Retirement Benefits.

Superannuation (or) retirement ensures some monetary benefits, encomia and a farewell party. The Star of the day feels sad as well as relieved. Sad: to start a new kind of life.  Relieved: from the hum drums of a long, mechanical life.

The euphoria of accomplishment lasts for a week. Then, one start’s the process of “coming down to earth”.

Here is how it happens:
Charity begins at home, which is the epicentre for this process.

The wife initiates the downgrading. As an office goer, the Retiree got first preference for news paper as well as breakfast. Priority over News paper remains untouched unlike that of breakfast.

The Retiree would not have felt belittled but for the way it was done. Wife says, “Can’t you wait for another 10 minutes; any how you are only at home?” First let me serve our son and daughter. They are getting late.

The Retiree wonders how in a week it is the son and daughter who are getting late. How was this being managed earlier!

Next, the son will come up and ask. “Pa, are you free?” with out waiting for a reply he will off load a list of things to be done. That list looks like a grocery bill of a five star hotel.

The Retiree feels hurt on being told indirectly that he is free and doing nothing. Thanks God that his son is yet to complete his studies. If the son is employed, it will feel like a double whammy.

In comes the daughter. She says, “Pa, I am in a hurry to finish this project; help with photocopying these references!” Daughter, you know, shows a little politeness. If she is an office goer the tone may have been different, who knows!!??

Don’t let out a sigh, there is still more to come in the way of the Retiree.

Months pass. Madame starts bossing over him on unfinished works. Yet, she goads him to take care of his health, which he has been neglecting that, under the pretext of important office work.

Requests increase from the son and daughter.  Slowly the daughter might start obliquely to refer to the Retiree’s free time (read you are idling)

Friends (who are yet to retire) also join, at this point of time to draw the attention of the Retiree, that he was enjoying life when they were still toiling.

Fellow Retirees form a different category. Morning walks or visit to parks would invariably centre on topics such as “That man is lucky, as he is happy in retirement”, “My family mistreats me and expect only the pension amount”, “my son and daughter emptied my bank account” or some such thing.

Back home, the treatment varies if the son is married and living with the Retiree. Now, two more hands join in the process bringing him down to earth more often.

This is how it goes:
Son gets the first chance and says, “Dad, will you switch off the TV now; your grandson (or grand daughter) has unfinished home work; help to finish it”

(or)

“Dad, will you let Varun (Vanitha) to watch cartoons now; you can see the re-telecast tomorrow morning” The Retiree wonders whether he will get the promised free time tomorrow!!

Not to be left out, the daughter in law also may give a helping hand.

“Dad, I will get you a cuppa (of hot steaming coffee), can you take these clothes to the launderer?” The pile of clothes needs a donkey to carry. The Retiree wonders whether he had become one!

Then, comes, the salvo from tiny tots. But you move up a level in the hierarchy of relationships.  “Grandpa, grandpa (affection & task is proportional to the repetitive title used) can you finish this simple sketch & colour it?”

The Retiree cannot understand this - if it is so simple why me to help? Then he understands that the sketch in mind needs the artistic talents of a Picasso (or) a Rembrandt.

The last straw on the camel’s back will be loaded by relatives. “In your free time, can you go to the Railway Station to pick up my daughter? I am little busy and she is coming with luggage”

Is he looking for a friendly but unpaid porter?” But the relative did not mind it and reminds the Retiree to be at the platform for so and so train & such and such time!

Not to be left alone, the general public also lends a hand. “Oh, old man, be careful on the road”. Auto wallah's, mobike wallah's, car wallah's, bus wallah's – for that matter any driver wallah will drive you mad by offering unsolicited advice.

What is the solace, then for a Retiree? There are some benefits like these.

• A Senior citizen’s tag.
• Concession on Rail Tickets.
• A separate cash counter, in the 1st week of the month, in some of the Nationalised Banks.
• Slightly higher interest rate on deposits (i.e. if the retirement benefit is still in his control).

I hear a murmur, from Madame Retirees. I leave it to one of you to narrate your story :)

The Sounding Board.

Sounding board technique is used to collect views from others who matter. The “sounder”, then fine tunes his/her thinking. Trusted persons and well wishers act as the Sounding Board.

On various occasions, the little typhoon has employed this technique on me, for altogether different purposes – mischievous acts.  I used to wonder where from she has picked up that wisdom or was she born with it!

