20 years with TSYS

When I arrived in America on a cool, late Spring day of 1996 I wasn't in best of shape and spirit, going through a bad phase in life. As goes the popular Bhojpuri saying - "ZINDAGI JHOOND BAA (Life is all messed up), my life was a mess. My ties to a girl just broke up a month before marriage. I was having a horrible time with my boss at work. Living in Calcutta in the mid 1990s I was looking for an escape route, to travel somewhere far from the madding crowd as my surrounding milieu seemed to be mocking at me. I was insecure, unsure of myself and at my vulnerable best.

Still I had no immediate plans to come to the United States. Being the only son of my parents I was a pampered kid. Living in Calcutta was just an overnight train journey away from Bhubaneswar which I visited every other weekend to eat my favorite fish curry and Mansa Jhola (goat meat curry) cooked by my mom. Like many things in my life, I hadn't planned coming to America at that juncture. It just happened to happen all too quickly.

A friend of mine in the US took my resume and circulated around body shoppers, a term used for the placement agencies who hired folks from India on H1B Visa. From bolt from the blue came a decent offer from a Pittsburgh based Company called Mastech Incorporated (now iGate). So I landed here in the United States and been here ever since.

It was the beginning of a long journey. Four years later I got my US Green Card. A year later on a Fall afternoon my wife and I arrived in Columbus, Georgia on a rainy day to start my new job at the Total systems Inc. which at that time was the 5th best company in America to work for (no. 1 in the year 1999). My first day at work was on October 28, 2022 - exactly 20 years ago.

No sooner I entered into our new apartment, a teenage girl came from nowhere and rear ended my vehicle. The damage to the car was minimal, but perhaps as I was Bonded to the place I was shaken, not stirred. There is a DHAGA (proverb) in Odia - "GHARE PASU PASU MUNDA RE CHALA BAJILA" (No sooner I entered my home, my head hit the roof). I thought this freak accident was a bad Omen, harbinger of worst things to come.

It didn't turn exactly that way. Many good things happened in due course of time, though a few stood out. Our son arrived in our life in the year 2005. A year later I acquired US Citizenship as the same year saw the arrival Facebook as a social media platform. It taught me writing when I joined Facebook in 2009 and haven't stopped ever since. Please excuse me for some self bragging here -currently with nearly 5,000 on my friend list and almost an equal number of followers I have come a long way.

But the most important thing happened to me was my tryst with Total Systems Inc. For all these years I have seen many ups and downs in life and company as a lot of water has flown under the bridge over river Chattahoochee. But what hasn't changed is my unwavering commitment and bondage to the company all these years as I feel proud to be associated with it 20 years down the road.

Slangs of Bhubaneswar

 Akin to most Americans who have a middle name, majority of those back home in Odisha, my home state back home, from my generation carry a nick name. The first name is also called good name. It is not so uncommon to be asked in India - "What's your good name".

While the first name is used in educational institutes and paperworks, the nicknames given by parents are the ones preferably used by friends and relatives. A common way of addressing a person in the twin city of Cuttack - Bhubaneswar is by using the unique combo of nickname and last (sur) name. For example Bunu Panda, Muna Sahoo, Lulu Patnaik and so on. Don't know why the nickname overrides the first name, with the last name remaining constant.

Nicknames are often juxtaposed with the following terms to form an alias, giving an peculiar identity to that individual.  For example, MOTA or MOTU (fatty), PETA (potbellied), POTALA (rotund), GEDA or BANGURU (shorty), LAMBU or DENGU (tall), TERA (squint), MIAN or PATHANA for Muslims. For example, Budu PETA, GEDA Gopala, Haq MIAN and so on. 

Sometimes certain activities or actions get stuck to names as tattoos get stuck to human body for whole life, refusing to go away. Once in our school one guy farted loudly, followed by bursts of laughter as Chinese crackers on a Diwali night. He was nicknamed as "So and So the Farter". After leaving school he entered the college and thought that the episode will be forgotton. Or so he thought. He asked another guy, a junior from his school asking him if his name "So and So" rings a bell. His  junior gave an impromptu answer - "Oh, So and so the farter". It further his disappointed senior who remorsefully walked away.

Another common and reverent form of addressing is the last name followed by "Babu". In Odisha I have been addressed as Dash Babu on numerous occasions, not yet sure why I am not addressed as Sambeet Babu ! Being referenced as a "Babu" invariably brings an image of a Head Clerk wearing thick framed glass in me, but I never take any offence. 

