Those were the days V

One of the tests, the instructor had left us in the room and we had great fun writing the exams. For the first time ever I had seen there was a mass scale copy and we were all screaming away the answers. It was the first time I had ever copied otherwise generally people would be asking me to help them during the tests. Needless to say we all cleared the tests. However the next class we were not so lucky. After a hard day, the class had become groggy and most of us were asleep and I was the unlucky one to have been caught sleeping.
“Richa, pl repeat my last statement”
“I, uh..”
“Out of my class”
I couldn’t believe it, me and punishment!!! Not sure if it was a promotion or demotion for me. Little did I know there were going to be lot of firsts, and this was one of the many.
As it turned out, 26th Jan we had a birthday in our batch. Hence we collected money from our batch and set of to buy a gift, Mickey, Mukesh and myself went to buy a gift. Now as we were approaching our salary day, we were lavish and went by an auto. I cant explain how we were all awaiting our fist salary, we were to get it in hard cash, I cant put the feeling of getting the fresh green currency notes and the curiosity with which we were waiting. After the bus experience we never trust Mickey and his knowledge of malayalam. The autos in TVM , one has to bargain, we had a standard conversation, at times using sign language.
“City, Ambrosia” ? This doesn’t require any translation
“Three People” ..by pointing to the three of us
“Twenty Rupees” said the auto fellow using sign language
TCS should have mentioned that as a part of the training course, they also taught us sign language. We got off in the city, purchased some CD, shirts, had a coffee and back to Phillip.
At 12 midnight, we had the cake cutting session. And had some games as well. As it turned out, Jatin had written or rather nick named each of us in the batch. I later learned that the credit goes to the T59 batch for nick naming us. Some of the females in our batch took it all in the good spirit and some had a smug look. Jatin as I had mentioned earlier had the monicker of mama. Guru was now our bachcha because of his child like build and look. Mukesh I had not clue, but some how got the name based on the third grade restaurant opposite to Phillip, Chinchuu. That name is stuck to him and little did I realise that he will be the crown jewel with the maximum names in our batch.
Mickey had the distinction of having as many names, a name a day for him sounded good and seemed he rather enjoyed that distinction. Currently hez called Colgate, (a popular toothpaste brand in India), and you guessed it, whenever and where ever you see him, he has a smile pasted on his face. And last but not the least, your truly, I got the moniker of chunmumn chachi !! I till date don’t know the meaning and for the first week couldn’t even pronounce it. However I didn’t mind it as long as it was not something crude. Some girls though were fuming at being compared to cows and monkeys. Any how the name stuck to some of us atleast ..and the late night birth day party was fun.

The breakfast and lunches at TCS campus were an event in themselves. Every 2 hours we had a break, hence the name TCS (tea coffee snacks). Mickey was our class CR hence had the added responsibility to ensure our classes got over as early as possible and take care of the admin, in short he was the go to guy if the professor was on holiday, to arrange class picnics, etc. Thats beside the point that if you ask him why we don’t have a class, he would just grunt. Apparently he didn’t like being the go to guy.
“I am not someone you look up to if you problems”.

Those were the days IV

Later there was an announcement, inter batch cricket tournament. So we had cricket teams finalised from each batch, all the logistic was finalised and the teams were set to play. The match was held on Saturday, guys playing and gals acting as cheer leaders. But as it turned out, I was the only female from our batch who sat in the audience cheering our team. Goes without saying, I was looking to our batch winning, at the least going till the finals. We won the first two league matches, but lost the 3rd one. All of the boys were tired and a tad dejected on losing the match. As most of them were playing after a long period, without any practice, each had some excuse for their bad performance. Nevertheless it was an exciting morning for me, to watch some live cricket action. I also met some of the other CET folks who had not joined TCS. Once the team was packed off from the games, everyone was hungry and looking forward to some hot piping food. As it turned out everyone was a non vegetarian, me being the lone person favouring ghaaspoos (vegetarian) food and was left with little choices. Everyone was to treat me as I was the only person there to cheer a losing team! With a treat due, we headed to our base camp, Phillip.