The little Typhoon always carried with her a bag of tricks – stuffed with odds & ends for the play in mind. Grapevine has it, that she has 20 such bags ready for use as the mood demanded.

Be it a tuition class or surgical session or scaremongering (or) starting a mini war – she was ready with an earmarked bag.

In her vernacular dictionary (Telugu), “us” means “me” after some time.

Does it appear a little perplexing? Let me explain. To start with she will say “let us do it” and the moment her doubts are cleared (or) a procedure has been partially  understood, she will drop the “us” like hot potatoes and start using “let me do it” This is temerity for you.

The varieties of play things available on the menu card, allowed her to cook up both the games (a la carte) & the rules of play (always in her favour). The sheer permutation & combinations she works out is truly amazing!

She almost takes it for granted that I will participate willingly (or) unwillingly! That particular day, she decided to play with balloons and make balls of different shapes. She has already tried it at home, but the filled air had leaked and balls shrunk to marble size.

She was unable to tie a thread, tightly at the neck of the inflated balloon. That was not acceptable and she did not know how to solve that technical problem. But any how she showed me the shrunken shapes as a fait accompli.

That was when she took me on board, with an “us” request to find a solution for that vexatious issue. I demonstrated the technique of filling air, holding the balloon’s neck in a “pinch”, stretching the neck and knot it to hold the air in.

She watched in rapt attention as my fingers coordinated in stretching & knotting the neck. Losing interest in this play (for a change “us” did not become “me”) and not willing to give credit to me, she abruptly changed the topic. She was obviously trying to cover up her de-fait accompli.

She wanted to know how a ship floats in water and how an airplane flies without flapping wings.

With the help of a bucket of water and a paper boat, laden with plastic objects, I introduced Mr. Archimedes to her. A paper airplane, actually a rudimentary one, did help her to understand some of the aerodynamic principles.

She was enthused by the demonstration with the paper objects – it might have appealed to her “origami” talents. Partial understanding of the mechanisms of floating & flying was sufficient.

She immediately dropped the “us” and started using “let me explain to you…..”  Then we took up playing the game of filling and bursting of polyethylene bags and paper covers – salvaged items from her house, kept naturally in a separate bag!

This game was played by “us”, as she had not yet mastered the art of crimping and holding the open end of the covers/bags, to retain filled air. Here she needed my help the most or otherwise there was no game at all to play!

Then, gingerly she took the crimped end from me, came behind and smashed the inflated cover on my back.
The bursting and the loud bang thrilled her and pained me. Who cares? Now, are you wondering about the connection between the title and the narration?

Let us (not the “us” mentioned till the balloon incident) read the first paragraph again, trace the metamorphosis of “us” to “me” , sounding me out with her doubts ,seeking clarification , sticking with “us” when the chips are down, reverting to “me” when the game was in her hands.

As a good will gesture, using my back to burst the air filled bags with “bangs”. Do you see the connection now? Now, reminisce such incidents you had and share them :) I’m pretty sure you have come across ‘Typhoon’s’ in your life.

Rat in the shoes.

The Muser had two other friends (shift mates) in the Hostel. They were occupants of a room diagonally across and two such rooms away. They generally took part in extracurricular activities such as climbing, trekking and 3 show cinema stints.

Sreeni and Kumar always came together – the double antennae. They can ferret out buried information but they had no ulterior motive.

Satire and wit was their forte. This had an undesirable effect on some of the inmates. Wit & satire everybody liked but when used on someone else.

Needless to say the aggrieved person waited for his turn, in case he was not able to redirect one at them , his own brand of wit or satire then and there.

But for this minor infringement on personal sensitivity, they were gladly welcomed to be part of any group or activity. Though friendly, the hostelites did not visit the duo by going in to their rooms.

Somehow this culture had taken root and all the friendly discussions took place either in the mess hall or at the hostel entrance.

Friends gathered in a particular room if a music session (singing or listening) was on or for playing cards without stake. During festival times, the hostel wore a deserted look. The aftermath of festivals meant exchange of variety of homemade eatables.

After one such festival, Kumar came back with a pair of new shoes. It was a bit costly, on our salary (which in reality was a stipend). He displayed his shoes happily, must be due to the sheer joy of owning a pair of such shoes.

