One Day in the Life of

Yes, I am that jobless.

It was all calm and quiet from outside, almost as if nobody was home. I am known to exhibit an eerie inclination to land on friends’ front doors unannounced. Thankfully, Neethu was home. “You’re here already!”, she exclaimed, quite surprised with my early arrival for a lunch appointment. “Yeah, I was feeling bored. So, here I am.” The time was half past eleven and nobody else was home. A few minutes of catching up ensued and then, a cake arrived. It seemed like it was going to be a relaxed Saturday after all.

The telephone rang. And then it rang again. And then she made another phone ring somewhere. Meanwhile, I was leisurely flitting from car to car in Autocar, the car and bike magazine. “You’re coming with me, right? Of course you are.”, she said to me. In less than five minutes, we were in a car whizzing past the city limits to the CESS office. Yeah, that’s the Centre for Earth Science Studies. I got busy in reading the news articles pinned on the notice board at the entrance while she went in to meet someone. A few minutes later, Strange Lady comes in and starts a conversation with me.
“Are you here for a project?”
“No, I’m here with a friend.”
“Oh, the other girl! I saw you two getting off the car.”

Doesn’t that sound like a logical place where any self respecting person would stop an unwelcome conversation with a stranger who was busy reading the notices in the first place? Apparently not for some strange ladies. She went on to tell me all about her life, her education, her qualifications, her designation and then, her husband, his education, his qualifications, his designation and then, her son and his so on and so forth. Before she could go on to her sisters and nieces, Neethu came back and announced that we were invited for lunch at the canteen. So, we had a nice traditional Mallu lunch.

Next, we headed to meet someone else, who gave us a lecture on EIA (Environmental Impact Assessment) and basically why these folks do the work they do. We were all set to leave when Strange Lady reappeared out of nowhere and requested to be dropped off at PMG. I would have wanted to say no a thousand times over but the driver had already said yes. At least this time I wouldn’t have to endure it alone. She started with a conference she was attending earlier that morning and added that she was heading back there as well. Just to clarify, nobody asked for such information to the best of my knowledge. She went on to talk about her husband next and then her son. More information poured out about his college and applications to universities and all that stuff. The driver enquired about our destination and she went overboard with, “Oh that place? I know that very well. I'll direct you there. Don't worry.” I had officially stopped listening to her with that. She was basically one of those old women you read about in short stories and wonder how you’ve never really met anyone like that. PMG seemed ages away but it finally came and she got off, waving a very dubious goodbye.

We got back to her house, stayed there for less than five minutes and left in another direction whizzing past city limits yet again to her under-construction house. A phone call to a guy with a girl’s name who responds to my name with, “she’s a weird girl”, happened. A few hours and a few FRIENDS episodes on a faulty laptop that made everything look like infra-red vision later, we headed back. And with that ended one day in the life of Blah! Blah! Blah!

Going bananas

It all started as I thought of starting a banana chips shop at Trivandrum next year. Add half a day of coding with an unfinished statement of purpose and placement strategies running in the background and this is the level of insanity that results. Here's what followed.

Vani, possibly having reached equal levels of insanity, decides to join me.
Vani's a business partner.

Surbhi is not planning on staying far from the action and decides that she will be given two packets every month free of cost.
“Let’s take the product to North India! I will tell everyone I know that banana chips are amazing.”
“Well, we can always appoint a dedicated sales force to do that for us. Why would we give you two free packets to do this?”
She decides to change strategy. “I will tell everyone that your chips are useless. Nobody will eat them.” She wins.
Surbhi gets free chips. Launching in North India.

A certain Hippo yawns, “I booked the franchisee first for North India.”
“Done.”
“Are you sure about your business prospects?”
“We’re discussing it around an imaginary round table as we speak.”
Hippo appointed as franchisee in North India.