The gang was tired from a whole day match in the sun and looking to rest. Sunday, we all/ the entire batch went to “Shangumugam Park" . It was a huge lake, with a big shell structure placed in the middle. Now was time for some photo ops. Those were not the days of digital camera where one went about clicking pictures with scant regard for cost. We needed the film to click the pictures and also incur the additional cost to process them. To add to all this very few amongst us had camera, therefore we all ended up sharing a camera, the costs and the incidentals. Girls didn’t have a camera to themselves.
“Hey Mukesh, a picture of the 5 of us please”. I ventured
“Hum Panch comes on TV, and those females are more fun and comic compared to you guys”.
I turned around, it had to be Mickey he never missed a chance to go one up on us, rather me.
However I realised later that he was a better photographer than others. After a sightseeing round, we followed our staple diet of an antakashiri game. Guys vs gals it had to be. This had become the norm de rigour of our class, any where any time time-pass game for us. Did I mention it was the guys who won the game, Mickey had come to their rescue. Or I should say we let them win some game at the least if not cricket.
Back to Phillip, we now had more people, the T59 batch for our company. Classes were going on as usual and it was time for another weekend. The plan this time was to go to Kovalam beach. It was a very beautiful and clean beach, especially after seeing the juhu beach in mumbai, kovalam was a big surprise, very clean, and sandy beach. The journey itself was very breathtaking, coconut palms surrounding the beach and the clean water. One must see the beach in the sunlight as well as the night time. Each time is an experience unto itself.
Need to mention one thing, TVM had become an ocean of TCSers with so many batches joining every week, you were bound to meet someone known anywhere everywhere during the weekends. Kovalam was no exception.
Jatin, Mickey, Mukesh, Guru (a close four some), Madhuri, Rashi and a whole lot of us headed to the beach. Being a Saturday, the beach was pretty crowded. We all removed our watches, purses and dumped them in my purse and headed to the beach. I had the dubious distinction of carrying the biggest purse hence the place holder for everyone especially Mickey, I could always see him standing, watch in his hand, keep my watch. No please nothing.
The beach was good fun, we were all splashing water, running around and playing.
Suddenly some one tapped me and I just casually asked
“Tcs ER” ?
Somehow I had assumed everyone out there was a tcser or maybe he had seen me in the tcs canteen?
And it had become a standard routine. You meet anyone, ask them which batch are you from and go on.
However it turned out, they were some strangers and Mickey just came around and seeing him, the stranger just went away.
Guys preferred to go to the deep water, leaving us far behind. After that incident, however we all stayed close enough.
We had some photo ops, tamasha and fun and after dispersing the watches back to everyone, we all headed to Phillip. Mickey however didn’t join us back as he had prior commitments. I was very much looking forward to a bike ride with him, but it seemed elusive. Gradually our classes were getting difficult and did I mention tests, we had surprise tests, quizzes, et all.

Those were the days III

Unsaid rules, girls were out and it was a guys night on town with a drinks party in the room. We quickly gulped down the food and crashed. We were all unknown to the mayhem the guys were creating, next day morning as it turned out the guys of our batch had a gala time having drinks and making merry. There were some nick names, those were the times of movies like Titanic, Satya and Kuch Kuch Hota hai. Jatin was nick named kallu mama as in the satya movie and goli mar bheje mein was our batch song.

