Random Thoughts at work

• I want to chuck my job and travel through Japan with a backpack
• I want to go back to Chandigarh and see the new house
• I want to have paranthas with home made butter
• I want to go to my favourite cafe;sit cross legged on their comfy sofas and eat cheesecake with coffee while I read a good book
• I am fed up of working with unprofessional people and want to tell them so
• I am tired of motivating others when I don’t feel too motivated myself
• I want to ask some people if they have ever heard of the terms "Schedule management" and "Contingency Planning" ?
  

Its not such a good day at work people !

Friends, Shopping and Rajma Chawal

I’ve been meeting a lot of old friends lately. Met A last weekend in Yokohama and yesterday met S. She was in shizuoka for a week which is quite a distance from Tokyo and I had almost despaired of meeting her, but the great pal that she is she delayed her flight to Sunday so she cld spend Saturday with me.We had the most glorious time. We shopped till we dropped and talked about how life had treated us since we met last. The weather gods were kind - for a change the day was cloudy so we spent most of it walking ard Tokyo and by 6 in the evening we were just about ready to collapse.S is a pure veg and not the kind who drink - so I couldn't take her to a Japanese restaurant or a pub without getting disapproving looks and a lecture about the sins of drinking and eating non veg.
Actually S is so shockingly different from the other people I know. She doesn't drink, eat non veg and likes to stay at home with her yr old son and spend time with only good frnds or family. She loves to shop but will shop for bangles and traditional salwar kamizees where as I wld go for silver jewelery and ethnic kurtis and jeans and short tops. As personalities we are poles apart - she is a bit conservative and doesnt adjust to modern ideas fast. - I am the one with the modern outlook who can do anything live anywhere and off course eat anything !
But what is similar is our values and beliefs in life and that goes beyond being modern or conservative- Under all my veneer of modernity I am a person to whom spirituality means a lot - In fact that is the one common factor that brought us together.She understands that part of me so well.Like her I stick to my few friends and will only spent time with like minded people and wld rather spent my time alone than in company of people I dont agree with or enjoy much.
And so we had coffee al fresco and gorged on the snacks she brought from home. Her mom makes all sorts of fabulous namkeens imaginable and I guess she knew that for all my talk about “I love Japanese food and I cant understand why people have to eat Indian even in Japan” I wld be dying for some Indian food so she brought it along all for me.
Then in the evening we had to go to a old colleagues place .. apparently his wife had cooked dinner for us and we are sort of fond of his wife so off we went The wife made us good adarak chai Indian style and then we had rajma chawal for dinner.Rajma Chawal is something I can die for so I really hogged and hogged.
On Sunday - I went shopping to Tokyo hands and lazona in Kawasaki and bought everything from books to hair clips to perfumes to foot creams. I also wanted to buy a very lovely peasant blouse but then off course they didn't have my size - no one in japan has my size - it really doesn't help to be 5 feet 9 inches in a land of tiny people with no busts or behinds to speaks of !
So that's how I spent my weekend ...

P.S
Have I been giving an impression of “poor me I am so lonely in Tokyo”?? coz There was a comment on my last post .Some smart fella wrote about how he pitied me coz I was supposedly friendless in Tokyo and how he was having so much fun coz he had a lot of friends there – dude – first of all this is someone who has been coming to Japan almost every year for the past I don’t know how many yrs now and something I can never get in this city is lonely. And then that post was just a nostalgic bit about how nice it feels to catch up with good frnds you haven’t met in ages. OK !

The company of Friends

What do you do when a dear friend calls to say he will be in town soon and will meet you ? You hop skip and jump around the room like a five year old and start counting the days till he comes. Meanwhile you call your mother, his mother and a hundred people in between pestering them to tell you his exact schedule. And when he does land in Tokyo you call him a thousand times a day when he is in very important meetings with very important people demanding to know when he will meet you.
And when you do meet,the feeling is like coming home. The best thing that can happen to you when you are in an alien city suffering from the blues is to meet someone from home.
And so as the ice tinkles in the glasses and you munch on the chicken wings, the conversation spirals and rambles into everything from philosphical discussions on life to hilarious anecdotes about the people back home to crazy inane happenings. And as you laugh and talk and laugh some more,you realize how much you had missed being with people with whom you can really and truly be yourself without putting on any pretenses.
Then suddenly you realize only five minutes remain till the last train home and you gulp down the last of your drink and hug him and hug him and make your self seem like a little lost kid in a big bad city and extract a thousand promises from him to see you when he is in town again.
And on your way back in the train,as you smile thinking about the conversations and the laughter;you realize that life's finest moments are those that we spend in the company of friends.