In REC (now NIT) our teachers with a doctorate degree preferred to be addressed with the prefix Dr. So and So. If someone inadvertently addressed a faculty constipated with tons of ego by his Doctorate degree as a "Mr" instead of "Dr", he was inviting trouble. That was the time I was enlightened that there are two kinds of doctors who live in this world, one PADHAIWALA (teaching) type doctors and the other DAWAIWALA, the medicine kind who treat diseases.

Here you go with a few popular slangs of our time, mostly from the twin city of Bhubaneswar - Cuttack.

MANDU - Nubile Girls

LUNGUDA - A habitual girl chaser

PENA - Nincompoop.

GHODI - Literally meaning mare but denotes a Tom Boyish girl lacking feminine qualities. A tall, lanky girl those days, however pretty she might be would be written off a DENGI GHODI (Tall Mare) versus a plump, fair, short, stocky girl adored as a DAUL DOWL (Chubby) beauty.

LULLA, CHOCHALA - Thoroughy useless, Good for nothing guy.

DHAEEN or DHAIYAAN - Literally means a person with respiratory ailments gasping for breath. As a slang it means a worthless guy, an abject failure in life.

MUNDA - A naive, slow witted person who can be dangerously moronic.

Those days the BADAGADIYAs, the folks living in a village called BADAGADA in the outskirts of the city perfectly fitted the bill as MUNDAs - naive, slow witted folks who can be dangerously stupid. Their heads were rumored to be stuffed with cow dung.

There used to be a popular anecdote about the residents of Badagada. One day the head of the village who was getting persistent headache visited a doctor. He came back triumphantly announcing "Doctor checked my head and found nothing in it" which was followed by cheers from his fellow villagers. Though we were in awe of their muscle power, it did not deterred us from poking fun at the Baragadiyas.

A fly-in encounter

 The other day I was buying lunch from a drive through window at a local restaurant when a fly from nowhere suddenly entered into my car. I frantically tried to shoo it away, but the fly refused to fly away. I kept the windows of my car open for a while to let the barging air suck the fly out. But the tiny insect managed to swing inside the car, toing and froing from one corner to another like a pendulum, mocking at my predicament.

The fly reminded me of that drunken uncle in a house party who comes uninvited and refuses to leave. I have some interesting anecdotes from my childhood days to share. The father of my friend happened to be a reputed Contractor in Odisha who got some lucrative government contracts. During the marriage ceremony of my friend's sister, I noticed a middle aged man in an inebriated state passing lewd, uncomfortable sounding double entendres at girls old enough to be his daughter. The guests maintained a safe distance from this obnoxious person for his mouth smelled a unique blend of smoking tobacco, Pyorrhea and Whisky. 

Couple of years later I bumped into the same man again, this time during the marriage reception ceremony of the same friend's brother. Our drunken guy from the previous marriage reception was in a bachhanalian mood was giving lascivious looks at young girls, ogling them with his shrunken red eyes and passing disparaging remarks, his countenance reeking of lecherous intent. The history was just repeating itself.

Feeling irritated and now a bit curious I asked my friend - "Who is the person ? Why Mausa (Uncle) keeps on inviting such folks to your family gatherings ?" My friend got a bit defensive and replied hesitantly - "After all he is a family friend and very close to my dad." Later on I discovered that this abominable person was an Engineer who passed the bills submitted by contractors and hence was deemed tolerable and given a free pass.

The fly was still humming inside my car when I remembered this incident. During my childhood days this man from our village used to visit our home quite often. My parents were gracious hosts. His peculiarity was that he would always arrive close to lunch or dinner time. One day just out of curiosity I asked my father - "Why this gentleman turns up exactly close to the time when we eat our meal ?" My father replied back - "Once upon a time this man not only used to be rich, he was a well known spendthrift. Back in those days he would never blink an eye or think twice while lavishly entertaining me out of utmost regard for educated folks. We shouldn't forget his generosity during his torrid time. Never underestimate the power of a hungry man's blessings".

Both incidents could be construed as two similar incidents separated by a common sentiment in different times. In both cases two different men were considered as fly on the ointment in my eyes in two separate situations, the licentious Engineer who had a choice and the poor man from village who didn't have much of a choice. What I remembered on a fly flooded my memory while I drove back and it ebbed as I reached home. 