As it turned out TCS was on a major hiring spree and every Monday and Wed we had one or more batches enrolling/joining TCS. The next batches to join after us were T-59 joined on Wed and were our hotel mates. They were the unlucky ones staying with us in Phillip, around 10 guys and one lucky or unlucky girl Priti in their batch.
She was staying in the room opposite to me. There was now a gang of around 20 folks in Phillip International.
Finally we were having our first weekend as a batch and I was just imagining how quickly in a week things had changed. Weekly the schedule was set, breakfast, lunch in office and dinner near Phillips. Weekends however were a different affair. As it turned out our hotel was not good but had a location advantage. Very close to the office and also to the city. Plus there were couple of buses/ auto-rickshaws to take us to the city. Saturday morning breakfast was fixed at Govinda’s - a dhaba serving piping hot parathas with curd. After a week of south Indian food, it was a welcome change to eat hot parathas with butter. We had not yet received our salary hence bus was our transport mode of choice. Mickey, Madhuri, Mukesh, Jatin, Guru and I had slowly become a gang. Of all of us Mickey had the advantage of being a localite. He had completed his graduation from CET.
Mickey, which bus to the city? I asked
Hey I hardly know Malayalam, but worry not, I have managed to learn basics. I can read, from the bus name plate where it is headed to.

A bus approaches. We were looking at Mickey and Mickey at the bus.
Mickey, is it our bus?
Just a second let me read. And at that time no one can break his concentration.
Hey guys, it’s our bus, jump in.
Too Late!
The bus was on the way to the next stop.
Mr Mickey didn’t mention one small bit in his claims to know Malayalam language.
I forgot to mention, by the time I read and understand the bus directions, bus has picked up speed.
Better late than never, we finally managed to get into the bus. TVM had reservations, specific privileges for ladies, separate seats for females, separate queue at movies. After a great breakfast, next stop was movies. Those were the good o’l days when there were no malls. Hence we watched movies every week. But I can’t complain. TVM being such a beautiful place we had a new place to visit every weekend which unfortunately cannot be said for Bombay.
Monday we had another problem to grapple with, less or rather no water. Girls were staying on the first floor and the guys on the 2nd floor. We were waiting for the bus to arrive. Mukesh walked down and he sure looked weird, clean shaven but not quite. It turned out, Mukesh set out shaving and was done on one side and there was no water. Hence he adorned a new style, half shaved.
And began a new fight, guys v/s gals. Gals never faced water issues and guys had started having issues finishing the morning chores before office.
Also TCS was deducting a HRA and providing the hotel. Guys had done the mathematics and had concluded that the hotel was not worth the HRA being deducted. We were being looted hence the request to shift us to another hotel.
But the only hotel available was in Muruthalli, supposed to be a shady place in TVM. I was clueless of the geography of TVM, however other gals in my batch said Muruthalli is an unsafe place and we shouldn’t shift. I had to mediate and thankfully water problem was solved and we didn’t shift. Phillip had a location advantage we had the choicest of food to choose from, South-Indian, Chinese, Punjabi and also not to forget the proximity to the medical college (full of beautiful lady doctors).
Of the 36 students in the T58 batch around 25 were from the CET and hence knew each other. The rest of us all were staying at Phillip. We used to go for dinner together only. Needless to say, being CAs, odd ones out, I was closer to Jatin. We had lot in common to discuss and he seemed a nice chap.
“How many attempts to clear the CA”? Jatin asked me.
“I cleared my CA in first attempt, rank holder. I used to study for 12 hours, last 4 months.”
Uh ! I would never study for so long. A cigarette was company in those days, smoked around 20 cigarettes a day and gained 20 kgs in weight.
Article-ship from which place?
That Mickey was Jatin’s good friend was an added advantage.
Next day, we had a general Q/A in the class amongst the participants. I happened to be presenting something on the purchase order cycle.
“This is the Purchase Order Cycle”, I said
“Excuse me, but I don’t think that’s right”, argued Srini
“It is, I am a functional person, hence know better”.
I am a manufacturing professional!!
Shit, I just lost an argument.
Not to mention, I was pissed. T58 was not turning out to be as good as it appeared. Later I saw Jatin having some fun with the others, which I somehow thought was at my expense. Another tiff !! uf uf

