The extraordinary people- Chapter 1

In an early afternoon of July 2010, I was standing in front of the receptionist of a leading MNC which specializes in developing and marketing computer hardware systems and enterprise software products while asking for Mr. Manohar Kulkarni. After confirming with Mr. Kulkarni  on phone, the receptionist escorted me till the lobby and asked me to have a seat on the couch. He also informed that Mr. Kulkarni might take few minutes to show up while leaving.

I gave a quick glance to the place and made myself comfortable enough into the couch while grabbing the newspaper. Mr. Kulkarni showed up after almost 20 minutes. He was a middle aged man with a bulky physique, fair complexion and an average height. We greeted each other with a handshake and then he introduced me to a guy saying he is the one who will be interviewing me. I had almost overlooked the presence of anybody else other than Mr. Kulkarni in my nervousness of the pre interview phobia.

Well, the guy was pretty easy on the eyes aged around 28 to 29. While I was discreetly looking at him, the inner voice of me uttered- Roohi, relax. Didn’t you hear Mr. Kulkarni properly? This guy is about to interview you and hence he must be a demonic character. I immediately brought myself back into this world and smirked at my inner voice. By this moment, Mr. Kulkarni had already left.

So Roohi, shall we find out a cabin, he said in a firm voice while proceeding towards it. I followed him without uttering a word. He offered me to sit on the chair which was just rightly placed on the other side of the center table. I sat down on the chair and gave an unsuccessful trial to make myself comfortable.

Now, it was the time for me to get bombarded with his all so technical/drudging questions. Well, I was also in the “come on girl, let’s face it” mood.

He asked, “To Roohi, kaisi ho? BTW my name is Ifthikar”

I gaped at him, too dumbstruck for words.

He said,” Dekho, I am not much familiar with these typical interview sessions. So, let’s treat it as a formal meeting between you and me. Besides, I am not feeling too well today but didn’t want to postpone this interview. Hence, here I am with a 102 degree of fever sitting in front of you. ( the grey color half sweater over his formal shirt did witness the truth behind this statement of his)

By that time, I was almost out of that pre interview phobia and was quite comfortable with the environment, my uneasiness has suddenly vanished and a sense of comfort had taken it’s place. I think he managed to achieve what he actually wanted to..

I answered, “Main thik hun. And it’s sad to hear that you have to interview me even in this state of fever.”

After that, he asked me a bunch of technical questions, few of which I did manage to answer correctly while rest of them being wrongly answered and hence impacting a not so good feeling into me. So far this interview didn’t seem to be going on the right track to me.
Well, after those technical questions, now it was the turn of that typical question which I so hate like those melodramatic twists and turns of Ekta Kapoor’s serials.

And, he did ask that “Tell me something about your positive and negative characteristics.”

I usually don’t like lying to anybody but these kinds of questions do force me to lie specially when I am sitting in an interview room and my career is at stake.
I answered in a firm voice-Talking about the positive aspect, I am hard working, patient, and can handle stress very well and blah..blah..blah..( Well, everybody around me can explain you briefly about my laziness and the way I panic sometimes.) And, I am an emotional fool( Well, most of the girls are..and I love the way I am), you can consider it a negative aspect of my life.

He gave a 5 minutes lecture over the negative aspect making it to sound like the greatest weapon to win the world and then left asking me to wait for few minutes. I really was expecting him to come back and then say “Roohi, you can go home. I am really sorry, we did select you in the telephonic round but you were not up to our expectation in this face to face interview.” But to my surprise, he came back with Mr. Kulkarni who was supposed to be my next interviewer only to be followed by another 2 round of successful interviews.

Well, I must say that the dude did help me beyond my expectations to grab a job in a leading Database Management company.