Me Myself and Mysore

The last year of engineering was going great for me, from start to end. From 23 June 2005 to 18 June 2006 !!

23 June 2005 because : I gave my first interview that day... and cleared !! I was a "Infoscion" since that day. They had given a specific info on that day... "you will undergo training at our Mysore campus. " And they had assured that "those will be the best days of your life" !!

The year passed on... projects.. exams.. project competitions.. winning at national level.. everything was going smoothly.

Then 18 June 2006 because: I gave last oral of my engg life.. came back home only to find a mail from Infy, Mysore. That was end of BE.

Mail stated "training at Mysore from 17 July 2006. Accomodation available for 1 week". Little was known that the second part was about to cause a havoc. Only 1 week prior to the "set sail" orders, we came to know the real meaning of "1 week" clause... we were not offered the on campus accomodation and we had to find our own accommodation after that !!

Be it treks, camps or trips I had not lived out for more than 1 week from home. (This was parents concern.. of course :) ). They managed to "hunt down" a family member who was in Mysore. Mr and Mrs Shah. I will came to that part latter.

So one fine after Me, Jaideep and Roy packed our bags and left for Mysore. We reached Banglore on next day, and in Mysore by noon. The day was 15 July. We were going to live at my "aunt"s place for 1 day and search for a house which we were going to occupy with in next 7 days.

We took taxi from Mysore CBT and with address in one hand, finding a number "57 E&F block, Kuvempunagar". That was first view of Mysore. No buildings.. tailer made roads, people waiting for signals, and bungalows bungalows everywhere !!! As expected we couldn't find the destination, thanks to taxi driver, and then we stopped to call my aunt to ask for directions. The name of the hotel from where I was calling was "Sri ShanthiSagar".. little I knew that time that this hotel was going to become a inseparable part of our lives in Mysore.

We reached the address finally. And taxi wallah charged us .... really nothing compared to Pune rates. And even though we were meeting for the first time, Shah family welcomed us cordially.

Welcome Mysore. Uncle called one of his friend who was a real estate agent and was going to show us some houses on the next day.

And he did so ...
My first house hunting experience... He was leading us through the ever-calm streets of Mysore. We were following him in a auto.

First house we visited was "1669, Vijay Padma, P&T Block, Raman Maharshi road, Kuvempunagar, Mysore - 570023". Only word .. we were stumped.. bungalow with marble all over the house, huge hall.. dinning, 3 HUGE bedrooms, 1 sit-out area, nice garden around the place... enough parking space for 6 bikes. If the city was Pune, the rent would easily have been no less than 40k !!! We were getting that for 10K !!! "Welcome to Mysore" !!

We eventually decided to move in.. 7 of us.. all friends from VIT, Pune. Me, JaBa, Roy, Samya,
Kelya, Gujju and Snowy.

Next day the remaining public arrived and we all shifted to hotels provided by Infy. Next day was "the" day.

That was a memorable day! 330 acres of amazing planning !! Professionalism personified. You can feel that from the main gate to toilet :) everywhere..

So the training started off...

Not to talk about the days schedule... starting from home at 7 .. then break-fast at the FC1.. training sessions .. leaving class rooms (strictly) at 5:30... and then games.. they just have everything there...


to be continued...