Days went by, and the hostel inmates smelled a malodour in the air. Many times in the past, such malodour had wafted through the hostel ambiance. More often, it turned out to be of chemical origin from nearby processing industries. The air clears after an hour or two.

But what perplexed the inmates, in the first floor rooms, was that the odour was persistent and gaining strength day by day. The odour cleared off in a week’s time, bringing relief to the inmates.

After ten days, that mysterious odour stared to waft again through the corridors like a “ghost who walks”. Within a week the odour was categorised as ‘mild to severe’. Finally, one of the inmates hailing from an agricultural family sniffed and identified the cause of odour – a dead rat.

This sniffing posed another puzzle instead of answering the earlier one. The questions that remained to be answered were ‘Where from the rat had come and where it breathed its last?, Why it should come here to die? Where exactly its demise had occurred? Why at a periodical interval?.

Among the hostlers, a few were inquisitive.  They took upon the task of finding the origin of odour as the sniffer’s theories had gaps in it. This inquisitive nature led me to think about the adage “Curiosity killed the Cat”.

The investigation started off by forming a search team. No corner was left out in search of the rat, in the ground floor. This was based on the assumption that the rat also could have lived in ground floor or in a hole in the ground around the perimeter of the hostel. At that time they did not suspect a dead rat in any one of the 20 odd rooms spanning across two floors.

One member of the search team, made an accidental discovery. The smell appeared to emanate from one of the rooms in the first floor. His nostrils picked up the odour as he was crossing over the corridor/aisle. He had a strong suspicion on the left hand side row of rooms.
He could not pin point the source 3 doors of the 5 rooms were ajar. He convened an emergency meeting with the search team to disclose his findings.
The team had some firebrands, who did not stand on courtesies when it came to business. The “sniffer” in tow, they knocked on all the doors and entered inside for a field study – like contestants canvassing for votes.
The first and second doors they knocked upon were clean. The team entered the third room (remember the earlier adage about cat getting killed), fought the stench and came out gasping for fresh air. They were in no condition to continue the search there after, hence abandoned it.

The real culprit for the putrid stench was the unwashed nylon socks soaked in excessive sweating of feet.
The search team was very happy on two counts - mission completed and the culprits (the satire duo) were nailed.

Next day, the Team cornered the duo (wit & satire) and sarcastically said “Having given a demonstration of what your wit & satire could do to a field rat, why not market this technique?”

The Investigation team presented them with a rat trap and a packet of rat poison. Wit and sarcasm had been paid back in their own coin.

Needless to say that Sreeni & Kumar vanished like a rat chased by a cat. The hostelites coined a new adage “curiosity killed the rat too!”

Snake on the Ladder.

This private company is nestled between national highways, railway station and lush green agricultural lands.

The entrance gate is built over a drain water canal. Encroachment of over grown weeds in the stagnated water gives the look of a medieval fort surrounded by water ways. Only a full fledged moat and draw bridge is missing; otherwise it would be a picture perfect setting.

The company MD is a naturalist – allows weeds and shrubs to grow at their own will or pace.

He has such a strong faith in nature - depends on sunlight for illumination and the depressions in the bay for ventilation.

He let nature to provide these every day and magnanimously allowed his employees to avail the same at the work place.

The cabling work for the installed machines rivals a spider’s web.

For all these miserliness, he possesses a brilliant brain – thinking ahead of others in the field, doing the impossible with unskilled employees and to capture the imagination of probable customers.

Over a period of time, he positioned himself as a designer, developer and producer of critical components for space related activities. He used to proudly say that, all the prototypes that were manufactured by him performed well.

He even started to design and develop special purpose equipments and then got them fabricated from vendors of questionable capabilities. Some miserably failed. A list of such useless items would easily fill 2 pages of an inventory book.

Being a born fighter, the failures never bothered him. He has a proud motto “Design, Build and Operate”.

This story is about one such equipment, fortunately functional but suffering unwanted handicaps. This twin tower was 6 meters tall and some of the moving parts were placed at the top. In his cost pruning exercise, he did not provide a ladder.

He will close his ears whenever such inexpensive items like a proper ladder, a plastic bucket or a torch light are mentioned. This psychology, even now remains a puzzle to Muser.

This heating & drying tower is to be used, in a first of his kind venture, to produce resin coated organic and inorganic filament bundles of various types and strengths.

The main reason for this attempt is to overcome the non-availability or market volatility for such coated products. As is his wont, the Top Man has already lined up buyers for this yet to be made product.

