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Saturday, June 24, 2006

I got a job!!!!!!

So this is how it feels!!!!!!!! Earning your first job, passin a real aptitude test and a real interview. Boy all those MOCK tests were really sitters compared to the real deal. The story goes like this.........

I got to the college at 840, slightly wet from the drizzle today morning. Saw the buddies of my class over there, all in formals. So was i, but i had on a different shirt as i ddnt wanna ruin my prized possession - the shirt i earned from my quiz @ Amrita TV. Had been saving it for so many days now. So there i was trying to put up a good show, so that by the end of the day, i get into WIPRO, a company that started off as a vegetable oil sales company to the multi billion dollar comporation it is now ( i knw many of u ddnt know that fact abt Wipro). Now am not sayin all this cause i got into this company and being loyal to it. Actually am very happy that i got a job and i can rely upon to it if my CAT preparations screw up big time.

So lemme continue with the recruitment process. Reached there and then went to the hall where the Pre Placement Talk(PPT) was scheduled, only to find that the projector ddn't show the image on the laptop and all my friends were trying all tricks in the bag to make it allright. Then i came in the scene, at first even i couldn't do anything. Then as they say "the magical touch" happened and ZAPP! it worked. Now i came to realise the biggest blunders i made today:
1-i ddnt take the audio out cable that was in my table(for the PPT)
2-i ddnt take the 2 photos required(considering th fact that it was me who msgd evry1 in the college to bring them)
So, i thought of all th bad times in my life and prayed to god that this day shdn't be among those. So we tried to make an audio jack in the 15-20 mins we had. Vivek went home and brought some audio jacks, now the only thing needed was the cable. Finally we made a crude arrangement and got the audio working, now the people from Wipro came and lo! they ddnt need any audio out. HOW NICE.

Now the presentation started and all went well till the slide with the salary details came up, i was quite shocked to see that for CIRCUIT branches the salary was 2.04 lakhs a year and for NON CIRCUIT(read mechanical) branches it was 1.74 lakhs a year. Now that was a not such a big issue then as i ddn't have much idea if i will get the job or not! The PPT was good, they told a lotta good things about the company and showed a lot of nice picture as well!

Now came the test! The test was of 1 hour duration and had 50 questions: 15 verbal, 15 Apti and 20 Tech. The tech part really sucked! all C++ n electronics, simply greek n latin to me. Still there were some sitters like "Wat's the name for the junk e-mail that we get??" now with my VAST experience in browsing i got the right answer as SPAM(i knw any kid wd know tht). Then there was NO NEGATIVE marking so i wrote all the questions, except 1. I did well in the verbal n apti part, but was a bit fearful abt the tech part. When i got out i heard people sayin they got 2..........3 right answers in tech, and from my count i had about 6 or 7. So i stood a good chance of gettin thru, and so i did. I got thru the test and then came the interviews.

My interview was scheduled to start at 4 PM, but i was the last person in my room, so it went on till god knws when. The last thing i will do then wd be look at my watch! By then, a good number of my classmates had cleared the tech interview and some had even got over with the HR interview. From my experiences in Stress interviews and Best manager contests that i used to frequent in my college years, i had a pretty good idea wat a HR interview will be like and knew the kind of responces that would get me the job, but then all this only if i clear the tech interview. Finally i got into the room, and was greeted with a bored figure, i too empathised with him, i can understand the plight of a person who is to go through the same routine for 10-15 times in a day. But there ended the boredom and i saw him firing questions at will and surprisingly i didn't do that great! i sucked at questions from mechanical, but i can't do anything if he asks me questions from papers that i passed with the bare minimum 40 marks! He just seemed to know those papers(i have got 3 of those so far in my BTech) and so he just asked questions one after the other. Finally he said "you don't know a thing"; i cdn't think of anything else at that time and i thought it was all gonna end then. But then he had a change of mind and asked me questions from some subjects that i know like the back of my hand, and i did better than the 1st round. Now he seemed pretty satisfied with the way i did and so he went onto ask me about some IT stuff, again i did badly and finally he got that worried look on his face. I got a beat or two off the track and still managed to look cheerful and showed interest in what all he was going to ask. He said "1 final question, tell me the algorithm to draw a line?" and i said a YES!! in my mind and felt like getting up and punchin the air as a sign of victory, but rather i found myslef takin my pen and scribbling what i had learned last semester in my CAD paper. The answer was what he expected, then he said "ok some more questions......". My mind was showing the letters "SCREWED" in multicolor across his forehead. I was thinking why does he want to play games with me again. Then he asked me about the basic features of a CAD software. I thought this chap passed out in 1995, at that time CAD was in the electives of the Kerala University Syllabus, so he wdn't know much. I told some features and then he asked me something i had never heard of! Then he tells me that he worked as the On-site engineer for a project that wipro did for AUTOCAD. How lucky for me, i thought i wd be rejected after this.

