Taken for Granted

Not many people in this world know the meaning of Taken for Granted, well, I think this is one of the qualification to pass the exam called innocence. I appeared sometime back and failed miserably with negative marks, this exam was conducted by a famous internet service provider called Sify. I am partly happy that I won't have to count myself in the innocent crowd. I am partly sad since I lost my innocence ;-).

Alright, here is a study material for those who want to lose their innocence by knowing what Taken for Granted means.

My name must be notorious in Sify's customer service wing, then how the hell they can tell my history just by my name, (thinking)... maybe the recorded conversation between me and the many of the CS team members would have been used by Sify's (in)efficient management team to fire some of their employees to cover their arse. Well, did I say that I lost my innocence? ;-). Damn! Let me replay that conversation in my mind, hmm, a bit loudly so that you can also hear.

Kari, the internet is not working da, this fell on me twice. First one in my ear, the next one in my head. It was Chakku who calmly chanted this to me, I know he was screaming inside, because this is the 100th time we are having this issue in 1 year (well Sachin should learn from Sify on how to hit a century without struggling ;-)). I did not think twice, sprung up from my seat and dialled 02026051002, (Pune Sify CS number). This number wins the award for the most dialled number in my mobile. The call failed thrice, uhhh! it rung atlast, I was curious, and to keep me excited, the ring was alive for 6 times and died. Chakku glazed at me and asked what happened without saying a word, I shook my head and tried again... this time, got through the interactive mode, hoo haa!.

Sify CS member: Good morning, this is Pramod here, how can I help you?
Me: My id is karikalan01, k for.. a for...
Pramod: Thank you for the details, what is the issue?
Me: The internet connection is not working for past 3 days, and I have logged a complain plenty of times in 3 days, I was told that it will be resolved within 24 hours, now it is more than 3 days.
Pramod: What can I do for you today?
Me: Don't you see that in the history?
Pramod: Can you tell me, what error you are getting?
Me: BB101-Gateway not found.
Pramod: Have you tried unplugging the cable / restarting the PC ?
Me: I have even tried throwing my PC from the 2nd floor.
Pramod: Can you ping the gateway?
Me: It is not pinging, Request Timed out.
Pramod: I think we are having an outage in our server for past 1 week, I will raise a ticket and our back-end team will attend this within 24 hours.
Me: That is of no use for me, you said the same 3 days ago and nothing happened.
Pramod: It is a usual practice for us.
Me: What? committing to 24 hours and not turning up for 3 days?
Pramod: Yes, no Karikalan, within 24 hours our engineer will attend your case.
Me: My dear Pramod, don't you understand? you said the same 3 days ago, what is the assurance that you will not throw this as well in the bin ?
Pramod:....
Me: Who is your supervisor?
Pramod: Sorry?
Me: Who is your boss? Transfer the call to him.
Pramod: Sir, the issue will be resolved within 12 hours.
Me: I just want to talk to your supervisor, and see what he has to say, and do not tell me that he is busy in an another call.
(2 mins later)
Pramod: He is busy in an another call.
Me: What is the solution now? I do not have the net connection and I cannot do my work and this is the case for 3 days.
Pramod: Karikalan, you can go to the nearest sify iWay and do the browsing.
Me: Would my broadband account work from there?
Pramod: No, you will have to pay for that like any other net cafe.
Me: (now you can imagine the heat in me). So you are telling me to go to the net cafe and do my work because you cannot provide me the service?
Pramod: Yes sir.
Me: hmmmm, excellent, is this call being recorded?
Pramod: Yes sir.
Me: Would you ever play this to do quality assurance? Well, I bet not, if it was, we would not be talking now.
Pramod: This is an issue with our cable provider ICC, we cannot do much about it.
Me: I do not want to hear about your problems, I just need the solution and I pay you for the service. Who is going to pay my 3 days business loss, phone calls made to CS, Internet cafe charges we...
Pramod: What can we do if ICC is not providing any good service sir?
Me: Ahhrr! Let me tell you loud and clear, play this to your entire CS team and ofcourse to your management team. "Even a shit smells better than your service. It is shit, let me repeat it, it is shit".
Pramod: Yes, no sir, I have passed the urgent request to the back-end team.
Me: Don't you feel ashamed of yourself for providing a crap service like this?
Pramod: No sir, I have marked this as a high priority. This will be resolved in 24 hours.
Me: It's better be.

Being taken for granted can be a compliment sometimes (since it means that you have become comfortable or a trusted person in another person's life), but what to say when the consumers are taken for granted like above even after paying more than it's worth.

Sorry Pramod, I know you cannot do much sitting in CS desk and logging calls, but you are working for an organization who pretend that they treat the customers as kings before subscribtion and as beggers after subscription. I am afraid, your service sucks.

Here you go, I am beginning to realise how big is Sify as a parent, since I am meeting more successors of Sify everyday ;-). Do not be surprised, their names are Tata Indicom and Airtel. This time, my strategy is different, the complain numbers are being noted ;-).

I had an another interesting conversation with Sify where I tried to explain that the switch was stolen and we need a replacement to get our internet connection working, it took a week for them to understand what I was trying to say and note that I was talking to their technical team ;-(.

