Five months in Chennai just flew by, albeit at the pace of a kiwi with one wing strapped behind its back. The final few days in Chennai were quite eventful, with me and my team having to toil in order to meet the deadline for a project. Add to that, the excitement of moving to a new place and it felt like 24 hours in a day were not enough.
The new place in question is Pune, which will now be the hub of my blogging activities. I’ve not been able to explore the place so far, but the signs are good and maybe I’ll start liking this city. Of course, the one thing that I’ve learned in my first few days is that the transport system in Pune… err… sucks. Compared to Chennai which had connectivity to almost every nearby suburb by means of local trains, over here you have to rely on the 6-seater rickshaws and the ST buses. And you need to wait for them for a long time. Depending on your luck, it could be a while before you manage to get a ride. Of course, the situation might be different in the city. I don’t want to check it for myself, though.
It’s been raining/drizzling (delete according to time of day) ever since I’ve arrived here, which is in start contrast to the sweltering heat of Chennai. My office, being located on the outskirts of the city, has a scenic view of the mountains. I just hope I don’t end up spending hours looking through the window rather than staring at my monitor. More on that when I get my workstation.
That’s it, then. I’ll be spending the weekend getting my house in order and learning about the route to my office. And once that’s done, work awaits me on Monday. Cheers, and have a great weekend, fellas! 
What does a bored man do when he finally gets some time for himself? He blogs.
Well in my case, I tend to save myself the trouble of writing something and instead, when I have some free time I fiddle with the blog’s theme. Call it stupid if you like, but that’s the way it goes for me. A lazy Saturday made even lazier by the doctor’s pills was spent in searching for a new look for my blog. At least it will remove the cobwebs, if not shoo away the spiders from my site. The 8 legged creatures will be back soon as I’ll inevitably go back to my busy life.
Speaking of life, there’s been a sort of revolution. Gone are the days when I moseyed over to the office after waking up just in time. Now I need to wake up at least 2 hours before I’m expected at my workplace, thanks to my new abode. Yes, I’ve finally moved closer to the city and closer to civilization. And although I have joined the horde of commuters who travel… actually, they just stuff themselves into the local train and hope that merciful Lord will somehow push them out of the tin when they reach their destination. It’s a small price to pay for the convenience that you get by staying closer to the city. For one, you won’t die of hunger. Ever. There’s always some or the other eatery that’s open for a Sunday dinner.
Ah, dinner. That reminds me of the beans that I cooked (burnt would be a better word) today. Yup, yours truly is now trying his hand at cooking food. Don’t laugh or I’ll shove a spoonful into your mouth. Safe to say, I won’t be assisting Sanjeev Kapoor on his show any time in the near future. But at least I can survive for a few days even if all restaurants go on an indefinite strike.
Okay, I think that should be enough for today. After a month, I’ve finally managed to clear the cobwebs from my site and make a blog post. That should set me up for about 2 weeks of busy-ness (is that a word?). And lest I forget, I also need to write an article for The Final 3rd. Don’t want that site to become a carbon copy of mine, crying out for attention while weeping in a corner.
Is this little mini-series turning out to be some sort of weekly soap? I hope not, because then I’ll have to down shutters and move to the mountains to regain my sanity!
I hoped that I wouldn’t crib about the weather again and my prayers seem to have been answered by The Almighty. The city of Chennai (or in my case, the outskirts of Chennai) have been receiving rain showers daily since the past 3 days. I would be lying if I said that I was expecting rains here at this time of the year. One of my friends actually expressed his amazement at this natural phenomenon thus – “Bloody hell! It rains in these parts too?”. We made it a point never to curse the rain Gods ever again.
Meanwhile, I had another misadventure with a Hindi+English-illiterate shopkeeper. I wanted a 500ml bottle of Sprite and if that wasn’t available I was willing to settle for a baby bottle of LMN. My attempts at guiding the grocer to the goods using a combination of hand gestures plus broken English bore no fruit. Finally I had to use the linked-list concept of ‘next->next->element found’ to get what I wanted. I left with a cold drink and a hot head.