So - Here's to the time very well spent in TGIF Yokohama and here to many more such rendezvous in the future !

Our sleeping beauty from China

S and I have something entertaining to do at work now besides passing comments on how much we hate M.
There are two new Chinese guys at work ... both of them rather cute but painfully shy.They sit right opposite us and we spent most of the time observing them and then commenting on them in Hindi. I share the phone with them and every time they have to use it they go into paraxyms of guilt saying sumimasen(sorry in Japanese) to me a billion times before using it.
Then there is something slimy and green that one of the guy adds to his water bottle every morning and it sort of floats around looking like worms or something. So S and I spent an hour debating what was in the bottle - is it tea leaves or does our Chinese friend really like to eat raw food?
But our absolute favourite is the one who site right opposite S. He is really young, and has permanently raised eyebrows that give him a perpetually startled expression.When ever someone speaks to him suddenly he starts and becomes all nervous and jittery.
Whenever he doesn't understand something he asks the other chinese guy and his manner of asking is so interesting that I am entirely captivated by it though I don't understand a single word of what he is saying.He moves his chair close to the other guy, points at something in the document or in the computer and says something in rapid fire Chinese all the while flaying his arms about. The other guy's replies are always punctuated by a furious tapping of his computer screen with his finger.Our man looks at the other guy, then at the computer screen scratching his head with a very puzzled expression on his face. When he is truly agitated the scratching of head turns into rapid churning of hair which leaves it standing up in spikes.Then he flays his arms around some more and says something again. The other guys replies by more tapping of the computer screen.
But the best of all is when he falls asleep at work. He sits staring at the computer and slowly his eyes start to close and his head starts to nod - the first few times that happens he gets up with a start and discreetly looks around to see if any one is watching ...then shakes his head not unlike a puppy just out of water and diligently start typing again. But soon his eyes start to flutter close again and his head is nodding against his chest. Its then that the other guy hits him with the back of his hand and starts reprimanding him in Chinese - so our poor sleeping beauty shakes him self awake once again and gets back to work.
This performance is repeated at least twice a day and forms the highlight of our work day.
For those of you wondering if we ever work .. take your own guess !

On Living your dreams ...

How important is it to get the job you want? How many people are doing what they really want to do? How many of us spend our entire lives doing a job we don't even like?
There have been many things I have dreamt about doing .. about living in the mountains and writing ....on getting more invovled in social work and of finding and doing the kind of job I really want to do.
A while back I went for an interview to a media company..I Knew I was not qualified for the job also knew the chances of getting it were one in a trillion ..but I went for the interview for that one in a trillion chance and also because I simply could not let pass an interview with such a great firm .. And it was great simply great.. I royally flunked their test coz it was all about finance reporting- and they asked questions meant for an economics or commerce student and not someone with a humanities background and who needs a calculator to add 2 plus 2.But the questions about writing articles and proof reading and copy editing .. by god how I enjoyed doing them ... And I loved the ambiance and I loved talking with those people. As I stood there soaking in everything I realized how much I have missed associating with like minded professionals. My mind, my intellect has been yearning for some stimulating conversation with intelligent educated brilliant minds. I learnt Japanese because I loved the language.. I loved playing with words, I loved the art of translation I loved learning the different nuances in a language and using them. And now after a Masters in that language I am doing something that is not even remotely similar to what I had ever wanted to do.
I really respect and admire people who have the courage to give up a well paying job just to live their dreams .. I just wish I had that sort of courage ...I know no one gets the perfect job ..but please god let my next job be better and different and please give me the wisdom to find it......