Foot in Mouth Disease.

"Welcome on board Sir"
"Yeah Hi. Thank you"
"What is you seat number Sir"
"Hmmm... (Flipping the boarding pass) It's 13A."
"That would be towards your left Sir."
"Yeah Sure. Thanks"

She is standing there, holding a pillow to her chest. Ear to ear smile, lots of mascara and other stuff. Eyes gleaming with all the hospitality that can ever exist in a pair of eyes.

"Welcome Sir."
Nod in approval.

"Amm! You have a yellow spot on your shirt (points towards his left shoulder). You might have spilled something on it; pickle or something with turmeric maybe." Looking at her expecting probably a thank you.

Change of expression to a bad one.
Change of expression again to a good one.
"Oh this (removing that pillow)! This is our logo (SpiceJet)."

Damn why did I not notice this before? Was it necessary to be my usual self? What a noble git I am!
Sheepish Smile. "I am sorry I didn't notice this before, first time with Spice"
"Well that fine Sir. Which seat Sir."
"Well I guess you will have to move. Mine is 13 A."
All smiles. "Oh Yes, this is 13A. Sure Sir."

Okay this doesn't happen that often.

An emergency for just that one time!

I am not a sadist. No never been a masochist; never been in the likes of those like Al-Quieda.

But then sometimes, like those times when you get thoughts, because your dreams weigh down upon you, the aspiration for that one moment where you could do that one thing which in usual way of the world you wouldn’t be allowed to do, that one moment of being everybody’s hero; for that one chance of being that one being who could twitch that muscle just when needed never more; and so many of those other just one times.

So it wasn’t usual.

I boarded my flight from Bangalore to Hyderabad. I always take the window seat. The excitement when you can hear the roar of the engines when the pilot puts the thrust to 100% or when the flaps and slats deploy or when the air brakes are deployed is just too big to explain in words; and also that there are just too many people wanting to visit the loo when the whole flight time is itself 45 minutes.

So when I was given my seat though it really didn’t make much of a difference on the boarding pass, but in the aircraft it made all the difference in the world that it could ever make. The seat was as usual a window sear but also happened to be next to the emergency exits on the wings. Now that is a very good place to sit and fly. The seats here provide with the most real estate when it comes to leg room.

So as the Captain welcomed us on-board one of the cabin crew members approached us to explain how to open the emergency exits and that if we feel that we are not competent or comfortable in doing it we can ask for a change in seat. But all these instructions to open the emergency exit came with a rider “DO NOT TOUCH THEM UNLESS THE CABIN CREW YELLS AT YOU FOR DOING SO”. Message registered.

I then so badly wanted some kind of an emergency to happen so that I can just for once operate that.

It is not that simple. The urge to just for once open that emergency door, throw it, let the slides deploy and jump to slide on it. Well not a very noble, “And for the world piece” (hmm sorry peace) kind of a thought. I cannot agree no more. But I never want it to go into an emergency while in flight that is catastrophic. What I really wanted is like, when we touch the tarmac, the main exits would for some reason be jammed and fail to open, for some strange reason the cabin pressurization system would fail, or the lights would go off, something like a failure of Level C software on board. It is an emergency in the sense that the emergency exits have to be opened but at the same time is not catastrophic. No one needs to die. No one even really needs to cry too. All for the sake of that just one time opportunity!

The deam Interview

No matter how many years one has had been in the industry, no matter how many interviews he/she has braved, no matter how many interviews he/she has had taken; it still is a war of that one last breath of peace when it comes to giving an interview.

One of my acquaintances recently had to attend an interview and he had more than 10 years of experience. So when I was visiting him last week, I had to mock the interview panel as questions for his preparation. And all this time during the mock interview he was with his two year old son, trying make him sleep. Well that the best way to prepare for an interview while being under extreme stress. If you can live this you can survive any!

Now that he is geologist and the only thing I know about geology is the way it is spelled most of my questions were “What are your X strengths and weaknesses? Why do you think we should hire you? What makes you stand out from the other N people who have applied?”

More of the HR kind of questions; the only technical question I could ask was “What were your key learnings from the last job? What was the thing in the last job that you think were big, challenging both technically and resource wise and how did you solve then?”

Now that was something. Having been trained in “Interviewing skills” and “Enhanced interviewing skills” and given that I haven’t selected any of the candidates in so many interviews I have taken, and recommending background check for almost all the panel recommended for the next round of interview, I had my own comments on the answers.

Don’t say or stress on “I and hardworking, sincere. Blah Blah. These are all universal truths from any interview candidate. Try to build on your experience, how this varied experience makes you stand out from the crowd. Whatever your weaknesses, they should be the ones on which can work upon and if not then either you should not tell them or mask them as the ones which also work as your strengths.”

So the organization where he had the interview was the one in which his father had worked from the first day to the last day of his entire career. So invariably everybody, the higher ups, in particular knew the candidate, and knew just no casually but personally.

When the day of interview came, the panel had people, who were known to him since childhood, were a distant relative, or had known his cousins. Now that is what I call as a perfect interview panel. Even before you are bombarded with questions you are already comfortable. One of the many must things taught to me in my trainings “Interviews are tests, and like all tests this too makes the candidate envious. Try to make the candidate comfortable. When the candidate is nervous he/she won’t give his best shot.”

Best shot. I think here the candidate was playing on his home ground in front of his home crowd.

So the interview started. “How is your mom? How is your father?” And then the technical questions started.

Now isn’t that a dream interview?? And a scary one too, all those people who know you so well will get an insight on how deep or shallow your understanding of the subject is?

Between the Dollar and the Rupee Tussle

Okay so the Indian currency the Rupee hit an all time high against the overly popular and transacted US currency The Dollar.

While most of the news channels wreaked havoc on the TV with their 24 hour sympathies with the IT companies as appreciated rupee would mean lesser profits; the nicely suited gurus of stock market, who incidentally were never wise when I decided to take their advice prophesied the loss in share price of these major, minor, and still in incubator listed companies, I was already seeing the road ahead. Not the nicely tarred road ahead but the one with drain and rain water all over it which for some reason of perfection fails to hide some of those numerous potholes.


So I was visiting my friend who works in this big IT Company and was surprised to see that what I foresaw was actually not that far!

As the rupee appreciated:

- There was more water in the coffee decoction in the vending machine;

- There was more water in the milk in the vending machine;

- The all time available juices in the canteen disappeared;

- The floor temperature, which I was informed was usually comfortable 22 degrees, was not well beyond 24 degrees;

- Even the liquid soap in the restrooms had more liquid properties than water itself;

- The paper towels, the newer ones, have so much quality inbuilt into it that you cannot pull out one in one piece from the dispenser. The towel dispenser incidentally has “Eco Friendly” plastered on it. Yeah! Why cut trees, use that square inch of towel.

- The lifts, one overly gregarious person told me, are now mostly out of order.


Of all the things what is more worrisome is the coffee. I mean most of the IT guys when they reach office search for one thing, even before booting or logging into their systems, which is, what else, COFFEE!!!!

I am sure the ILO (International Labour Organization) has the right to perfect coffee as one of the basic rights of the IT employees which if you prioritize comes before equal opportunities.