Tuesday, October 28, 2008

It is a small world after all!



It was a nice lovely morning; 29th Sep 08. All of the ES (Enterprize Solutions) folks living in Chicago Area had gathered for a Cruise party at the Wacker Drive in Downtown. Since Navin is part of ES group, we got to participate in the boat ride along with the other ES folks.

All people were very friendly and warm. Never did I know that one of my team mates who was supposed to join my team beginning the following day was also at the location. I knew Anubhav Srivastava was part of ES group, but I was not aware that he was from Chicago too. Or else, I would have tried to look out for the new face amongst the huge crowd of 75 odd people and get introduced ahead of time. Anyways! ES party was a good fun time and we all headed back home.

Next day, at work I was introduced to Anubhav. As we were talking, we realized that we had been to the same cruise a day earlier and must have looked at each other or even got introduced. But neither of us recollected clearly.

At work, Anubhav was sitting next to my desk. Navin happened to call me and we started talking in Konkani over the phone. The language sounded familiar, and Anubhav asked, 'was that marathi?' When I told him I am from Goa and we were speaking Konkani, Anubhav mentioned that he had spent two years during his higher secondary in Goa and knows Konkani too. Interesting! So now, we both knew we had a common language to talk, specially as a code language at work; in case we need in future ;)

What year did you graduate, was our next question. 1997 12th Std! Oh, I finished HSSC the same year. Now, we were both very excited. Meeting someone from your place (even though he lived there for short period), moreover when you are in a foreign land, is a different feeling all togather. Goa is such a small place and I was sure if not me, some of my friends or relatives may know him. Thats what happens in Goa!

He told me that he was living in Bicholim. Bicholim, now that is not very far from Mapusa; the place where I lived in Goa. Ah, north Goa, so now we have more common things to talk about. My immediate question was, which college? There can be some chance he studied in St. Xaviers because Bicholim is not very far from there. But he said, he studied in Bicholim itself. Hmm, Ok I thought. 'But I travelled to Mapusa for XII class tuitions? Ahh! Now, there were fixed set of coaching classes in Mapusa where almost entire XII class in the college used to take.

We started listing down some of our tuition teachers and like we guessed, we had been going to the same coaching classes! My my, I meet someone from Goa and then he happens to be in the same place where I was many many years ago! We even matched the class timings. :) What a coincidence and yeh, such a small world.

Now, what else can be common. We had had enough of shooting questions at each other and getting amazingly sync responses! I gave it another go; I could not resist. Since he was from Bicholim, I was sure he knew one of my friends in Bicholim; one - since he was from same batch as mine and must have gone to same college and secondly - Jayesh I was sure must have been famous in his hometown :P. No particular reasons for his popularity, if you get to meet him, you will just know!

And Ola! How could he not know Jayesh, who apparently was one of his best buddies. He told me Jayesh is currently in the US and he speaks to him very often. Wow, now that was cool, isn't it? Jayesh is also my good friend and we are from a common college group.

And that was one of the last links we shared. I am so glad, I came across another new friend and coincidently we had lots to talk and that too in Konkani.

We both had one thing in our minds that day! This world is a small place and you never know whom you will come across the next minute; most of times you will be happy to know the unknown faces.

Tuesday, October 21, 2008

An old story - Tie ki Story

Hi,

Been a while I posted something... I will very soon... have a few incidences in mind. Till then I thought I will share an interesting old story with everyone. I hope you enjoy it!


Dated Aug-25-2007

I cannot stop myself from sharing a funny incidence from all of you which neither Navin nor I will forget...atleast for sometime.
Yesterday, I was free from office pretty early... so thought will get myself some clothes that fit!!! :) I went to Pantaloons, one of the very few options we have here in Mangalore. Shopping was not at all enjoyable; with me having to try out 2 size bigger clothes all the time:'(. Well, lets not go there. Let me tell you the actual kissa.
I was almost done, when i thought.. Navin ke liye bhi kuch leti hoon.Kya le.. hmm... itna kharcha ho gaya already... hmm... kuch offer hain kya.. .aise sochte sochte I decided, I will buy him a TIE! Few days back we were trying to figure out which tie would go on a shirt he was wearing and nothing from the collection that he had matched!!! He needed a solid color, probably navy colored tie.


So here I was trying to find a navy solid colored tie in the store.
I went to the tie section, and there were plenty on sale. Some Allen Solly offer, buy one get one and many more too. But I just couldn't find a solid navy! Ok i thgt, I shall settle with any solid color, but none were good enuf...others too expensive ;-)Finally I got hold of a sales represen to help me search one. Bahot dhoondhne ke baad he came to me with one. A silky, navy, solid colored tie. I looked at the price tag... 249. Ah.. perfect :-)!


