A Welcome break for thoughts

After a very long boring year or so I finally took a quick long weekend break.
I am not too social as it is and my current job - where we dont have much of a team really being scattered as it is -
so no outings, lunches etc - the usual corporate hoopla and thus for a very long time my only outing was to the shopping mall.

So this was was a very very unplanned trip. Some girls at my office had a planned outing with some other of their friends and a common friend suggested to join them.So I and my sister were virtual outsiders in that group and then other girls too joined and it was one tortourously packed cab we were in .

So prior to my usual rant - few lines about this quick trip to Coorg - it had its moments.



That moment atop Talacauvery temple and at Raja's seat at Madikeri to get a view of the mountains with fog and clouds.
Then the walk to the Abbey falls in rain - it was a beautiful waterfall - but for me the euphoric thing was unlike quite a few girls I did
not get any leeches onto me. Seriously since the time I heard of Coorg - I who have a perenial scare of all crawling stuff was quite
worried.

Finally we hurried off most places to get to Nagarhole - but it was one big dissapointment. When the safari van chap
does not close the doors you know nothing wild's around in the forest.
Nothing really - just deer deer and more deer and as they say so many deer means no tigers.
Not sure if we were unlucky not to spot any or its a nice coverup as many Indian things are.
But what I remember of that ride in nagarhole was the fresh and fragrant smell of forest . It was very very nice.
When you came out you could tell the difference.

In fact with the group of excited young women that I was with paddy fields on the way seemed to be
most entertaining with everyone posing their photographs.

All in all it was a welcome break for me - It was a experience though despite the travel discomfort of being packed up in a cab.
But I needed it to tear myself away from my laptop. It just isnt work - I sort of seem to be stuck with it - to avoid thinking .

So firstly the whole group was the very young brigade - hyper excited , jovial - the just out of girls college syndrome.
I was quite apprehensive on this count .
Also I sometimes I feel its better for me to maintain some personal distance with people at office.
The below incident explains why

Vibrant vivacious and very sweet this girl who sits two cubicles from me and I are in same room with my sister.
It starts such
You got the hike ? How less they give :( but at least you got. You must be a rich girl.
Me: Try to play along - Yeah Yeah you are as rich as you feel
She: OOOO and my sis tooo joins in with ooooooooo
What I wanted to say: kiddo when i was your age I did not have a penny in hand - money is bloody important -
but what for the money is also as important - as is being peaceful at least ,if not happy with your surroundings.


She: How much experience you have XXX - Oh really I did not know that.
Then why are you here - you should jump and get such a good hike

Me: But well I am used to the good life here and work too is not bad and I have my perks of not being answerable theoretically half the time to anyone really - I have my issues but where are there no issues.
See in other jobs I'd never have been able to take this holiday as easily - though Id been abale to afford a expensive one
- so for me things balance out
She: But see this is the age to work work and earn. later we cant esp after marriage etc etc.
I cant afford anything with what they pay - have to buy a car.

What I wanted to say: My dear I am already at a age where I am tired - (then I would have rethought - really -
at what age did you not have the inertia disease.)
Seriously when such sweet young people offer advice so overwhelmingly confidently I can only remember one quote -
esp as since a decade -I think of myself as old

" I am not young enough to know everything"

She: This place has so much politics, this that and about her manager , other managers
Me: Have you worked anywhere else prior to here
I finally say what I wanted to say - I have worked a a few more places so let me tell you ,
while all you say may be true - wherever you go dont expect any different - just that they will pay you more which is good surely.

Its always been nice to work with young people their enthusiasm and all , but somehow there is a sense of discomfort.
Because they haven't seen the other part of life. for e.g these I wish they would have a look at their juniors from 2009 who had seen their dreams crashing. What you get easy - one never values is what Ive seen and learnt from them.

As I said its the exuberance of youth - and as much as I like to watch it from a distance - getting cozy with them
raises such uncomfortable situations to which I have the answers but not the heart to slam it onto their faces.

P.S: Seriously I have my extravagant tastes - books for one or lil diamonds for another - , but why do people including my sister have a problem if that isnt buying a car or splurging on restaurants and dresses at sales of their choice.
I dont condemn their tastes - but whenever I end up in company of such people they have this way of making me feel like I am a miser.
I am surely compared to them - but thats how I am and have no qualms about it.

My sisters an expert at these esp with her interpretation of "The Ant and the Grasshopper" Aesop fable.
Most version I checked on google - specify that ants turn their backs on the grasshopper - and then the moral of the story is displayed about " there is a time for work and time for play"
Buy my dear sister and me in our childhood must have read a kinder version wherein the ants after giving a long moral of the story
ask the grasshopper to join in - in return for singing for them.
So here's the moral of the story she picks up -
After all the grashopper said sorry and it was just a short repreive and all Grasshopper does is sing along
doing what it loves and lives happily.

In a way she's damned right and probably the world is skewed that way.
Grasshoppers always find ants who sustain them.