Suddenly the fly in mymy car swung by and sat on my lap. My reflex action tried to swat it off while I opened my car door. The fly flew away towards the bright and blue sunny sky hovering on the misty grass on my front yard and soon melted away to its freedom. My fly-in encounter left me alone, still slave of the memories from the past. 

Back to work at office post pandemic

 Went back to work at my office location after 2 years and 7 months. The attendance in the office was frugal. There were not many people around as some of them are working remotely following the new "2 days at office - 3 days from home" schedule. I have now started to work Mondays and Tuesdays at office and rest three days, Wednesday to Friday from home.

Last time I worked at office was on March 17, 2020 when Donald Trump was the President of the United States and Joe Biden was struggling in the Democratic Primaries. A lot of water has flown in the river Chattahoochee since then when I started working from home due to the Covid pandemic until today.

It was mixed feelings going back to work after such a long time. I was excited as I missed the office and my coworkers for such a long time. Missed the fun, chat, eating lunch at the campus cafeteria and the office gossips. I had my share of fun and chat with my team mates as and when I encountered them. 

During the lunch time I decided to take a walk to the cafeteria. My ever alert ears receptive to spice, juicy stories overheard two ladies walking ahead of me. They were gossiping, doing character assassination of their Mother-in-laws. I heard one of them saying - "My Mother-in-law would listen to everyone but me". The other one nodded - "mine is no better".

There was hardly anyone around. It seemed I was walking through some ghost town as I encoured only a couple of souls on the entire stretch of little less than a furlong from the elevator to the cafeteria. It was peak lunch hour, so I expected some line and the place streaming with people. 

But I was so wrong. The cafeteria had no more than half a dozen people looking around as they hadn't much of a choice. There was no soup, the popular salad bar was missing. Only the grill section was open with only a handful items on menu. The usually busy lady at the cash counter was yawning waiting patiently for the next customer. It felt like something was missing in the millieu, like an orange whose juice has been sucked out.

A few team members complimented me after a long time no see for shedding a few pounds and my salt and pepper hair which has started growing like weeds on an uncared lawn. It was a long day being Monday today, but nevertheless felt great to get back to work after a long hiatus. 

The saga of Archana Nag

 Her name is Archana Nag. A small town girl from Bolangir she came to Bhubaneswar, the city of opportunities in Odisha to study law and dream big. Not sure how far she went on her academic pursuit, she was posing as a lawyer and as an active member of a leading political party. In this process she got married and had a child.

Then she hit the jackpot and stuck gold earning the tag of honey bee with her horny escapades. Soon she figured out the ugly underbelly of the city. As reported by media luring the high and mighty of Bhubaneswar which includes at least three politicians and a leading Odia movie producer, policemen, she had sex with them in her house while recording the steamy scenes. She then used those raunchy videos to her advantage by blackmailing her victims and extorting exorbitant amounts.

She apparently succeeded in her profession as the result spoke for itself and living quite well for herself. Soon she started living a lavish lifestyle in the capital city, owning an expensive bunglow, a fleet of fancy cars. As pets she not only had her henpecked husband and suiters, she owned exotic animals - a white horse and a brood of foreign breed dogs. Not to mention she was seen hobnobbing with the high and mighty of Bhubaneswar.

But soon fate caught up with her and her luck ran out. One of her alleged victims, a movie producer complained to the police that she was extorting 3 crore (Rs.30 million) from her, leading to her arrest. Stay tuned for more spicy news as skeletons are bound to come stumbling out of her cupboard as the hounding media has already smelled blood.

Bhubaneswar is no more the sleepy township of a couple of lakh (200,000) folks of mostly salaried, educated and intellectual class I grew up with. It has now turned into a melting pot, a city of immigrants from all over Odisha. The city has grown beyond its means, now harbors an estimated number of 1.2 million people. This unplanned growth was accompanied by unpleasant rise in people living in squalors strewn all over the city, rampant rise in crime, drug and prostitution. No wonder, such juicy news keeps coming out once in a while. May Lord Jagannath bless my home city back home.

Congress party in crisis

 The current imbroglio in Rajastan where its Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot refusing the high command, an euphemism for the Gandhi Dynasty duo of Sonia and Rahul heading the Congress party speaks volumes. That's because been an old Congress hand he is aware of the fact that the party is in its death bed and he wants to cling to his position in power as long as he can, for power is world's biggest aphrodisiac.

