosquito in the swarm of people here. The sheer number of people an IT company recruits is quite overwhelming. Anywhere you look, you can cover at least twenty people in your range of vision. Faces are similar, names are similar, dresses are similar…Sometimes, I have a feeling that I really don’t matter…that I am just a tiny bubble in an ocean, floating away to nowhere. Getting lost here is a child’s play…though becoming invisible might take some time.
By the time I reach home, it’s nine, it’s night, it’s dark, I am exhausted, I am hungry and the door is invariably locked. Jim Morrison said that there are things known and things unknown…and in between are the doors. I agree. It is just that I am always standing outside, with my head in the handbag, searching for the key, which is never there.
Labels: Life...or something like it...
