Summer Camp

There is always a never ending argument on school life and college life, which one is better. Some people say school life, some say college. If you ask me I would always say School life. Like all my friends I also never realized this during school days. In those days we all had a strong feeling to get rid of it as soon as possible. Now when poor fellows like us, sub merged in professional goals and responsibilities, we dream our old days, always. The school, the recess time, the fun between lectures (and during the lecture as well ;) ), the morning prayer and every other small thing. Now all of a sudden why I am saying all these. Actually last Saturday, 16th April I went to a school with my sister and her group to attend a summer camp. The moment I entered the school, I started missing my school. I never got a chance to attend any summer camp in my school days. We used to have one day outing once in a year. With that background its beyond my imagination how much I would have enjoyed if I got a chance to attend any summer camp.
The summer camp I attended this Saturday was organized by a group named SPrayas formed by the Syntel employees. The group was not at all new to me. I attended quite a few activities organized by them. And believe me that they are not doing it for the sake of their CSR activity. They are doing it from bottom of their heart. Else I wouldn’t have seen my sister, Abhishek, Seema and other fellows doing this for more than three long years.
What I understood from the very first day’s introductory session is, the goal is to teach the students something new during this one month of summer vacation without losing their interests. These kids don’t get much chance to learn something above their educational curriculum. May be because of financial condition, may be because lack of opportunities. The entire idea is about giving them what every children deserve equally. It’s about spending some good time with them, it’s about giving them the faith of doing something special, it’s about cascading the knowledge we have to the next generation, the future of our nation.
Saturday morning we reached the school at around 8 in the morning. The kids started coming in groups and by the time we started the introduction it was around 35-40 kids in the class room. The black board, the chalks, the duster, every single stuff was reminding me my class room. We spent there almost two hours with the kids. We got to know each other, we danced together, we sang together. In short we enjoyed together. My sister is lucky that she will get this opportunity for next 30-40 days but definitely if I get time I will come back again to attend my first summer camp.

Back in Pune

Well well well!!!
First day in Pune office after a long time and I already started finding lot of interesting things about Pune and the office. Let’s talk about the things which didn’t change, The Auto service. They still refuse to go by meter and charge a bulk amount. Girls here still go out like Phulan Devi covering their faces with dupatta. Bus drivers still don’t bother to stop in the bus stop. No one still bother to maintain the traffic rules. Interestingly in front of office on Mumbai Pune highway the traffic appears to be more than last time I saw but people who cross the road still don’t bother about how fast the cars are coming. As usual they don’t look towards the cars coming and surprisingly this is working for years and years. Now come to the office. The elevators are still slow enough to make the employees desperate to take the stairs till 9th floor. Most important unchanged thing in office which affected me is the lunch. Though the vendor is changed and the number of items are increased, I still had to throw half of my food in lunch yesterday and today’s breakfast. People still talk regional language not only for chit chat but also for official work. All my colleagues still don’t wear the tie on Tuesday. The chairs are still in a condition to give you a feel like you are sitting on a half broken brunch of a tree which can collapse at any point of time. Half of the employees are still struggling with the CRT monitors. Most of the folks still don’t bother to smile if you say good morning to people whom you don’t know personally. These are only a very few things I noticed, there must be much much much more stuffs which didn’t change. Now it’s time for the change. I will start from office this time. There are no paper cups available in the break out area, I heard that admin has supplied proper cups to every employee and as I was not there on that particular time I don’t have any cup which led me to spending an entire day without coffee. I got my desktop right after my manager put the request, that was fast and honestly I didn’t expect it. People are not tailgating anymore. The biggest change of all is a change which is quiet obvious over the time period and not at all surprising but still it’s a change. I hardly know 15-20 people in this office. It’s a whole bunch of new faces. If I talk about the change in Pune, roads look in good condition, you don’t often find old buses. What else?? Nothing I could find as of now. Its less than 48 hours I spent here. I know a lot more is still to come.