Rats are the first to jump off a sinking ship. It's not surprising that many Congressmen and women are leaving the party for greener pastures. Those still clinging to power may leave the party as soon as they are out of power. During the Sepoy Mutiny of 1857 there was a saying alluding to the old, weak Mughal Emperor Bahadur Shah Zaffer - "SULTAN SAHA-E-ALAM, AAJ DILLI SE PALAM", which means the writ of the great Emperor of the Universe today runs from Delhi to Palam (a Delhi suburb).

Sonia - Rahul led Congress should know that it is not 1988 when Rajiv Gandhi whimsically replaced Harideo Joshi the CM of Rajasthan who had the support of 80% MLAs with Siv Charan Mathur. Then Congress was in power at center with massive mandate of 425 MPs and at ruling most of the states. Rajiv Gandhi as the scion of Gandhi family could change Chief Ministers like his underwear and get away with impunity. The situation is different now. Congress is in death bed and a la the Mughal Kingdom of Bahadur Shah Jaffer in 1857 its writ only runs from Delhi to Jaipur.

Now the party leadership's conundrum can be best defined by the Odia DHAGA (Proverb) - "BINASA KALE BIPARITA BUDDHI", which means at time of devastation the mind travels in the opposite direction". On its last throes the high command of grand old party is hell bent on committing blunder after blunder. The Gandhi led Congress may be anathema to many, but asset to BJP. The longer the Gandhi family stays at the helm of affairs, the better is BJP's prospects in the next General Election. Modi should give Rahul Gandhi a big thanks if he wins a record third term in 2024.

The night that changed REC, Rourkela

 It was a warm night in the fag end of an unusually dry monsoon season in the Steel township of Rourkela. The students of 2nd year Engineering residing in Hostel no 3 retired to bed after another long, hectic day of academics in Regional Engineering College, polularly known as REC (now NIT) - the Premium Technical Institute in the state of Odisha in India. The pariah dogs who fed on the messy leftovers from the Hostel mess fell quite after a long night of howling and sniffing around, for it was the peak of their mating season.

This happened to happen in this month of September 1987, exactly 30 years ago. All of a sudden, like bolt from the blue, a bunch of marauding guys from the senior batches of the 3rd and final year of Engineering (mostly the former) fell upon the sleeping students of 2nd year. Using utmost secrecy and surprise as the main element, the attacking students used wooden planks, hockey sticks, iron rods and even bare hands to bash up their hapless victims from the junior year.

The well planned attack was fast and swift, executed to perfection. Before you could finish chanting "Laxman Shivarama Krishnan" 108 times, the perpetratorss retreated fast, fully well aware of the fact that staying too long will give the victims time to recuperate, rally around and turn the tables on them. After all the attackers stayed in the Hostel - 3 earlier and were pretty familiar with its geography.

And it almost happened, as one of the seniors (I personally knew him as he hailed from my school in Bhubaneswar), a lanky and slightly lame guy was the last one to leave post thrashing his juniors. The already beaten, bruised and fuming with fury of a wounded tiger, the Hostel - 3 students chased him for a while and almost caught him as only a few feet separated him from his pursuers. God forbid he managed to flee - for if caught, at that moment he would have been lynched and never seen the sun again the next morning.

Why and how this incident happened ? A sequence of events, a series of comedy of errors by the college authorities who failed to gauge the mood of the students led to this incident. The bucks stops at the Principal who later was hailed as hero for dousing the fire he had a hand in creating it. He was more like part of the problem than solution.

It all began one day, rather one evening. It was the immersion ceremony of Sri Ganesh Idol following the Puja held in Hostel - 2 (abode of final year students. Traditionally Ganesh Puja used to be held in Hostel - 2 where the final year students stayed, Saraswati Puja in the Hostel - 3 where the 2nd year students were housed). That year, though plenty of Bhang (cannabis) and alcohol was available, there was a shortage of dancers to consume them and follow the slow moving truck carrying the idol towards its destination at the bottom of a close by lake. 

The academic session of the new arrivals 1st year students, the usual MURGA (whipping boys or fall guys, the way you see it) didn't start yet - so axe fell on the 2nd year guys, the junior most ones available to fulfill the void of crowd needed to dance behind the truck. A bunch of apparently intoxicated seniors entered their common room in Hostel - 3, where a few were glues to TV.  They were slapped multiple times for disobeying the orders of Senior Gods to join the immersion procession - a cardinal mistake to be made inside the REC Campus.

