Monday, June 11, 2007

Work it out

Rachel - I know I know!! He's a... he's a... transponster!
Monica - THAT'S NOT EVEN A WORD!!!!!!

Fellow fans of the TV series F.R.I.E.N.D.S will know what I am talking about. This is one of my favourite scenes from the series, not just because of the way Chandler reacts to none of his close friends knowing his occupation, but because of how true this phenomenon is.

For years I have faced questions like:

"So Sayesha, how's the newspaper going?" (What newspaper??)

"I heard you're like a journalist and stuff?" (Where did you hear that?)

"So do they send you to places with natural disasters for news reporting?" (Huh??)

"Is your job dangerous?" (Yeah, very. Editors of kids' books and magazines are shot on the streets of Singapore.)

"Man, I heard you're the Chief Editor of the largest newspaper in Singapore! That's cool yaar!" (I wish! Actually I don't. Newspapers? Bleah.)

"So MBA over?" (MBA? Who's doing an MBA? If you mean Masters in Mass Communication, yeah, that's over.)

And that's when it struck me - instead of being glad that most of them at least know vaguely that I have abandoned engineering for good and plunged into publishing, I go "What buggers! They're supposed to be my close friends and they don't even know what I do!" without wondering for a moment if I know for sure what the hell they do.

I mean face it, your friends, your cousins... do you really know what they do? I for one, don't. I mean I know some are in IT, some are in banks, some are doing their MBA degrees, some are doing random things, but if you ask me exactly what they do, which company they are in, what their designation is, what they are studying, I have no clue most of the time!

Take for example this cousin of mine. Every time I speak to him, I ask him the same question. In fact, I've been asking the same question for years now, "So have you graduated from university? Got your IT degree?" And he keeps saying he hasn't. So either he's flunking every year, or I have been asking him the question since he was in primary school.

When you become friends with someone, the first thing you find out is what they do. But the closer you get, the less it matters what they do, and after a while, it stops mattering. And by then, not only have you forgotten what they do, but you're such close friends that you have missed the window period of friendship when you can actually ask them, "So what exactly do you do?" Even trying to be smart and asking them, "So what's up, man? What have you been upto?" will get you answers like "Same old yaar..." or "Still working in the same place..." while on the inside you're dying to ask, "And what exactly was the same old?" or "What is that place again?"

And that's when I discovered this wonderful solution called Orkut. We may curse it for all the random "frand shib requests" and "Nice profile. I want to friend you. You want to friend me?" messages, but the truth is - it can help you in a way no one can.

Every moment of every day, long-lost friends are getting in touch through Orkut. Visit the profile of any of your friends and you will see messages like "Hi Bhaiya, remember me? I was your junior in school, you used to snatch my tiffin box!" or "Man, you look so different from school days!" or "Hey, remember me? We were in the same IIT coaching class!" or "I can't believe I found you after so many years! How are Uncle and Aunty and Didi?" Now the trick is to follow the trail of these long lost friends of your friends, for they are bound to ask your friend at one point or the other, "So what do you do?" And when you see that, bingo! You go to that person's scrapbook, read your friend's reply, and lo and behold, you know exactly what your friend does for a living!

Of course, do remember to disable 'profile visit views' before you go on your spying spree or you may just end up with a message like "Why you visited my profile? Now I want to friend you."



34 comments:

manju said...

GOLD !!!!

manju said...

Read the post too :) I agree with you completely on what the closest of friends do to their living. I too don't know what few of my friends do, though we know each other for quite long time.

manju said...

And I love that episode of F.R.I.E.N.D.S. Its such a funny quizzing episode.

Neihal said...

hahahahaa

so u got the solution to one of the more embarrassing problems :P

I never looked at it that ways but now that u have written I realize it is only in the beginning that we take notice of those details and once u become close friends those things dont matter. not a good thing though :P

and yeah I love that episode but I totally hated the move afterwards. I still skip those episodes :D

Neihal said...