Voluntary Madness

Here goes a successor of Alien vs Me.

...yeah the truth tastes like a beer, yuk, not tasty ha ;-). So, here is how the war was fought between me and Mr. Alcohol.

Drunkard sitter appointed, name is Jose, Don Jose. He was very generous to do this job without any compensation, no compensation? you may shout, yeah Jose is new to this job ;-).

I am onto a mission, lead me to do something strange, something dangerous, something which changed my life entirely... alright, alright, I am partly lying ;-).

Jose is one of the few from my trust planet, but he lived in (earth) Stratford. Did he promise that he will look after me if I go crazy? do not ask me ;-). I thought Jose never knew who fear was, until he invited Cristina (our friend) to this adventure.

The year was 2003; The day was fixed, friday; dinner was ready, curry; beverages were rolled, now I realised that Jose invited some more to the party - beer, whisky, wine and champagne.

Heard "Ding... Dong..." 8 times, yeah, it was 8 pm; evening swallowed half of it's life; central line threw me and Jose in Stratford; prawn puris, some rotis, butter chicken and jalfrezi, costed 30 pounds; Stratford bus station, shopping mall, McDonalds, KFC, curry house, college, kebab shop, a big Sainsbury... hmmm yeah Jose's flat is bit of a walk. We marched, Jose was like a jet, I was like a duck.

"Hey Kari! let us not do this today", a voice boat cruised through me. It was familiar, yeah, it was mine. "aahh, come on, do not look back, be a real man", yeah, you are right, me again ;-).

When I gathered myself up, it was warm, heard the door closing behind me, we were inside Jose's flat. Jose visited his kitchen to make it up (he loves his kitchen ;-)), the sofa was soft, I innaugrated Channel 4.

Quick it was, first sip of the whisky passed through my throat and then spine; thirsty I was for ages, that is how I felt; beer, wine, whisky and champaign; it continued to flow; I continued to drown; 3 pegs bottoms up; zhhoom... 30 minutes passed; heavy was my head; crossed were my eyes; there were Jose triplets, Cristina clones; I was floating & blabbering; Jose tried to control me; both Cristinas were not in the room; think I was swearing, Jose was red, furious; did I care? ha ha, did not want to; let me stand up, no let me walk; my steps were going deep down in the valley; am I under the water?; did someone click slow motion?; let me get on the table, success.. wahey; tune.. do you hear that, la la la.. let me dance; danda nakka.. danda nakka... very traditional; kicked the bottles, what? yes it broke; Whoops! do you know what I did? smile, laugh, giggle.. that is all I could do; the liquor and food spilled on the mattress; one Cris shouted at me; I laughed; 2 Joses scolded me; I laughed; 3rd Jose said, get out of my flat, he was holding my shirt and dragged me out of his flat, I accidentally banged into the TV, the TV went off....

Jose threw the remote on the sofa and said "Hey Kari, come on let us start the party!".

I forgot to blink, blrblrblrblr!?!? shook my head, uhhhh What!? ufff, it took sometime to sense the truth, yeah I was dreaming and I was paranoid.

A cute spanish accented voice, "Hey Kari, are you alright?", it was Cristina.

I am ok, let us start, I said. Naah! Let us drink first, Jose said.

this time, it was real. Becks, Screw Driver, Red wine and a home made whisky were wramp walking on the table. "get.. set.." GOOOOOOO!!! the alien entered my blood territory.

Slowly, burnt my taste buds, throat, lungs. I felt warm somewhere deep down in my stomache
2 rounds of becks, tried touching my nose... perfect.
a line of screw driver, tried touching my fingers, pefect than ever.
2 squares of wine, looked around... could not see Jose's twin, you can guess ;-).
a glowblet of glaalss of whhikksy... staaedy I ma, you think I am drunk ?

no way... let me prove it.
Straight line drawn in the hall; hand in the air positioned to my shoulder, like a flight; Forward March.. left & right.. left & right.. no flaws, a trained soldier.
Nose game again... both of my big fingers were bang on the nose target. Ouch!

Really, I was alright, my head was a bit heavy. Well, I spoke less fluently, yes it was late. Wish me, Jose and Cris shared the same mother toungue.

Surprise, Surprise for Jose, his eyes were wide open, yeah, he forgot to blink, ha.
"You are a strong man Kari", spilled Jose.
Laugh... it was Cris.

yeah, I didn't get drunk, hmmm, maybe the consciousness killed the flavour, maybe it is meant to be ;-). Who knows.. my dream might have come true, thank God for keeping Jose still in my planet ;-).

Lights off, I fell on the sofa, what an attempt, not the one to be proud about, ahhh!?!? especially after seeing what alcohol can do, I dared to give a try, faaah... yeah, not the one to be proud about, but my stand never changed, yeah unbeaten in the war with this alien ;-). I closed my eyes, did I snore ;-).

The next morning, Thirsty, first thing I felt; Water, first thing I wanted. Head was heavy and the pain was mild; I was stinking bitter; yes I was going through a famous feeling called "Hang over".

I switched on the TV and it said...
Drunkenness is nothing but a voluntary madness.
..
..
Sorry? Did you ask whether I kissed a... cigarette? ;-).