Road to Nirvana

Rishi was smitten by it --- simply smitten. He was in awe of the job, the company profile, the pay, the amenities and what it promised as a brand name. Most importantly, for him at least, everyone else thought that this job would be the crowning glory of their careers, and they were quite in awe of the job, too! Therefore, it had to be good.

Rishi tried then to find out all about it. He checked all the quick routes he knew: googling for question papers, looking at yahoo groups and firing off an email to anyone in any college he knew where this company had visited. He got hold of all the urban legends about the interviews, what they grilled about, what sort of dress code was expected, he wanted it all! And what he really wanted was a shortcut: somehow to trick the interviewers and sneak in. Rishi's time in the last few days oscillated between memorizing answers to questions they had asked earlier and finding out the latest rumours about the company. Who cared about the textbooks and what he had learnt? He knew the answers to the questions that they had been asking, and that was all that was going to matter! What if they asked him to elaborate the answer? Umm... he'll manage something.

Finally, D-day arrived: the company visited their campus. But fate had dealt the quirkiest blow to his dreams --- Rishi wasn't shortlisted at all! And why so? Because apparently his resume didn't show promise. He was on the borderline of the marks requirements, but the recruiters were looking for something else. "What the fuck else??", he echoed along with many of his friends. He never really understood how that uncool nerdy Kapil was selected! He even had lower marks than Rishi did! Yeah fine he asked a few intelligent questions in the class --- but how, just how?? How did they see promise in him whereas they didn't do in Rishi?

All his notions were disabused now. Rishi openly proclaimed his hatred for the company. How it made disasters out of its employees, how they had no social life. He hunted on Orkut for all the "I hate ___" communities, told everybody else all the rumours he could find there. When asked, he would say, "I don't care!". But he did care. Even though he never told anyone, he still cared. He expressed glee when the stocks fell even by a single rupee, he grinned secretly when he read a newspaper article about how that company might face competition in the future from some other startups. But he still knew its worth, and wanted to be a part of it. Oh, he didn't want to work for it though: "I'll sneak in" is what he thought and applied again, in secret this time.

When the second rejection came, however, Rishi was truly beyond caring. He had a job from another mass recruiter, and he was content. He had applied himself to his studies, he found the new concepts really interesting. He even succeeded in getting the highest marks in one subject! Oh, it was all so interesting to him now: he even wrote and presented a paper about it in the IIT Techfest. There was so muc to learn, to explore and find out. There couldn't be a doubt --- he liked what he did. Sometimes he even smiled to himself how he had hankered after a petty job. He had honestly stopped caring about the job now, any job! He wanted to go for an MTech, or maybe an MS in the USA if he could. There was a certain peace within himself now that he didn't want the job any more.

And then, one fine morning, he found in his inbox an email from the HR of that ____ company. "Dear Mr. Rishi, we are pleased to offer you .... ". They were offering him a job. Apparently their management had been very impressed with him during his paper presentation and wanted him to come and continue his work at their company. As he finished reading through the email, Rishi smiled. It had come to him only when he didn't need it any more --- his detachment had made him worthy of the job itself.