Workstation Grievances :-(

So I am in another facility of my firm for the past three weeks.


Day one, I am just roaming around cafeterias of different buildings trying to find which cafeteria is best for pop corn.
Day two, I have a workstation configured with all client connectivity, outlook and office communicator, and a desk phone.
So in the open cubicle next to mine, I noticed a lady, around 35, coughing.    Unstoppably.

Days passed.

The cough doesn’t stop. Not even once did she bother to cover or use a towel. She just opens her mouth, coughs nauseatingly into the air. And sometimes into her laptop, mobile or desk phone. Now this lady is a manager, very annoyingly loud and rude to her subordinates. So now it is clear why people don’t react.

As Papa and Mummy would be in their respective workplaces, I call them separately during office hours.
Me: Hello Papa..
*cough* *cough*
Papa: What happened Anu? Why are you coughing?
Me: Its not me Papa, just a lady who happen to sit near me.
Papa: And she sits so close to you? Stay away from her!!
Me: So what else… how is work going on?
*cough* *cough*
Papa: You should actually tell her to cover during cough.
Me: So did u both go to see Ammamma yesterday? How is she doing?
*cough* *cough*
Papa: What the hell? How can people behave so irrationally? She is spraying germs into your mouth!
Me: I hear Ammamma is not doing so great. Why dint you bring her home until she recovers?
*cough* *cough*
Papa: You buy her a towel! I will pay you for that!
Me: Okay, bye. *SLAM*

After a few days.

Me: Hi Mummy..you in college now?
*cough* *cough*
Mummy: Dint that sicko recover from that damn cough?
Me: So when are you coming to Bangalore next?
*cough* *cough*
Mummy: How much common sense is required for someone to use a tissue or towel while coughing?
Me: Better come during summer. Bangalore is pleasant in summer compared to Trivandrum.
*cough* *cough*
Mummy: You have such a big mouth for everything else. Why haven’t you told her about the matter?
Me: For God’s sakes , she is a Manager!!
*cough* *cough*
Mummy :[at the peak of her volume]:  How does it matter whether she is a manager or a sweeper!!!!!!!

Sensing a potential threat to my job, I cut that call.

The following week, I suffer from unbearable tooth ache. I update this on facebook and twitter, and people come and console me saying ,’ dear, this is why I say, that you need to brush your teeth’. Haha, very funny.
I even take a leave and stay home due to the pain. The phone rings.

Mummy: Hello Anu..
Me: Hii Mummy..!
Mummy: How is that coughing manager doing?
Me: !!!!!!!!!!$#@#$#%^$^%&^*(&)(
Mummy: How am I supposed to know that you have tooth ache!
Me: You should first ask how I am doing !
*SLAM*

Processor Woes. :-(

 Sometimes it kills me that I am not able to say want I actually want to say. My head, which is my inbuilt processor, is probably processing a lot of requests concurrently, and is inherently slow. So my verbal communication is often delayed and quick responses if any are not logical. And the situations that I get myself into are very complicated even for my processor to interpret, and it takes some time even when I get to see the logical side of it. But some daily life scenarios take a higher priority with my processor. For example, I just met one lady in my project and she introduced herself as ‘Silky’. The very second I found myself laughing at her. At the same time, I also thanked God that my parents did not name me like that…cos if they did, it would have been embarrassingly contradictory. Anyways, the processor works diligently when there is something to laugh. But when there is something serious to think, I would be left wondering whether the existence of a processor is just a myth.




Today, I was crossing one of the busiest roads in Bangalore… the one near Dairy Circle.

I crossed half way through (with some two wheelers wondering aloud whether the road belonged to my Dad… hmm…I wish it was) and waited in the separator awaiting the police to interfere. Another girl was standing near me, wearing an ID card similar to mine, and a shawl covering her forehead and cheeks. Two small eyes were partially visible. In order to cross Bangalore roads and end up alive at the other end, two eyes are not sufficient. This wonder woman was covering half her eyes also. The police came, stopped the vehicles and signaled us to cross to the other half of the road. At the very instant, the wonder woman took out an umbrella and pointed it near me. The next second, it opened in my stomach, the pointed tip of which had now touched my intestines. I yelled with pain, but the wonder woman swooshed past, and reached the other side.
My processor rushed to my stomach and was busy consoling it, that any communication to the verbal end was terminated.
Back in my workstation, I am painfully regretting, in regular intervals, why I hadn’t given her a piece of my mind.

5 minutes:

I should have said, ‘Don’t you have eyes!!!’

30 minutes:

I should have said, ‘ What in God’s name are u doing??’

2 hours:

I should have simply taken the umbrella and thrown it on the road.

4 hours:

I should have taken that umbrella and given her a good thrashing.

6 hours:

I should have killed her.