But then he said the lucky words " i am passing u onto the next level" I grabbed the form from his hands and ran down the stairs, only to meet my friends who had got there before me, some who were filling it and some who had done all that and now helping others to fill up the forms. After filling it up and pastin my photo(i always have a spare in my purse, HEE HEE)i went to the HR panel and gave my form. I was called in after 3-4 mins and had the interview with the same guy who took the PPT in the morning. He was sitting and offered me a chair. I sat and there i had 2 ppl on either side of me, one the guy whu was gonna do the interview and other this charming lady who was listening to my performance. If i had seen here somewher else, i wdn't be able to take my eyes off her, but here a job worth 15k salary was at stake, so i became the most DECENT guy in that room and answered the questions. They were one's which i was expecting; stuff like why my marks went down after i got into the college, or like what will be a mechanical engineer like me doing in a software firm like Wipro. I did pretty well, and it showed in the guys' face. I got out and was waiting outside, cracking PJ's among ourselves. Then at about 7:15 PM the list was announced, 1st the ppl frm EC, then those from Mechanical, i was just counting how many got and when i reached 8, i thought " oh god, dnt say tht i ddnt make it" and the 10th name was mine.

That's when i felt what one calls absolute euphoria. I was on the nth cloud of happiness!!

Reality hit me when the rain poured heavily as if nature was also cheering with us!

Friday, June 09, 2006

The Beautiful Game called Football!

The greatest spectacle on the face of earth is going to be unleashed in exactly 5 hours from now. The show that millions are gearing up for. The show that has more fans than anyother game in the world. From today the world will witness a shift in the issues being discussed, no longer will people notice which leader gave what starement, or how many got killed in a terrorist strike. All that would matter from today till 9th July, will be who scored, who went down and which underdog got thru to 2nd round and so on. From tommorow people in Thankappan's chayakada to some high tech board room in silicon valley will have just one issue to talk, FOOTBALL, FOOTBALL n FOOTBALL!

I was amazed when few days on way to college i saw giant boards of soccer stars put up by people living near my college. Usually they are least bothered about what's happening in the world, but their support really astonished me. That really conveyed the message that football is something that's universal and has followers from all walks of life. Football is one religion that has followers in each and every corner of the world. Coming to think of it, the caption for ESPN's World cup coverage is "duniya GOAL hai". How appropriate, the world is gonna be just goals, freekicks and corners from now on for 31 days.

All i wish to see on the 9th of july is English skipper Beckham with the golden cup in his hands. I know many will have different opinions about this, but am supportin england this time, not that they are the best, but still i think when it comes to the game, the present english team can beat any opponent. Still i am keeping my finger crossed. What all happens, in the end the deserving team will win and ther's just 31 days and 64 matches that separate us from the final. But as they say it's about the beauty and aesthetic appeal of how the matches are played. Am eagerly looking forward to some great matches and to see who are the new key players emerging from this world cup.

So IT HAS BEGUN. Hoping to see a great World cup.

Wednesday, June 07, 2006

Petrol becomes dearer !!

Am overcome with rage over each and every policy this govt makes. It's as if they are hell bent upon making the life of Ordirnary man miserable!! They say they are a govt that stands for the rights of the "AAM AADMI". But not a single move that's taken by this govt's done any good to any AADMI, let alone the AAM AADMI. The govt says the price hike is inevitable and that the international crude prices are what drives the prices high. But if we look at the prices of petrol in the countries around us, we are among the higest paying customers in the world market. Does anyone care why???