Those were the days - II

Then began my introduction round with Rashi,
Hey Rashi, where you from?
Electrical Engineering, CET.
As it turned out, Rashi was also from the TVM college and a south indian. I was like is there a CA, a north Indian in this entire freaking place, the whole south Indians and the Engineering folks were getting to me, atleast for the time being. As it turned out, TCS had arranged a cab at each hotel to pick employees. Finally we were all in the office, it was a very large complex, an IT park build in the outskirts of TVM, and very close to our hotel. All of us were given introductory lecture, our employee numbers, and a list of do’s and dont’s for our stay during the training in the hotel and the office premises. Later we were all busy completing our joining formalities, handing over the forms and signing the forms, some more forms and then more. A pretty uneventful day to start of with. We went back to our hotel pretty tired and bored. Our hotel didn’t have any food facilities in the premise, not that we would be able to afford the expensive in house restaurant food.
We were all coming back from our dinner when we met Jatin. Jatin had an interesting if I may say trip to TVM. He was coming from Calcutta and the train was delayed by 24 hours. He had spend the last one day thirsty and almost famished in the train. And did I mention that he was a CA. I was glad to have met someone from my field who was as much a stranger to the word platform as I was. We had our usual round of introductions and he rushed to the restaurant to have his fill of food. And yes, his joining date was made as 5th Jan, 1999 a day later than the rest of us. Our days in TVM were no less than college, we had lectures starting from 8 AM until 5 PM with good amount of Tea Coffee Snack breaks. I later realised that Tea Coffee Snacks was an acryonmy for tcs which some of them had derived during their stint at TVM. The classes were a drag is to put it mildly. We had lectures on different subjects ranging from computers, hardware, software, the different languages and also the soft skills.
The classes were getting boring and the class had not yet got its official round of introductions completed, hence there were quite a few known and un known faces in the batch. And we got what we needed in the form of Neelam Kothari. She was from the HR department for the TVM office. The minute Ms Neelam entered, we had gossip mongers running amock, with the oohs and aahs, what a stunner , pretty, etc. She was definitely eye candy.She had us play a game to break the proverbial ice. Neelam divided our class into groups of 4, Our class had 37 students, which made us 9 groups of 4 each. Each one had to know and understand each other in their respective groups. We were required to know the usual name, place, qualification and in addition, also the likes dislikes, hobbies, books etc, in short a short 5 min introduction for each. And randomly we would be asked to introduce someone from our group to the entire batch. Luckily for me, Rashi was in my group. And I was asked to introduce her. Rashi introduced me first, my name, education, likes dislikes etc. Further the audience were free to ask any question if they so wished, for eg. When I was introducing Rashi, someone asked what kind of a husband would she like, to which I had give an answer and as a jibe to Mickey, I added she doesn’t like people who smoke. After all it was my first encounter with someone who chain smokes. It was a long session , but gradually turned out to be fun filled. By the time we reached home, it was well past dinner time and was time to gulp down some drinks