I was already tired with all the trying out of clothes, re-trying out more, earlier.I went to the counter and the guy at the counter started scanning each item. Hey the tie does not have a tag. He enquired with some people in the stores. He was checking 2-3 tiems. kitna discount hain.. 20% off? 30% off? I was like. itna kya hain... tie ke liye. 20 ya 30 kuch bhi dalo... jaldi.. i want to go. Quickly I did the payment and took an auto home.

Later, at home, Navin and I sat to see what all I had bought. I somehow managed to hide the bill from Navin. Usko pata nahi lagna chahiye uska tie kitne ka hain aur mere kapde kitne ke! Then showed him the tie. His first reaction - Ah... silk one... nice one... Must be expensive. I said its OK :-) Just for you :-P (Mann main socha...249.. not bad)But he insisted to see the bill. To our amazement, we saw one item marked as 2490 Rs!!! What the hell was that? My jeans? Or oh.. yes.Probably the skirt...it had a 50% discount. But then why did they not reduce the price by half? I just could not understand! Man. 2500 ka fhatka.. lekin kispe?
We matched the bar code for every item we had,one by one. Nope. None of the things I owned. To phir??? One last item. The silky navy solid colored tie!!! There was no tag to that tie:( even when I bought it. That TIE costs us 2500??? Navin, pls pinch me. Navin ne socha rahega.. pinch?? ek lafaa de deta hoon. We are like... Dude, do u really want that tie? But they don't take the sold items back.

Now what? Is it really worth 2500? Meri jeans se bhi mehenga??? Ok.. a nice tie but itna..! Kya tie itne mehenge hote hain kya... I had never bought one. Navin is like... haan hote hain.. lekin mujhe nahi lagta Infy main koi aise pehenta hain. Shayad Bangalore Infy main pehente honge.. :P hahaha Tears rolled down my eyes... mera saman tere se sastaa! ahh. :-)Phir maine khud ko bahot samjaya. Finally I said, Navin, you can keep the tie... 2500, thik hain... 60 dollars hi to hain. No problem. Then bahot nautanki ke baad we decided, that I should go back and try returning the tie.

So today, i somehow dragged myself to Pantaloons. Yesterday I had already made a scene there. Scene mhanje.. HMM Ok.. Ok.. I'll tell...when going into these shops, if you have any hand bag you need to keep it at the entrance itself and the gaurds will give you a token inreturn which u use when taking your stuff back. Now, what happened was... I took the token and lost it when I was going around in the shop. :( and that idiot gaurd was not ready to return my stuff without the token! I somehow managed to get my bag back :(!

So many people already knew me at the stores from yesterday's incidence. Abhi bolenge.. aa gayi madam. Kapde wapas karne? mehenga tha? To liya kyon? Abhi akhdenge. But I was ready to give a shot.
Now, this time too I met the same gaurd and this guy was not ready to take the bag inside! haha. God.. help me. It was raining and I had wrapped the clothes in 2 plastic covers and did not want to open it there at the entrance. What if the clothes get wet... and what if they don't take it back, though I knew they would never take it back! anyways. I wanted to finish the whole exercise ASAP!

I went to the counter. I said... I had come here last evening. Ibought one tie... it costs 2500! I read the price as 250 odd. The tag was not clear. I don't understand. How could you put 2500 in my bill? Baazi unpe i thought ;-) The guys at customer service also looked confused. They entered the bar code from the bill into their system.'Madam, we are sorry. actually the bar code entered was of a suit!'WHAT!!!?

So all the tears, and sleepless night that I had? All thetrouble of going back to their store? Was cos of a mistake by YOU guys!??? Now I was raged, I want my money back. OK OK We will pay youthe amount in cash was what I could hear :-) :-) :-) The tie cost me 230 something.

I came back to office and told Navin. Abhi yeh useless bolta hain 2000 ki treat chahiye! Thode log pet se hi sochte hain ;-)Anyways. Happy to end this incidence here.

So...........? Abhi sablog suno. ALWAYS check your bills when you go to buy anything. And don't laugh at people when they do that. A smarter Shreya would have never let her husband know that she later got the money back and the tie was never 2500!

Would have been a real scene to see Navin wear the tie proudly showing off...thinking it is still 2500 :-). Will share a picture of Navin with the tie anyways ;)