“Count me in!”, pings Aditya.
“As a what?”
“As a cook. I'm pretty good.”
“But I actually want to carry this out.”
“Honestly.”
“Okay, welcome aboard.”
“And if we do well in the first 2-3 years we'll open a branch in Dubai. And then we'll come to Insti for placements.”
“Of course. We’ll be taking MAs mostly as part of sales force.
“We'll make commercials with them perhaps or let them just cut the bananas.”
Sundar Aditya appointed as executive cook.

Er-what-arbitness expression fills Divya’s face. She is unanimously chosen to be the license provider.
Divya IAS shall provide licenses.

“When you start a food business, first rule is to appoint someone who won't eat up whatever you make. Hippo? Seriously? Rahul Venkatraj - chief taster (quality control). I have previous experience in a kwality walls ice-cream factory.
“Wonderful. Work ex is always welcome. Welcome aboard.”
Aruppu appointed chief taster with reco from Kwality Walls.

Pressure comes up with, “How can you forget Bangalore? I will market it in the whole of Karnataka!”
“Why should we choose you for Bangalore?” On spot interview begins.
“I have spanned Karnataka from Bidar to Chamrajnagar, from Bellary to Madikeri!”
“Sold! Welcome aboard. “
“So I have got clearance from all of the board of directors! WOW! Can we also market banana chips cut longitudinally? That will be new!”
“Right now, we are focusing on the basic model only. We will keep you updated.”
Kshitij appointed franchisee for the *whole of Karnataka* and not just Bangalore.

The honourable BC, Dickens, makes his contribution with, “I want to do the chip design :)”
“Ah, why should we hire you?”
“I'm an experienced chip designer. My BTP is in chip design. Ever since childhood I have had a fervid desire to be a chip designer.”
“I see. Have you faced any obstacles in any chip designing that you did and how did you deal with it?”
“Obviously the design of any good chip is never free from obstacles. You might know that the famous Banana Dual Core Chip is my brainchild.”
“That’s an interesting idea. Could you elaborate on that?”
“Not, really, I'm afraid it's trademarked.”
Quick! Hire him before we lose him. “Welcome aboard!”
Dickens appointed as chip designer with trademarked Banana Dual Core chip on the cards.

“Hey you missed out on me. I need some job too.”
“You have to apply! We won’t come looking for you, you know.”
”Do we need to upload CV? I’m applying for the AP zone.”
“Ok. why should we hire you?”

“Well firstly I am a huge fan of banana chips. Secondly I am also telling you (having been a resident of AP for like 18 years) that banana chips has a huge market there, but is marketed poorly. So you’ll get multitudes of contracts just from my region.”

“Welcome aboard.”
BG appointed for AP division.

“Volunteering for TN division!”
“Ah, why should we hire you?”
“I have experience in tasting a wide variety of banana chips from various parts of Kerala and Tamil Nadu. This way I can eat a banana chip and tell you if it was made in TN or Kerala in a jiffy. Besides, TN is a very big market.”
Impressed by the market fundaes. “Welcome aboard.”
Deepak appointed for TN division.

“You can get the bananas from my farm.”
“Do you have a farm?”
“I will in the near future and then you’ll get bananas from the rich Palakkad soil.”
“Wonderful!”
Ragesh to supply raw material.

“I shall be the graphic designer for all your design needs.”
“Welcome aboard.”
Multi for all design needs.

"Gimme middle east distribution marketing and sales Qatar UAE Bahrain Saudi.", pings Noufal
"But why should we hire you?"

"Because I have conties in middle east, so I have sufficient experience and networks on ground already up and running. I have prior experience in fmcg and sufficient cheap manpower from mallu land."

"I see. What prospects do you see by expanding to these zones? "

"Well any enterprise started by Ms. Leela Aarthy would definitely have the potential to be a global brand. Ms. Leela Aarthy likes this. Middle East has a number of mallus, I mean probably more than Kerala and if you see a potential in Trivandrum and Kerala as a whole it is bound to work in the Middle East."

Noufal appointed franchisee for the Middle East.

All that in the span of a few hours. :)

Updates:
Whitelighter to take over sponsorship and so on.
Shrav for internet advertising.