Back home:

*Wailing* Mummy, one girl opened her umbrella into my stomach..sob sob..and it is paining u know..

Mummy: What were you doing when she took out the umbrella? You should have moved and given some space!

*Wailing harder* I know…I know… Don’t talk to me *SLAM*

The art of expressive living :)

I can  interpret facial expressions and convey entire sentences or even paragraphs with just my eyes and a few other facial muscles. Those who thought I am an illogical creature, please note: I can read minds too. This being my trademark quality, I will not share the trick with you, but I can give some inferences with examples.








* I was going to my native place over the weekend. I had to travel in a jam packed bus till railway station, with a back pack trice as heavy as me.( Now don’t ask me why my bag was heavy, as my eyeliner and lip gloss constitute majority of the weight..whereas his shaving kit, and shoes are lighter than feather) .Putting it down would occupy the space of at least 5 average passengers. With one hand on the bar at the ceiling of the bus, I almost hung there, with the back pack weighing me down heavily. One lady, about my age, sitting very comfortably in a seat, was enjoying the beauty of the concrete jungle outside, but is very much uneasy by my presence. At a major pressing of brakes, I lost balance and hit another woman who was also standing, and the tag of my back pack touched the comfortably sitting lady. She gave me a stare which said:

“What the bloody hell are you doing… you insignificant creep, with a very significant luggage”

At this look, the hell broke loose( inside my head). I gave an expression back which said.

“Please pardon me, if I did the unimaginable sin of touching you, your majesty the Queen”.

At this expression, the lady gave me another expression which was difficult to comprehend. ( It must have been some regional expression).



* A five minute incompliance of corporate punctuality would raise the eyebrows of some managers in a perfect shape. (Sometimes I wish I had such shapely eyebrows)
These raised eyebrows with eyes balls popping out of their destined sockets, follows you to your seat with rigorous lifting the sleeve to stare at the watch .
This expression reminds you of the deadline with exact date and time up to microseconds. It also tells ‘Don’t come to me later asking for extension of deadline’.
However sporting any expression as a sign of retaliation to this would have very unpleasant consequences. Just think of some software code, and your face would become as expressionless as is required for the current scenario.



*As soon as I step into the office bus, I take out my ipod and be engrossed in it. Some ladies come in late and create a huge hullabaloo inside the bus. One such day, I accidentally touched the screen of my ipod, and it displayed the song I was listening to in a font so big that some of it went out of the screen. One contemporary lady saw that I was listening to ‘words’ by Boyzone and gave me a cold look , which said:

“ ‘words’? and ‘boyzone’? !! This song was released during the dinosaur era!’

I gave another expression, two fingers on my nose, eyebrows formed like a tilde.
“ What an awful smell! Don’t you ever take bath! ‘

Beauty Business!

It feels like it has been ages since I blogged. There were some instances wherein I really wanted to write, but then anger and sentiments wouldn’t make good writing (neither does it make good reading!). So I let it cool down. Now I am back to Bangalore, after a ten day vacation at the in laws, and the silver lining is that I got to meet my parents as well.

The trip to hometown had been a major function- a wedding. Wedding is good business for the beauticians. We give them gold, wedding dress, veil, and whatever it takes to dress for the event. They put it on us and make big bucks. It reminds me of my own wedding. A month before the wedding, my Mom calls up the famous beautician, who has many celebrities as clients in her credit.


Mom: Hello?

Ms.Beautician: Yes?

Mom: My daughter’s marriage on the 28th, next month. I wanted an appointment.

Ms.Beautician: I am so sorry, there are around 12 appointments already.

Mom: Oh, in that case, could you recommend some place you know?

Ms.Beautician: Well in that case, if you can be here before 6:00am..

Mom: We’ll be there. Your rate..?

Ms.Beautician: Ten Thousand rupees.

Papa stood next to Mom, trying hard to eavesdrop the ‘rate’ part. His jaws fell wide open when he heard the rate.

“Ten Thousand Rupees..! That means will she be providing the gold and saree as well?”

If you thought Papa asked that sarcastically, you are wrong. Papa actually asked that out of innocence and curiosity. Whatever that was, it drew some skeptical looks from Mom and me.

The big day came…and ten thousand bucks were utilized in a matter of three hours. I dint like the lip liner, lipstick and lip gloss colors. Once out of the beautician’s area of control, I wiped off the lipstick with a handkerchief borrowed from Papa. Soon relatives and friends hovered around me, and some uttered feel-good compliments and looked at me admiringly. One of them asked Papa,’ So Anu got dressed from Ms.SK right? How much did she charge?’

Papa: (looks to the heavens)…Ten Thousand..! And Anu just wiped off a five thousand here in my handkerchief’.

Posing for the photographers, I glanced at them and got to see the peals of laughter, followed by a display of a lip-shaped red lipstick on a fresh white handkerchief.