Perpetual Deja Vu

Beep. Beep. Beep. That was the alarm of my cellfone. Unfortunately, it never serves the purpose. Its the stupid sunlight that does it. Whats more disturbing than having sunlight all over your face at 7:30 am? This is how my remarkable day starts.

I am a newborn in the ever expanding IT industry. Its the usual 9 to 6 routine for me. The moolah is good and lets face it, I kinda enjoy the work too. But hey! its not like I meet Beyonce everyday at work, hence the gloomy face every morning.
Office is a warehouse, refurbished into a corporate workplace. Surrounded by a Soap Factory, the feeling of being besieged by chemicals takes over as soon as you step out of the front door. Not to forget the flyers saying 'Caution', 'Danger', etc. which further heighten the thrill. I ain't complaining. In fact, I somehow feel the surrounding is contributing to the increased productivity of our Delivery Unit(DU).

Inside the facility, it’s a closely knit beehive. We are a big family of 100+ striving towards a single goal, keep the project going. And we are getting exceedingly efficient at it. The project is with us till eternity now. The workload is quite bearable, we get a decent bonus, parties and outings have ultrasonic frequency. All in all, its pretty overwhelming. Life's Good.

Its like an unwritten law, the first place to go after you reach office is the Cafeteria. By the time you are done with breakfast and discussing the match last night, the small hand of the watch reaches 10. The next big hurdle is getting into the Client VPN. Believe me, it might be easier to log into a CIA database than to enter our Client's network. If you have an average memory, you might actually have to maintain a file that contains the list of innumerable pass codes, required to log onto various networks and databases. So once you are done sweating over the Login process you are required to take a much needed break. And whats better than listening to some music for a break.

One of the most important tasks of an IT professional is checking e-mails. E-mails are the single-point source for News, entertainment, scores, eye-candy and ya, sometimes Project related matter too. But office hours are not just a bed of roses. There is a very high probability that you might have to actually work on some issue. You are assigned to an issue and finally when you are done cursing the villain who raised the issue, its already time for lunch. The chances that you meet the villain at lunch are also very high, since the cafeteria is smaller than a box.

Post-lunch is the time when you have to work on the issue, but you have the two most soporific hinderances; the food in your tummy and the workload of the issue at hand. Somehow you manage to decipher the issue and the sense of accomplishment makes you ecstatic. Time to enjoy the accomplishment with your friends over a cup of coffee....or 3 cups maybe. The coffee gets rid of the sleep but what about the desire to work. Its almost 5:00, how can any normal person work after 5:00? But the issue is still not resolved! Where there is a will, there is a way. Here, the way out is called 'Transition Document'. Just send a mail to the onsite team, transitioning the residue work. Even though you are absolutely sure that it would be transitioned back to you tomorrow (without any further development), still, the optimistic voice inside you ignores this fact. Unless you have meeting with the onsite team, you are done for the day. There you go, wasn't that difficult, was it?

That was my normal weekday schedule. In a nutshell, my daily activities are not as dull as the US Marines serving in Iraq and not as colorful as Richard Branson's life.