Another curious incident that occurred last week was when me and my friends went out to dinner. In order to avoid any conflicts, we go Dutch as a rule. I was bored of the usual stuff, so I ordered a Paneer dish. At times like these, it’s easy to make assumptions about the price and I dismissed it as a non-issue since I considered myself to be a regular at this particular restaurant, fully acquainted with the pricing structure. Dinner was served and midway through the dining I realized that my order was beyond the capacity of my tummy. There was no way I could finish it. None of my friends were willing to lend a spoon/fork/handful since they had already filled up their tanks. Leaving the plate half-full (optimism, you see) was the only option. As I walked up to pay the bill, I was shocked to find that my ‘for-a-change’ dinner cost double of what I usually spend on a meal. I turned back and saw my (still) half-full plate being carried away by the waiter, the contents laughing and sticking out their collective tongues at me.
“Hey! Bring it back! I’m not done yet!!”, I almost shouted.
So that was the week that was. Next week has already begun and that means more trips to the coffee machine and if the weather stays pleasant, maybe I’ll get to visit the real Chennai too! 
The past week just flew by and before I could make sense of it all, it’s Saturday already. Learning from my past mistakes, I spent the afternoon in the confines of my office, shielded from the 3PM heat. I had never imagined that writing PL/SQL code could be so relaxing.
I spent the week pondering about my second tutorial regarding Firefox. I’ll probably work on it tomorrow, since I’ve got nothing lined up for Sunday. The first one is here, if you’re wondering.
Okay, since this was a pretty uneventful week I’ve got nothing more to crib about. I’ll keep myself busy on Sunday by working on that little tutorial and cursing the heat again.
Here’s hoping my next post won’t be full of whinging and whining. 
You all love weekends, don’t you? I used to love them too, once upon a time. Here in Chennai, I wish weekends would be wiped off the calendar for good, to be replaced by 2 more working days.
“Why?”, you ask. So lemme tell you, I live in a God-forsaken place where I’d be lucky to find a restaurant open on Sundays. Saturdays are comparatively better, since most food joints in this area are open. Now this may or may not apply to Chennai ‘city’, so don’t get too wound up. However, the heat is still terrible. Apparently the Sun doesn’t do us any favours on weekends. The heat just makes me wish I could run away to the office and spend the day in the air-conditioned rooms.
So yes, we don’t have an air-conditioner in my room. In any other place, this wouldn’t be a big deal. But when I mentioned this to a friend of mine who was brought up in Chennai, she was shocked. Not having an AC in this city is equivalent to a death-wish, it seems. Still, I shall brave the weather and try to survive the 2×4=8 days of a month or two, somehow. After all, I’ll probably be posted at some place other than Chennai after training is over, right?
Right?
Right??
I’m in Chennai. And it’s raining. Yes, real drops of watery goodness sent from the clouds above. Never mind that this is happening because of the cyclone ‘Laila’ which would have hit the coastal regions of south India by the time you read this.
At the risk of schadenfreude, I must say that at least it’s better than getting cooked in the scorching May heat. The 5 minute walk from my house to the office seems like a marathon thanks to the ‘default’ Chennai weather. But like most things in life, the bad inevitably followed the good. My bed was the first one to suffer, getting drenched in rainwater leaking from a wall socket while I slept. The poor mattress is currently being kept under the intensive care of a table fan. And the mattress didn’t go for a dip alone. It took 2 of my bedsheets along, colouring them violet in the process. The worst part? I had changed the sheets right before I went to sleep that night.
For now, the weather is quite pleasant and I know it won’t last long. But anything’s better than having to suffer at the hands of the dreaded Chennai weather.
Hey there! Long time, huh?
I moved to Chennai a couple of weeks ago and since then my life has become more hectic, faster and busier than ever. Priorities have changed and a lot of things have had to be reorganized. That leaves little time for posting here. Still, I’ll have something to say every now and then.
My experiences in this new city and a lot more will soon follow.