SILVER !!


and that lesson I was talking about in that post was on political correctness on TGFI :P

Sakshi said...

Is that why you vacuum your scrap book? I keep peeking in there to see what you exactly do ;)

Navya said...

hehe ..I watched that episode just yesterday. [ Re-viewing the series for the Nth time.]

I do agree on the part that it matters lesser as we get closer to our friends and leave the questions at "Same old routine .. " and move ahead to more 'important' topics :P

Sayesha said...

#Manju,
Hehehehe, I love that episode too! :)

#Neihal,
I agree! Monica and Rachel so don't go in that guy-house! :P

#Sakshi,
Ya allah! Tu dhakkan thi, dhakkan hai aur dhakkan hi rahegi! You will not find what I do in MY scrapbook! Go to my friends' scrapbooks! :P

#Crazy,
//and move ahead to more 'important' topics :P

Hehehe! :P :P

Thisisme said...

hehhee...true very true..but i jst quizzed myself mentally n voila i do knw what most of my frnds exactly do in their offc/line of work..maybe m the odd one out to remember all such sundry details :P

Bivas said...

actually I do know what most of my friends do...but probably bcoz I keep chkng out the signatures at the bottom of their mails ;-)...dats another smart way to keep track (Apart from orkut of course) :D
Waise who cares abt profile visits disabled...its an open forum rite! Sometimes it can be beneficial...one never knows ;-)

Sayesha said...

#Thisisme,
Wah wah, you're better than me then! Now do something - draw your family tree (both mom's side and dad's side), list all cousins, do you know what each of them does? Muahahaha! :D

#Bivas,
//bcoz I keep chkng out the signatures at the bottom of their mails ;-)...dats another smart way to keep track

Hai raam! You use office email to keep in touch with friends?? Hai raaaaam!!! :O :O :O Arre koi jao re HR ko bulao re!

abhartiya said...

haha..very true indeed!

what do you do by the way?? :P

about disabling the profile visitor thngy, try disabling it for once and then simultaneously visit all our friends (who you do not want to notice you visiting their profile) and then enable it again, the visitor's list refreshes at a rate much faster than it usually does i.e. once in 2 days or so..

Thisisme said...

sash

:D:D sounds funny though..but i do knw what all of them do :))
i actually , out of curiosity, did this exercise some time back..jst to check how much do i knw abt my own family..n i succeeded to quite an extent..yeh keh lo..ki haathiyon wali memory hai :))

creepa said...

Well said!
even better,check out their communities for their workplace/colleges/etc. :D

Unknown said...

Oohh:) True true, I really am blur on what some of my cousins do:o And but of course, disbaling profile visit views was the first thing I did when I signed up..muahahahha

Iday said...

Hahha...

Now tell me this. Have u graduated from that University??? :P :P :P

Sakshi said...

Evil grin..
So now you give me leave to peek into all your friends SB's...
Muhaaaahhhhaaaahhhhhhh
such joy will come :P

Unknown said...

Hahaa...so true :-) So so so true.

I used to not think much of Orkut. But I am beginning to think I really should get on there (with my real name). One never knows! :-)

qsg said...

true - a lot of times we don't know how the chips fell and how the medicine aspirants became copy editors! :)

But...Orkut...don't care for it at all!

Ab said...

why go all that bother... i just surf around for their communities. and you usually find wer theyr working or studying, even the dept, mostly....
[But of course, there are exceptions. like me :)]

X said...

lolzz!! Thats exactly what I do. Orkut rocks!! :)

Prya said...

I agree.. :) Yeah and like people have said above, check their communities.. unless they are trying to hide something.. ;)

Orkut indeed rocks.. Now i only hope it is not banned or blocked like a political party is trying to.. :(

Phoenix said...