Those were the days

This is the story of a batch, t58. Those were the heady days of the dotcom boom. IT companies where the dream place to go. Like everyone, I too had applied to TCS. In those days all the TCS freshers had to go through a mandatory training at God’s own country, yes that’s right, at trivandrum @ Kerala.
People recruited from anywhere in TCS had to mandatory undergo the training for 75 days in Kerala.
TCS being TCS everyone had to join at TVM, i.e. one had to fly down from their respective homes to TVM. The reason I guessed/or as everyone would have guessed is that it saves TCS the money in a travel to TVM.
Hence you had all sorts of people from all over the country landing up at Kerala. I had been given a joining date of 4th Jan, 1999 and all my local HR gave was a funny name of a hotel and address Phillips International, TVM; be there for joining on the 4th.
Imagine my plight on landing up at the hotel. If anything it was an exaggeration to call it a hotel, it was more like a lodge, wherein there were 20-30 single rooms adjacent to each other with no television or food available in the premises.
Before I delve further into my experience about the trip to Philips International from the airport, let me tell you something about myself. I am from Mumbai, and I wish I could say that I was dying to go to Mumbai, leave the safe haven of my family and live a carefree life. As one may say live life as I like. However that was not the case with me, given a choice I would have any day preferred to be working/training from Mumbai.
I reached TVM on 1st Jan in order to avail of cheaper fares, yes in those days when we didn’t have the cheap carriers as today, we still had cheaper fares. Hence I landed at TVM 3 days prior to my training, little did I realise that I may not find company for the weekend.
As soon as I landed, I was given the keys to my room. It was a small room on the first floor, room 104. As I was the first one from my batch to land up, I was given a choice if I wanted to share my flat with 2 people or one person. I opted for sharing with one person. It was a small room with a double bed, small lofts to keep our stuff and a table to do some work. That was all the room had. There was a common television for the whole hotel.
As soon as I had checked in, I went to the reception to ask if there was someone else from my batch who had checked in yet. As a part of the check-in process, one had to enter one’s name, the batch one belonged to and your native place. As it turned out I was the only one who had come that day and there was no one else to accompany me.
I had given strict instructions to the receptionist sir if someone comes my batch, pl inform me. I am desperately looking for some company. Friday night was a very tough one to pass by all alone, it seemed more like a bhoot bungalow to me.
On the 2nd day as my luck would have it, I found some company, few people had come from my batch, there was a RP and Mickey.
I used to frequent the reception desk a lot that weekend to check if someone had come. Every stroll to the next door hotel was accompanied by a trip to the reception desk to check if someone had come and most of all is there a girl, has my roommate checked in. To my surprise, there were some people who had checked in. I saw a name Mickey, T58, Kerala. I was like o god, after a day’s wait no female to accompany me and all I find is some guy from south, v bad luck. Just then I saw some new face in the lobby (if you can call it so).
Out of curiosity I just asked, “Mickey”?
He looked more like a north Indian guy and not someone from Kerala). And I was standing there dressed casually, oily hair, with my floaters on. Looking like a behenji I thought and decided to stop oiling my hair on weekends as well.

Hi, Ya, that’s me. (Whoz this nerdy!)
Which batch you in?
I am in T58.
Me too, Richa.
Hi, I am Mickey. Going out?? Come over to my room
Need I say, I was just glad to have found some company at last in the god for saken place. No more hunting for dinner joints or breakfast joints.
As it turned out Mickey’s room was bang above my room, room @ 204.
So, where you from?
From Bombay, am a CA
Oh. I am a mechanical engineer from College of Engineering Trivandrum.
As it turned out, there is an engineering college in TVM itself and supposedly a lot of the people from that college were in our batch.
Mind if I smoke ?
Go ahead
The casual conversations or the breaking the ice always started with name, location, qualification and batch number. The batch number was THE identification for everyone as long as one was in TVM. Later I realised, that in addition the qualification, people do talk of the platforms they have worked on. Being a CA I had never got a chance to work on the computers so exhaustively to know or understand what is a platform. To me platform all but meant a train station to me as in Harry Potter the platform number 8 ¾. We parted after a while and decided to go dinner together. As Mickey was from CET, he was familiar with the area around, the restaurants etc. Gradually we started having some more company. People started checking in to the hotel. Sunday we all met up during the lunch time, we had an addition to our group, it was Mickey, GP and myself. The plan was to later go for a movie before we start work, none of us were aware of what lay ahead for us in the 75 day training period. We exchanged room numbers and left post lunch for rest.However the evening came and went and I didn’t see Mickey again for the rest of the day. I was waiting for him to call me for the movie and I guess he was waiting for me or rather wondering if he should go and call me. Next day morning, I was getting ready for work and around 730 AM I got a knock on my door, it was Rashi my roommate, she had finally arrived.