An Year Gone by at Chennai
The Beginning of Last November, saw me pack my bags, and head out to the land of anna’s and kutti’s. Chennai. It was hard bidding goodbye to Manipal, and it remains the one place I always want to go back to. Who knew that fate would bring me back to the place, where I grew from a kid to an young adult. Life has its own many ways of saying things you’d never hear otherwise. The 3rd of November last year, me, Kenneth, Raison and Rathan, set out for what was our first day at TCS. What we didn’t know, fast forward a year, we wouldn’t be sharing the same roof, nor be working at TCS.
The first few months at Anna Nagar, were a blur. Times at Anna Nagar S2, Birthdays, Walking in the rain and flooded roads, eating out every night, roaming around on 2nd Avenue almost every other day, friday night eatouts with an extended Nitte gang, making some new awesome friends during the ILP Days. Looking back I still can’t believe we stayed at a place, that was so tiny as Anna Nagar was. It was fun, great fun at that. And I miss it more so, because post college those were the only moments like college. And that’s the kicker.
Coming to Chennai One, post our times at Anna Nagar/Ambattur, was hard. It was finally time to start working, time to be billable(industry lingo!). After a little bit of deliberation I decided to move in with these guys to Kottivakkam(PJP, F14 hereafter) and not in with my family which is also in Chennai, albeit pretty far off from the Offices. The reason was simple. I knew that it was a simple thing to do, because nobody knows where our careers are going to take us. F14 was comfortable, spacious. It was the perfect place to be, post an horrible day at Office. Which helped ofcourse, because times at Chennai One had many of those. Moving to F14 also meant, that everyone had to go to different offices, leave at different times. That was pretty sad. We hardly got to spend more time together. At S2, we quite literally lived under the same roof, at F14 it wasn’t the same anymore. And to add to that was the fact that I’d go home almost every weekend. I absolutely enjoyed the weekends, relaxing and taking time off, because the Office was exhausting, and killing. And you can’t complain when you have mom cooked dinners and lunches, and a decent internet connection right?
After what felt like an eternity on Bench, I finally got a project, but it ended up being the one thing that I knew was definitely not what I wanted to do. If I remember correctly, almost immediately after my project, I started to look out for greener pastures. Office went from boring, to politicized and unprofessional later. Work wasn’t interesting, but it was hectic, and the tight schedules had me hanging on.
Fast forward to August 2011, I resigned from TCS. It was finally time to bid goodbye. It was an important decision, and a lot of people, specially family were skeptical on that call. I am now working at PayPal India, which happens to be the best place that you’d want to work at. Atleast in Chennai if I may add. :D At around the same time Raison also started looking around for Greener land, and landed at Sourcebits Bangalore in September. That simply meant that S2, and then F14 was no longer the same as before. A few weeks later in October Rathan also got transferred to Bangalore. I bid goodbye to TCS on the last day of September, and that was that, a chapter written in the history books. I decided to move back home, and travel to Office daily.
Raison spent most of October travelling back and forth, Chennai, Mangalore, Bangalore. I was sick for a better part of the month. And here we are; October was technically the last month at F14. It’s hard to believe that an year has gone by. A lot has changed, life is kinda moving at pace, where it no longer is predictable. The 3rd of November, this year(a couple of days back), looking back at the times was a day well spent doing nothing. To sum it up, I am glad I moved to F14, with the guys, and also glad that the TCS Story is over. I get to play a part in shaping the future of Money at PayPal. Everything is a part of the ever changing world.
About 60 of us from #Nitte came to Chennai last year. 14 of us became really good friends, and now you have folks getting married, getting engaged, prepping for higher ed, frustrated with life at TCS, moving to greener pastures. And of course split between Chennai and Bangalore. It’s just a 5 hour drive away, but we never get to live the same life again. So much changes in one year, doesn’t it?
To the times well spent… An year is gone by… At Chennai.
Footnotes:
- The most amount of fun was obviously because of #ShitRaisonSays and did.
- S2, is the tiny apartment in Anna Nagar, where we living through the training at ILP.
- F14 is the more spacious apartment that we lived at, in Kottivakkam.
- Chennai, also made me a bunch of new friends. But there’s a charm to itself, when you have friends from college.
Now I need to catch up with a lot of people, what’s been happening in their lives. It’s been an year and half since we left #Nitte.
14 Notes