Right indeed. Orkut is a good place to hunt for who works where, wats the mail id/chat id, whats the latest contact number (unless it;s a girl, girls dont put up fone numbers for obv reasons, mostly) and so on. Nice to network with long lost frnds and never-found acquaintances. A couple of my frnds searched their bosses' orkut profiles before joining their new jobs to get to know her preferences hobbies etc etc

Risha said...

:) lovely post, I just met one of my school friends thru orkut after 15 years.
I love all the episodes of FRIENDS lovely!!!

V said...

Must remember to delete all my 1900+ scraps...Must remember to delete all my 1900+ scraps...Must remember to delete all my 1900+ scraps...Must remember to delete all my 1900+ scraps...Must remember to delete all my 1900+ scraps...Must remember to delete all my 1900+ scraps...


Ya Allah!

Confused said...

"Now I want to friend you." LOL

I have never heard that line, but i like that..

t said...

I agree with qsg. Orkut sucks. Its a time-waster in an age when people hardly know who their next door neighbours are or what they do. Or, own cousins/friends for that matter.

My mom and elder sis are still in touch with their school friends even! Orkut ke bina!

And of course, I dont use it. Tried it, didnt like it.

Tejal said...

yea orkut is in a SAD state bcoz of the fraandshippers.. so i guess wen v discovered Facebook we found it much more appealing! (Please, all, join, me n my frens r in for advertising for FB free of cost bcoz its so much nicer :D) btw.. by WICH name r u on orkut?? i tried all sorts of names. twistin, turnin.. but cudnt find u. hmph :P

Sayesha said...

#Wacko,
Ahem, I am a transponster too! :P

#Thisisme,
Dhikkaar hai! You know everything! This post is not applicable to the likes of you! :P

#Creepa,
Haha, but not all join relevant communities! ;)

#Duhita,
Hehehe! :P

#Iday,
Sheesh! Dubbal sheesh! :/

#Sakshi,
Whatever makes the child in you happy, my dear! :P

#Harshi,
I have a love-hate relationship with Orkut. But I would recommend it for finding old friends :)

#QSG,
:)

#Ab,
Hahaha... like I said before, some don't join relevant communities, but you'll find them in strange communities like 'Shilpa Shetty's legs'! :O

#Pradeep,
:P

#Prya,
Huh? Some political party is trying to block Orkut? Hahaha! Why why? :D

#Phoenix,
Wow, your friends are really proactive huh? :)

#Risha,
Thanks! :)

#V,
Arre o bewde, apne scraps delete karega toh kuchh nahin hoga, go to your friends' scrapbooks and delete your info-wale scraps! :D

#T,
Well I think that in an age where people hardly know their friends/cousins/neighbours, Orkut, in spite of its vices, is a useful tool to find one another and stay in touch. :)

#Tejal,
Muahahaha! Bhai ko dhoondna mushkil hi nahin, namumkin hai! :P :P

Iday said...

//Muahahaha! Bhai ko dhoondna mushkil hi nahin, namumkin hai! :P :P

Is it??? ;)

Prya said...

well, its cos Orkut has a community which has inflammatory things written about Shivaji..
so they are upto their usual tactics of closing down cyber-cafes in parts of Bombay and threatening them and the ISPs to block Orkut.
I dont know how much of it is going to help stop the naysayers.
Its time they realise that their strong-arm tactics dont work in the world of Internet. Even if they close down Orkut, there are many other forums in which people can still write what they want to.
may God drive some sense into them!

Sayesha said...

#Iday,
Uffff! Bhai ko dhamkata hai?? :/

#Prya,
Gawd! Pls tell me it's the maratha Shivaji and not Rajnikanth??? :O

Prya said...

hahaha... it is the Maratha king Shivaji and not rajnikanth...
else there would have been a riot and emergency by now.. inferring from the news reports about his crazy fans, who had a puja and abhishekam etc before the screening in the theatre.. they even bathe the poster (if u can say that) in milk!!!! :O

havent seen such devotion for any other star.. :D

Sayesha said...

#Prya,
I know! I've been reading about it! Man the madness is err... insane! :O