The Butterfly Diaries 02- The Reptile House
What is the difference between a reptile house and a software development block? In a reptile house, the outside walls are opaque, and the individual enclosures are transparent. In a software block on the other hand, the outside walls are made of glass and the partitions between software engineer cubicles are opaque. That was the first impression I got of what was going to be my first ever office.
And yes. There was one more difference. The reptile houses were the only houses the reptiles had. We software engineers however had to have other houses as well to keep our belongings and to sleep in. And the important business during the weekend was to find these other houses. For right at the stroke of midday on Sunday, our 5-star hotel dream stay would come to an end. If we didn’t find a house before then, we would be on the streets. With the snakes and the crocodiles. And of course, the ubiquitous stray dogs.
But to the company’s credit, they did not leave us out in the cold. At their own cost they arranged a broker to tow us around the city in vans to see houses. It was here that we got our first glimpse of what a corporate rat race felt like. Everyone was grabbing houses left, right and center all around us like snakes gobbling frogs. At this rate, it looked as if we would end up homeless. I was gripped by anxiety and at the next stop, I blurted out those three little words before anyone else could – “We’ll take it”. If my two friends who had signed up to share quarters with me were surprised at this sudden burst of decisiveness on my part, they did not show it. So, this would be our house.
The rent was high enough; the advance took the cake – ten whole months’ rent – amounting close to five or six times our take-home salary. The fact that there were three of us helped. But still the amount was too high, and we needed to find a fourth person. So, we started doing what we had learnt from our worthy political leaders – horse trading – targeting vulnerable members from other groups to make up the missing number. We found one South Indian sticking out like a sore thumb amongst his North Indian friends. So, we set our Telugu friend after him to dangle their shared Telugu identity as bait to hook him. And he fell for it. And thus, our fellowship of the rented house was complete.
But that was by no means the end of the story. We were allowed to occupy the house on Sunday but before Wednesday we had to cough up the dough. There were frantic SOS calls to parents in Nagpur, Trivandrum, Hyderabad and Tirupathi for funds. While it was just the money that arrived from the first three cities, along with our new friend’s share of the money came the parent herself, determined to grab maximum resources for her ‘momma’s little boy’ – 50% of the living space, 75% of the clothesline, 60% of the storage space etc.
It was only when we stepped into the house that we realized a rented house was no hotel room. There were no beds, pillows, clotheslines, buckets, mugs, or any of the other household amenities we had come to take for granted in our parental homes. So, we had to procure all these items. On our first night at the house, we just ended up coiling ourselves on the bare floor like pythons after a full meal.
And talking of meals, only after moving in did it dawn on us that we had missed an important criterion while selecting the locality – there were no good eateries nearby. The nearest hotel or mess could be reached only by catching a bus. None of us had culinary skills to set up a kitchen at home. Nor would we have had the time even if we could cook, for the grueling training program kicked off that very Monday. On top of that was an hour’s commute each way, since the office was on the outskirts. And while Chennai was no Bangalore, nor the 2000s anything like the 2020s, the traffic was still something.
As if to foreshadow things to come, I started my first working Monday morning clearing the bathroom drain, for by the time I went for my shower, the drain had got clogged and water had started to pool. And getting ready for office was not like getting ready for classes at college where we just turned up right out of bed in T-shirt, jeans and bathroom slippers with uncombed hair and a three-day stubble. But a services business wasn’t college. Here, we were expected to turn up as suited-booted professionals in front of foreign clients. The company meant to train us for the show right from day one. We had to come to work clean-shaven, in business formals complete with a knotted “rep-tail” around our necks. So, one can imagine the time it would take to get ready.
Hm... and here I had been thinking I had taken the easy way out by opting to take a local IT job instead of the tougher foreign MS. It seemed like in life there ain’t no such thing as a free lunch. There was a free dinner though. The company provided one for those who stayed late to work, which we did on most days during the training.
And yes. There was one more difference. The reptile houses were the only houses the reptiles had. We software engineers however had to have other houses as well to keep our belongings and to sleep in. And the important business during the weekend was to find these other houses. For right at the stroke of midday on Sunday, our 5-star hotel dream stay would come to an end. If we didn’t find a house before then, we would be on the streets. With the snakes and the crocodiles. And of course, the ubiquitous stray dogs.
But to the company’s credit, they did not leave us out in the cold. At their own cost they arranged a broker to tow us around the city in vans to see houses. It was here that we got our first glimpse of what a corporate rat race felt like. Everyone was grabbing houses left, right and center all around us like snakes gobbling frogs. At this rate, it looked as if we would end up homeless. I was gripped by anxiety and at the next stop, I blurted out those three little words before anyone else could – “We’ll take it”. If my two friends who had signed up to share quarters with me were surprised at this sudden burst of decisiveness on my part, they did not show it. So, this would be our house.
The rent was high enough; the advance took the cake – ten whole months’ rent – amounting close to five or six times our take-home salary. The fact that there were three of us helped. But still the amount was too high, and we needed to find a fourth person. So, we started doing what we had learnt from our worthy political leaders – horse trading – targeting vulnerable members from other groups to make up the missing number. We found one South Indian sticking out like a sore thumb amongst his North Indian friends. So, we set our Telugu friend after him to dangle their shared Telugu identity as bait to hook him. And he fell for it. And thus, our fellowship of the rented house was complete.
But that was by no means the end of the story. We were allowed to occupy the house on Sunday but before Wednesday we had to cough up the dough. There were frantic SOS calls to parents in Nagpur, Trivandrum, Hyderabad and Tirupathi for funds. While it was just the money that arrived from the first three cities, along with our new friend’s share of the money came the parent herself, determined to grab maximum resources for her ‘momma’s little boy’ – 50% of the living space, 75% of the clothesline, 60% of the storage space etc.
It was only when we stepped into the house that we realized a rented house was no hotel room. There were no beds, pillows, clotheslines, buckets, mugs, or any of the other household amenities we had come to take for granted in our parental homes. So, we had to procure all these items. On our first night at the house, we just ended up coiling ourselves on the bare floor like pythons after a full meal.
And talking of meals, only after moving in did it dawn on us that we had missed an important criterion while selecting the locality – there were no good eateries nearby. The nearest hotel or mess could be reached only by catching a bus. None of us had culinary skills to set up a kitchen at home. Nor would we have had the time even if we could cook, for the grueling training program kicked off that very Monday. On top of that was an hour’s commute each way, since the office was on the outskirts. And while Chennai was no Bangalore, nor the 2000s anything like the 2020s, the traffic was still something.
As if to foreshadow things to come, I started my first working Monday morning clearing the bathroom drain, for by the time I went for my shower, the drain had got clogged and water had started to pool. And getting ready for office was not like getting ready for classes at college where we just turned up right out of bed in T-shirt, jeans and bathroom slippers with uncombed hair and a three-day stubble. But a services business wasn’t college. Here, we were expected to turn up as suited-booted professionals in front of foreign clients. The company meant to train us for the show right from day one. We had to come to work clean-shaven, in business formals complete with a knotted “rep-tail” around our necks. So, one can imagine the time it would take to get ready.
Hm... and here I had been thinking I had taken the easy way out by opting to take a local IT job instead of the tougher foreign MS. It seemed like in life there ain’t no such thing as a free lunch. There was a free dinner though. The company provided one for those who stayed late to work, which we did on most days during the training.
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