Cut Copy and Paste हैदराबाद में Day1

Blog no.4 and I am still writting (and can't believe that you are still reading it) it's been 60 days journey. All started when I got an email about my training and posting location. After an eventful training period in Pune, I finally reached to my posting location Hyderabad...Aur ab aage

Date: 21st Nov 2007
Time: 6.30 A.M.

Me: “विप्रो माधापुर चालोगे?” Actually, I wanted to ask him "मुम्बई चलोगे? " (not that he would have said "Yes") but I badly wanted to go back to Mumbai.
Autowala: “हा, चलो!”
Me: “कितना लोगे?” (This was Pune effect; in Mumbai you cant dare to ask this question to autowalas)
Autowala: ” मीटर पे जितना होगा उतना, और उसके उपर 10 दे देना” (This was New!)
Me: “उपर 10 क्यूं?” (Obviously, I was still on stipend)
Autowala: “अभी अभी आए हो ना हैदराबाद, हलू हलू पता चलेगा” (Wicked!)

What a start! I dumped my 2 bags at the back and sat just at the centre of auto. I was literally shivering with cold; my auto was racing through empty roads of Hyderabad. I saw a few ladies sweeping the roads (which was already pretty much clean), I have never seen that before in Mumbai( I mean both, clean roads and cleaning of roads).
He dropped me near one handsome building and just next to that Hyderabad’s famous Cyber tower [building as prominent as Charminar is]. Cyber Tower is landmark and an indication that I was in Hitech city. I was bit let down to see Madhapur office, especially after watching striking buildings of Oracle, Dell and Satyam. I tried to enter.

Security: ”Sir, $%&#*^&!@#@%?” (he spoke something in Telugu)
Me: “तेलुगू नही आती”

“Telugu radu” .my first sentence in Telugu; means ‘I don’t understand Telugu’.
I was supposed to report Mr. M; Madhapur office was no less than a 3 star hotel and there was water fountain at the centre of the buiding and just next to that was a food court. I had my coffee and went to the reception and there I saw Hanuman, my training mate and then after my project mate too. The super enthusiastic Hanuman had a great history behind him, just the way Hanumanji split his chest to show Ram and Seeta he once opened office lift’s inner door; causing lift for emergency stop in between 3rd and 2nd floor. We were scared to death(BhachaO!!); the only option left with us was hitting the alarm button and we did exzactly that. Security rushed in and they escorted us from the menace. So that's Hanuman and me standing in front of Mr. M and waiting to hear what he has decided for us. He handed over one small chit with phone no. of Mr. MM and asked us to meet him in Manikonda campus. Yes, you heard it right it’s Manikonda.
Our office shuttle took us to Manikonda(as Sujaku rightly describes it as the blessed land lay between Rwanda and Uganda). A 4 times bigger campus than PDC but majority of part still under construction; the surrounding giving us SAHARA like feel. A rocky(not rocking) place with full of under constructions sites all around. But the campus was accompanied by some of the biggies like Microsoft, Infy and ISB.

High on adrenaline Hanuman literally jumped over the security rod to enter Microsoft ODC. The security personnel almost shouted, stopped and asked us to wait till he call up Mr. MM. My First project, first Manager and first client; Microsoft (Well, that’s sounds cool). And then came MM; at first glance he seemed a pleasing personality. He briefed us about the project, expectations and opportunities (like he does for everyone else, good enough to impress us on day 1) and then he moved to some informal talking.

Mr. MM: “So everything is settled?” (As if?)
Hanuman: “Yes”(Great he is settled; already ??)
Mr. MM: "And, you?"
Me: “No, not yet”
I was confused, what does he mean by settled?... I dont have place to stay, I haven't made a call back home yet, I am extremely tired after 14 hrs journey and so damn hungry too.
Mr. MM: "A team of 20 will join you tomorrow , they are coming fromChennai."
He brough my attention to his talking.
It was 12.30 and he left us for lunch break. At last at lunch I spotted few familiar faces; there was Techie, Senti and Jhaadi (my Pune training mates... detailed intro later) but meanwhile Jhaadi told me that he spotted 3 beautiful girls in library [he called them 3 deviyan].

अपनी थाली:

I was fascinated with PDC cafeteria so was equally curious about this one, however it was quite disappointing; first setback No TV!!
But the menu list was interesting; there were two meals to be serve ‘North Indian Thali’ for Rs.28/- [with chapathi] and ‘South Indian Thali’ for Rs.26/- [of course without chapathi] which soon they merged and made it ‘Apni Thali’ [how homely and clever too ;-)]
Food was equally good or bad, you can get in any other companies food court.
But currently my biggest concern was accommodation. Finally I found Johny and Vinsa, my roomies for Hyderabad. I asked Johny “So, what’s the plan?”

New room New roommates

When I saw Johny firsttime, I thought he is our trainer in PDC [Just like Munnabhai], but his comments and remarks from backbench proved that he is nowhere near to be a prof. and the only interaction with Vinsa I remember was in PDC, where he allowed me to take the only chicken samosa left in the tuk shop.
Johny:” First you see the place and then we will decide.”
I cant believe this. Both of them were here from last 2 days, looking out for accommodation, calling agents and meeting house owners and now when they fetched one good place just 5 KM away from the campus and still they were waiting for my approval.
I was in no mood to say NO and there was’t any reason to do so. The place was good; quiet and quite isolated from the city but really near to campus [Just like my pune place]. There was one tam aunt downstairs who was taking care of rents, maintenance and all other jhamelas. Electricity, water supply everything was there, but earlier tenant took maximum precautions to leave nothing ( I mean absolutely nothing) behind. So we were left with the job of buying all the mandatory stuff for living(including tubelight and ceiling fan). So we had miles to go before we sleep. There was long list of tasks pending for us.

Task1: Collecting my bags from Wipro Madhapur and dropping it at my new place in Telecom Nagar
Task2: Buying all MUST things en route' to Telecom Nagar.
Task3: Even Pappa and Vinsa have to pick their baggage from Johny's relative's place in Secunderabad. And trust me it was quite a distance. Navigating roads in out and out new city was a daunting task and twist in the tale was Pappa mistakenly got down at place much before our destination. Catching another auto which will take us to Tarnaka and back home was real test. But finally we managed well.

After collecting bags from Tarnaka, coming all the way to Cyberabad again...it took us more than 3 hours. When auto rickshaw dropped us at Telecom Nagar it was already half past eleven; including all late night half return auto fare it was something Rs. 190. We offered him the exact.

Autowala: "साब और १० रुपये "

I knew it, We handed over 200 bucks and reached home. I was really really tired. Thankfully Hyderabad chill didn't make us realise the need of ceiling fan. We yet to buy all the bedding but as of now who cares? My all task were completed successfully.
Tommorrow there would be new place, new team and new work but tonight let me sleepzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.