Kosu Tholla...

Four days of rest and relaxation at home (not to mention made-by-Amma food) is a bane. No, I haven’t become any fatter (in fact, becoming a little plumper would make me extremely happy). It is a bane because at the end of four days, I have got to return to this city which is very similar in climate to Coimbatore, but horrible in terms of water, food and most importantly traffic. But return I did and stuck I got at work. And it does not help that I have a teamie who can’t see through a prank and escalate it to all managers (yes, I have multiple managers… sob, sob). It is certainly not easy for a small (read: shummall) girl to handle all this. I just turned 24 for crying out loud.

Just when you think it can’t get any worse, life bowls yet another one of its bouncers (IPL effect, you see) and says I will have attend a training from 10am to 7pm everyday for two weeks and then do the support activities from 7pm to 10pm. WTF!!! And any training is bound to put you to sleep. Don’t you lie to me that you have always been awake during any training you have attended! No? Not even during the post-lunch sessions? Then you are either a compulsive liar or an alien. Now is a post-lunch session and I am terribly sleepy.

I haven’t read a book in months, I haven’t read the newspaper in 3 days now and I don’t have time for anything besides work. It sounds nothing like me. I have always been the person that gives more importance to personal life than work. My priorities were and are and will be this way for the rest of my life. But I have to go through this for the next couple of weeks and I will have to put up with. There might not be further updates in this space until May. I hate me for quarantining myself from the outside world. I hate this job. I hate my work. I hate myself now!

My teamie (who I disgustedly call “kosu”) is getting on my nerves and is hell-bent on getting everything from high priority issues to pranks I play to his digestive disorders escalated to equally incompetent managers (when have we ever accepted that managers are competent?). He manages to piss me off and irritate me and make me want to pull the hair out of my head – ALL AT THE SAME TIME. Now I understand why Goundamani said his infamous dialogue “Indha kosu thollai thaanga mudila da Narayana… Marundhu adichu kollungada idha” – the same dialogue that I have been using for quite some time now and had mentioned the English translation in my previous post. As I am writing this now, kosu is showing off in front of everyone how resourceful he is by running up 4 floors to get different color markers for our trainer. Hold on a sec… that is the job of the Admin/House-keeping department staff.

Before exiting the door, he asked, “Do you need anything else?”

I couldn’t stop myself from saying, “Some coffee, perhaps?” And everyone (including the trainer) burst out laughing.

What pleasure he gets out of asking questions that in our domain are as dumb as, “How is 1+1 2 and not 11?” (The same dumb question multiple times and still not understand…) beats me! I have heard God helps those who help themselves. That explains my need for all the Tortoise/Mortein/Good Night/All Out. Hayyo Hayyo!!!

Fell in Love - Part 2

It is the one place on earth that is close to my heart. It is a place that has seen it all – my happiness, my craziness, my sorrows, my confusions, my stupidity, my anguish, my fears, my adventures, everything. It is the place where I was born and brought up, the place that has taught me to be talkative, a place that has offered my solace when I was depressed, and confidence when I was confused. Coimbatore. I know I have written so many posts about MY city but still I can’t help but write more as I find myself loving it more and more by the day.

• It is a place which is surrounded by mountains and is a treat to watch during the rainy season. And when it rains, it doesn’t rain like it does in Chennai where in November and December somebody from upstairs is pouring down buckets and buckets of water for over 3 days continuously resulting in flooding - rain water + sewage water + urine + spit mucous (ewwww). In Coimbatore, it drizzles ever so lightly, not even enough to get you wet. When it does rain heavily, it doesn’t last for more than 2hours, 4 at max. And some summer showers bring in small pieces of ice which we used to collect in jugs as children.
• It is a place where people are so warm and friendly and treat you with respect. Oh and the language – it is so sweet to hear. No wonder I am a lot more talkative when at Coimbatore. I just talk so that the other person would respond in that wonderful slang and I would keep listening. I am just used to addressing my Amma in singular (without the ‘nga’ in after each verb, or in cases after each word), I address my neighbors with full respect – so it is not “Illa, aunty”; it is “Illeenga, aunty”. Otherwise, it is considered rude.
• The city is a paradise to trekkers. It is at the foothills of the Western Ghats, what did you expect? There are a lot of different treks for trekkers of different stamina and skill.
• The water in the city is among the tastiest in the world. The Siruvani river flows through the forests where a lot of Amla trees exist and since the water touches the roots of these trees while flowing, it tastes super-good. I have seen the water flowing in small streams and it is so pure that you can see the sand and pebbles underneath it very clearly. And that water tasted great.
• The people of this city have unique, unmatchable sarcastic streak. The ‘Coimbatore Kusumbu’ and my talkative nature have combined together a lot of times and made me speak and gotten me into trouble big time. But I am proud of my kusumbu!!! :-)

All these reasons apart, Coimbatore is so good for me because it is HOME to me. That is what it is – HOME :-)