Leadership????

Friday we had a meet of our business Unit, An occasion organized by HR people once in a while.. Supposed to be quarterly but not necessarly so..
As usual the venue was in the western suburb of Mumbai.. Lower parel.. and for me meets spell as "T R A V E L" be it any kind of meet.. Not that I dont like travelling.. But the occasion should be worth the travel!
So after a lot of fuss with my PM and some kind of efforts from her side to provide me the returning transport, we all started off. My PM had talked to the transport co-ordinator, our ex-PM and had got an assurance for me that I will be taken to any railway station on the Central Railway. I was content with it.
The bus ride to the location from office took 2 hours. Put up on the last seat of the bus, the start was bumpy.. It took 1.5 hours from Mhape to Lower Parel. The road improved as we hit the express highway, till then had quite a few jumps!
As we neared Lower Parel, it dawned on us that the driver did not know the exact location of the destination. I overheard the guys next to me , lets name them A and B , saying "Ye galat directionme leke ja raha hai" One of the transport co-ordinators called up A, and the one side conversation was something as follows
A: "Ha Bol" "Mujhe nahi pata kahan hai.. Ruk B ko puchta hun"
A to B: tujhe pata hai na jagah?
B to A: haan pata hai
A: "Haan B ko pata hai, Hum pahunch jaate hai" "Haan me dekhta hun "
A to B: Ye driver sahi ja raha hai na
B to A: Abhi tak to aisa hi lag raha hai.. Are yahan left turn lena tha .. isne right le liya.. Aage se koi left hoga..
A to B: Dekhte hai.. Are ruk kyun gaya? wo banda gaya na dekhne .. usko pata hoga..
B to A : Nahi re usko bhi nahi pata, wo dekh niche utre puchne ke liye ..
Me (burst in cos I cant be a silent spectator) : Tumko raasta pata hai to jaake bolo Driver ko
B: (smiles) puch raha hai na wo
Me : (Speechless)
after some time on the wrong route
A to B : Chal jate hai
B to A :Haan chal
(Both are still not getting up on their feet)
Finally the driver found the right way and took to the place "High Phoenix"
A to B : aa gaye barabar jagah par
B to A: Haan sahi jagah par pahunch gaye.. Chal chalte hai.
And Mr B was the first to get down the Bus :-)
The meet was put up in Phoenix Mill compound, Bowling Arena. It was my First visit to any bowling arena so was a bit apprehensive about it. As soon as I entered I found few of my training friends and we started off with the pleasantries and discussion about whos still in the company and whos not! They took me towards the bowling alley and made me give a try.. And Lo!I hit all but two in my first throw.. The ball was heavy and somehow took me back to my schooldays when I played Shotput.. No similarities except the weight but probably that was the only thing I could relate to.. After trying my hand fr 2-3 times , I retreated to search more acquaintances..
Meeting up people with whom you have worked at a point of time is a nice experience!. You forget the arguments and grudges and meet with a fresh mind. At informal occasions as these, its changes your attitude towards people.. Also these occasions provide a conducive environment for cribbers, you can hear a lot of sensible and non sensible comments from co-workers and if you have extendable ears, from Top to bottom !
We had a small award distribution function. The awards were for Valuable contribution towards the Project and company and Letters of Appreciation. As per the citations read out, the Award winners had displayed a strong sense of commitment to work, good teamplay, proactive approach for the project, etc. Both A & B were in this list of awardees for Valuable contribution!!!
Later as the DJ started mixing songs, one by one all Project managers took their team for introduction with the SuperBoss , the head of the BU. I dont know how many names he heard or remembered in the din, but that might help him to know faces.
After some time, even My boss took us for th introduction.. The music was blasting in full volume.. hope he remembers atleast our faces :-)
My return travel had not been decided till then. Ex-PM and my PM had asked one of the Senior people , who incidentally stays at Dombivli to accompany me. This Senior came to me towards the end of the program and the conversation was as follows:
Senior : Aparna, its 7 oclock now, and the program will end at 7:30. Parel station is just a little distance away from here, You can get a taxi for it.. Or you can go by our bus to some station.
Me: Okay. We can leave now, if you are starting now.
Senior: Actually I am going to roam around a bit here.
Me: Okay I will be here till you are back. Or if I am leaving earlier willleave a message for you..
Senior: No, I might not come back to this place, might leave directly.
Me: Hmm, Okay I will go by myself. thanks for the directions! :-)
After he left, I felt like laughing aloud.
Anyways, the program ended in some time. Finally I left on my own.
And then I met the infamous taxidriveres of Mumbai. On hearing Parel railway station , each pointed to the other driver. I finally asked one , is it too near? He said yes go straight down this road. Unsure of the raod, I asked in a roadside shop. He said "Khup duur aahe madam, Taxi karun ja" Again the search of taxi. Finally the 9th taxi I asked said "Baith Jao"
And thus I reached Parel railway station!
Luck favored after that, No queue at ticket window, Whatever Change required was available with me. As soon as I got down on the platform, A Dombivli Local was indicated, I climbed into the train without any pushing. Got inside and found 2nd seat to sit. And then slowly moved to the Window seat!
At the end of the day, I had seen various forms of leadership quality!

Finally what I felt at the end was that "Alls well that ends well" :-)

"How are you"

The most asked, most heard rhetoric question "How are you?"

Are we really concerned when we ask this question? Or we just throw this bunch of words when we have nothing else to start?
Do we expect the other person to say "I am not fine .. I am too troubled with my life..and I want to crib and cry" I see that we dont expect such replies , unless from a close friend. or if someone has a really good heart.
What if someone really says that? What is the reaction? A raised eyebrow with the thought " Oh my God! I have my own problems, now this person is goin to start cribbing..Save me !!!!"

On my Office Phone I get regular calls from the tele-marketers of credit cards. " Hello Madam, How are you ? I am calling from XYZ bank and we are offering you this lifetime credit card"
At the first question and pause I say "I am not fine" , I am curious as to how do they react.
One person was baffled and then forgot his next lines. One another disconnected saying"Sorry Ma'am" . The interesting one , who was a good salesman , said ,"Dont worry ma'am , After you listen to the offer I am presenting you wil be fine !"

One more place I see this question is on Chats and Orkut. I see a long lost friend online, I am happy and I ping "Hi , Long time no see .. How are you?" or simply "hi hru" and the response is always "I am Fine" or simply "f9"

Once I did reply ..somewhere., "I am not fine, Pareshan hun apni lifese " and know what , I am still waiting for a reply.. the person just dint respond!!

Seems we are always in search of Happiness..and we keep searching it in others.. I want to go the other way round..

Being a Software Engineer....

Few things I did at sometime due to being habituated ..

1. I work on tool PL SQL developer which is based on Oracle. The Short-cut for executing a query is F8 . So Even when I am refreshing a webpage I click on F8 and wait for it to get refreshed !!

2. This is the most common one.. In MS Outlook, to send a mail we need to click Ctrl+Enter. So when I mail from a Gmail or Yahoo account , I do the same and wonder why the mail is not getting sent ;-))

3. Login to Home PC using the Office user name and password! ( This is contributed by a friend)

4. Start Dialling with Zero from Home landline..( Too common again)

5. And the weirdest one I Did..
Standing in front of the Door at home, searching for my I-card to swipe and open the door, instead of ringing the belll!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The last one inspired me to write about the things I do.. :-)))))