Well that's coz there are so many duties and taxes being levied upon customers like me. I still remember there used to be a sweet time when petrol was Rs 20 a ltr. Yeah frnds, ther were times like that. But now we are fools who believe that the petrol that we fill costs the Rs 50 that we pay for it.

The main reason that the govt's giving for the rise is that the international price of crude oil has reached $70 per barrel.Now lets do some calculations: From a Unit Convertor i got hold of in the net, i found that 1 barrel comes close to 159 lts. And $70 comes to Rs 3200. So that means 1 ltr comes to Rs 20. Now that's for crude and no matter how much the cost of petrol refining be it can't be 1.5 times the cost of crude. So the price of petrol should be lets assume Rs 30 per ltr(Am just assuming, coz i dnt knw wat's th refining cost).

So this means we pay about 40% of the petrol cost as TAXES!!! That's GROSS injustice, especially in a DEVELOPING country like India. We arn't a developed economy where the people can afford to pay such high taxes! The govt should cut back the tax rates or completly abolish taxing of petroleum products (i knw tht's a bit far fetched :D)

I wd surely love to have those Rs 30-35 a ltr era once again. Wat do you ppl say??

Friday, June 02, 2006

Another quota debacle

It seems that the govt is not gonna end the quota issue that easily, if we are to believe the comments from the Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment (News From CNN IBN). If her words are to be believed then it's gonna come in private sector too. Not only education they are givin jobs for free too!!

This is just as i projected in my previous post (do we need reservations). The govt is moving just like i thought. They waited till the students agitations get cooled and now they have started to make the move to halt the Indian industry which had picked up some pace due to good initiatives from the govt and the world scenario as a whole. But all this would now come to a standstill as the govt is going to put in their sweet words and say " We aren't gonna force it on anyone, but it's social responsibility".

Yeah Social responsibitlity my ASS!! They do things to make half the population suffer so that the other half is OK. Is that wat SOVEREIGN SOCIALIST SECULAR DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC means???

The preamble of THE CONSTITUTION OF INDIA says that

JUSTICE, social, economic and political;
LIBERTY of thought, expression, belief, faith and worship;
EQUALITY of status and of opportunity;

Well the 1st thng JUSTICE, i don't think anyone has heard about it being served anywhere in India, as we can hear from the numerous murder cases in which the killers are let go after years of litigation.

Then comes LIBERTY, yeah that's there in plenty. Truckloads of it, but only to policemen and to people high up in the ranks of power. Everyone saw what protesting students met with when anyone has the LIBERTY to have a demonstration, in a country that got its freedom through such peaceful and nonviolent protests. But now it seems those same leaders whoose forefathers did these agitations, turned a blind eye when students were lathicharged and protesters were gunned down with water cannons.

No one said anything about EQUALITY for a long time until this bill came up in parliament. Now it seems the people in power tried to read the constitution and just got their eyes till the PREAMBLE and already the whole country is shaking in its aftermath. But sadly they just seemed to notice this one word EQUALITY, and they are doing everything at hand to prove that they are the upholders of the CONSTITUTION.

Now if they continue in the same spirit and execute the rest of what is written in it, this would be the greatest govt that India has seen in recent years, but my instincts suggest otherwise. Now they have been in power for just 2 years and there are lotta happenigs now itself. The bills are being passed so fast that the media can't keep tabs on the proceedings of the Parliament. But the president sure reads all the bills before signing them. That's another rare feature of the present Indian administration.

If this goes on the people in power would have a free march till the next elections, in which they would say "we gave your seats you give us votes". Now the thing that they miss is that more than half this country is made up of so called unreserved GENERAL category and that if they wish all these MP's would never see the steps of parliament again. But yeah they know the public in India, the India where only the lower caste's go to cast votes because the upper echelons of society are, in their words "too educated to waste time on this". So the govt's safe on that front too.

Let's all just pray that the govt doesn't have such brainstorming ideas on other social issues also.