He has an uncanny ability in gathering needed information and technique, from internet & his extensive personal network. He requested Muser to handle the project.

At the appropriate time, he sounded the alarm on the anticipated shortage of people who took decisions. From that point on, the interested officials kept themselves abreast of even a minor advancement in the developmental project. Yet none asked for a solid proof and therefore, none was given.

He chose an opportune moment to propose the use of in-house made product in the production of pressure vessels.  This situation placed Muser in a tight corner.

Whenever highly placed officials paid a visit, The MD made it a point to introduce Muser and exaggerate the pace at which the work was being carried out. Muser was put in a Shakespearian– to say the truth  or  not.

All these added to the pressure, to come up with a good result. And the very look and layout of the equipment, meant for continuous operation was disgusting.

Determined to see through the Project, Muser began organising the required round the clock operation. The shift personnel managed to locate a dilapidated bamboo ladder left by a civil contractor. It was left behind due to the cost of transportation.

This ladder had very special qualities.  Auto-ambulation (Who ever needed it took it and left it somewhere else), Unique appearance (the missing rungs were strung with coir ropes of a blackish hue and were sticky due to semi-cured resinous mass). The same ropes were also wound on the vertical bars of ladder to increase hand “grip”.

We hit a road block right from the start of the maiden operation involving the heating tower and processing filament bundle to semi-dry state.

The operating personnel went up and down the heating tower using the shaky ladder - every five or ten minutes, to set things ready for a restart.

Finally, the plant stabilised to a normal run and a heavy down pour began – as though to cool the frayed tempers. There was no let up in the rain and also the need to continue production. By around 6 “O” clock in the evening, the rain stopped.

The change team took over and they started experiencing another set of interruptions – power failure, system malfunction and semi-dried filament bundle getting stuck in moving parts.

Finally nature relented and everything became normal and the plant was up and running. The operators dispersed for dinner to a nearby location. When the team returned to their respective operating stations, the power was out.

The work area was pitch black – no emergency light or even a torch light. The power failure lasted a good half an hour. The tower temperature plummeted to near ambient. But the filament bundle inside the tower became hard and rod like, due to the residual heat.

This filament bundle had to be gently moved down ward, manually, till the dried ends came out of the tower. One of the operators climbed the ladder, reached the top, opened the cover plate, and rotated the rollers to pay out the hardened filament bundle.

When he started coming down the rungs of the ladder and at mid-way, his hand felt something clammy and sending a chill feeling rushing through his spinal cord.

Who will not feel chills, in their spine, under this circumstance? He was actually holding a well grown snake, just below its head. The straining snake was trying to fight back and stuck out its forked tongue, which accidentally touched the wrist of the operator.

That broke his nerve. He let out an incoherent shout, started shivering head to foot and finally stood paralysed. The fear response made him to tighten his grip and sweat profusely.

The other personnel rushed near the ladder and did not comprehend the situation, though the man stuck in the ladder was gesticulating to direct their attention to the snake. After a few moments they all understood what the commotion was about.

Someone brought an empty drum and climbed on to it and emptied a can of a chlorinated solvent, available nearby. The solvent stung the stinger with such an effect, the snake simply became limp and stopped wagging its tongue.

It had an anaesthetising effect as it was directly poured over the eyes, on the head and in to the partially open mouth. The two meter long cobra’s last thought, before fainting, might have been - oh my GOD what a sting!

The rest of “Operation over kill” was neatly executed, after a snake specialist identified the snake as King Cobra. He also ventured to reason out why that snake had come this far, to die.

Due to the rains, its homestead must have been inundated. While shifting to a dry location it might have met a similarly displaced field rat and decided to finish the dinner then and there.

With the yet to be digested rat, it might have entered the factory premise and sought a warm and dry place for a night’s stay. When the operating personnel were taking their dinner, the snake climbed up the ladder and coiled itself on the vertical bar.It must have sneaked just before the power failure! The heavy meal and the warmth must have given it a false sense of security and drowsiness.

Next day, an exhibition of the dead snake was organised and among others the MD had been cordially invited to inaugurate the exhibition. Being an astute person, he understood their message.

Now, if you happen to revisit the factory, you will surely get the feeling of entering a well maintained medieval fortress – illumination, ventilation etc; etc;

Thanks to the Cobra, we have a better work environment :)