As a child when they used to make us fill a form under the question, what you want to be when you grow up ? that was a simple question without any answer and used to wear the look of Salman Rushdie. I could never ever come up with one word that describe me or utter a word to fill in that form and housemother used to help us find the word like ‘nurse’ or ‘teacher’, which I never wanted to be but, I let it be that way, because I did not know the answer and some form needs to be filled, without having any answers. But in my teen years, one thing was very clear, I wanted to go to college and wanted to be self dependent in my life; that's it, nothing was clear after that.
When I was in college I thought I was on sleepwalk and did not know what to expect from life. Or lets make it even more easier to understand, I have no dream for my life, which will help me to move ahead constantly. There was no goal in my life to work on.
It could have been 93 - 94, I was looking for job then, I have just completed my I.com and also had completed diploma in secretary course, hoping this will help me to find a job faster. It was the time, when there was no mobile phone and land-line was hard to get at high price and long list of people to wait for more than a year and most of the house I could afford did not have the phone connection then. So it was not easy for me to leave my contact number on my CVs.
In the midst of all this also, I do remember getting a call for an office that was in Putalisadak at the Pacific Building. There was this guy whose name was Mr. Chakovarty, who looked like the Sales Manager. He was a very smart Indian guy. Apart from his curly hair and he being dark and tall like Indian I do not remember much of his other features. As he saw me entered in the office, he reshuffled his short listed candidates and called me for the interview first.
After the interview with others, which I do not remember now; he stopped me for a small briefing also. The reason he stopped me for briefing was he had some positions vacant in his office, one is for secretary and the other post he was looking for was some smart salespersons. He was interested to hire me as a salesperson not as secretary, for which I had applied for.
If I would have been a smart girl with clear cut goal in my life, I could have grabbed that opportunity at once, as it was first job in my life. But; because I grew up in Bal Mandir, the people I grew up with, knew nothing about good career and best opportunity in hand and therefore they could not have been trusted for their judgement to guide me to decide, which one to take as my first job. Their horizon was very much limited to the ‘window vista’. I was trained and expected to be secretary in any office and that job of salesperson was somewhat I was not expected to be.
People who say poor people see their dreams in black and white must have some reason to believe that way. But on the other hand, do you know blind people never see color dreams in their life ? They say to grow in life you have to have peer pressure also to see them as inspiration. If there was none to look up, so how and where will we find those inspiration in life ?
In my case it was the same thing, besides for six months [ during my training as a secretary ] I kept hearing from people around me to become a secretary, after the course. Stupid as I am and as I was, I did not return to the Indian man's request to be in touch with my answer, because I was not mentally prepared to take the job of a salesperson.
It took me another couple of years to enter again in the Marketing and Sales department of The Everest Hotel as a sales secretary. When I entered hotel, I learned that the post was vacant for last six months and they could not find a single person to fill the position and out of the hotel I could not find any job. When I applied for the job I was selected instantly and they called me after about a week or so to join the duty, purely because big company do not hire anyone on any day of the month. Their hiring has to make it easy for them to calculate not just for salary sheet but there are many other reasons too.
However, it took me couple of years more to realize, why I was letting that six months of my life's training to decide the entire career of my life; when I went to colleges for four full years to be more than just an office secretary. But, I have to be thankful to work time in Hotel, where I got the opportunity to see and work with people who were more confident and smarter than me, and I just watched them and wonder what they have which I don't have ? Where did they get that kind of self confidence ?
Okay, besides having parents or going to abroad for their studies. Their college education was not much more than what I had studied here. This really made me think hard for long and then one day I have to leave hotel, despite my friends judgement not to leave the permanent job behind. It was presumed that looking at my background that was something stupid decision to make.
I have this habit of throwing myself in the most uncomfort zone in my life, where I have never ever been and none of my friends I know in my life have been. But However I do take pride in saying that wherever I worked I hardly bumped with people, with whom I went to college or school. It maybe not easy all the time, as they say its easy to work with the people with whom we share some kind of compatibility, but in my case its never the same. I did once bumped with a guy in a company but he was the first boy when I was in school. other than that I had never bumped with anyone.
I am thankful to Subhashini Rana who was my boss in Hotel, she once said to me that, “ in life you have to be serious about your career not anyone”. And I have learned one thing that, if I don't take myself seriously, no one is going to take me seriously. Besides there is one more important thing I have learned, I have to prove myself not to seek the acceptance from the people for who I am and what I am. There is nothing wrong in daring to dream in color.
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