The 2nd year of Engineering is a unique physical and academic stage in life. Physically one is neither a child nor an adult. Academically, you are neither a Fresher, nor exactly a Senior as the junior most 1st year students were yet to arrive in the college. Humiliated, the 2nd year students went to the Superintendent, Warden and eventually the Principal to complain against this mistreatment - after all they have endured the harassment for way too long. Ragged for more than a year already, they were not in a position to take it any longer.

Those were the days, the administration inside REC was an One Man show - ran by a Big, Fat, Hippopotamus look alike Professor, a self proclaimed DADA (Big Brother) who bullied students, teachers and employees alike. His writ prevailed inside campus like gospel, his words were being the last words. Dada's wish and actions vetoed over the rest. In other words - he was the de facto super Principal.

Though a majority of staff sympathized with the 2nd year students, it was supposedly Dada who firmly put his foot down on the idea of punishing those who slapped the 2nd year students on that fateful evening. The pliant, inept and reputatedly corrupt authority dilly dallied, apparently on the behest of the self proclaimed Dada of the Campus.

Frustrated by the authority's inaction, one fine morning the 2nd year students decided to boycott the campus, deeming it as unsafe, proceeding towards the Railway Station to return back home. At nation's Capital, the monsoon session of Parliament was on full swing. The leaving of Hostel mid semester by the students of a premier Technical institute of national stature, where 50% of students came from outside states would have sent a wrong message at the wrong time.

It alerted the authority who was caught napping, as it didn't foresee this coming. They scrambled to get their act together, preventing the students from boarding the long distance trains, cajoling them to come back to the Hostel. The authorities assured the students of protection. The leaders from Senior batches tendered their apologies, forgiving their junior brothers and treating the matter as closed.

Or so thought the 2nd year students. The fragile peace was short lived. Tension was still thick in the air inside Campus. Back to their Hostel and Classes with new found confidence, a few 2nd year guys allegedly taunted their seniors. The muggy September air resembled a room filled with inflammable gas, just waiting on someone to light a matchstick. It didn't take long for that to happen.

Though they amassed weapons and diligently guared their hostel during the inititial nights after these incidents, the gullible 2nd year students of Hostel -3 let there guards down, falsely believing the fragile truce brought upon by the authorities to last permanently.

A week or so later, it was the night of Feast (Local lingo for Special Chicken dinner consumed with abundance of liquor) in Hostel - 5, the dwelling of 3rd Year guys. Fueled by alcohol which shrugged off their jaded nerves and made them shed their inhibitions, prodded by a bunch of masterminds they proceeded to Hostel 3 to teach their junior dogs a lesson. They were soon joined by volunteers from the Final year on their mission.

In Hostel 3, the 2nd year guys were in deep slumber. It was their night of bad luck, as a few boarders who were Table Tennis (Ping Pong) addicts and often stayed late playing until 2 - 3 AM in the morning, went early to bed that fateful night. (If they were awake and alerted the rest there would have been bloodshed of catastrophic proportion).

The mostly drunk seniors came in droves, spread into the familiar wings in front and back rows. They started bashing the 2nd year hostelites in the darkness of the night after shutting down the Main Switch of Electricity. Many got injured with broken bones, teeth, suffered from bruised and cut skins and were admitted to Ispat General Hospital (IGH) the next morning.

The authorities arrived on the scene, trying to pacify the enraged students now vying for the bloood of the seniors. They acted swiftly, rusticating some of the perpetrators from the College for a year who led the party, expelled a bunch from the Hostel and fined many ranging from Rs.50 to Rs.100, a princely sum for most those days.

But it wasn't enough to act as soothing balm for the already bruised and battered 2nd year folks. Brilliant students who never held anything sharper than fountain pens in their life, suddenly found themselves armed with knives. Couple of guys from the wounded batch, now part of the Cabal plotting an attack on Hostel - 5 where the majority of the attackers came from, readily volunteered to fetch petrol bombs from Jamshedpur and stage a revenge attack Hostel - 5.  The same evening the College authorities after getting a wind of it declared the Institute closed Sine Die.

After more than a month post reopening of the college, it was never the same inside the REC Campus. The ragging in its current form was a thing of the past, the beneficiary being the 1st year students who got far less than the usual quota of ragging. Students of the same batch were no more kept together in one hostel, rather they were intermixed with guys from other batches. It was the end of a chapter in the history of REC and the beginning of another, the impact of which would last for generations to come.