Pic: Moscow, April 2008First Anand left. Then Arindam lost his job. Arindam tried or perhaps didn’t, for sometime. After four months, he too left. Trishikh was under too much pressure. From his mom, who started staying here with him, and his job, which started getting too hectic. CASA, Planman, and then something else. He did it all. And then finally he broke down, deciding to leave.
All these guys other than Anand were in the Capital for more than five years. Even Saurabh lost his job, though he wouldn’t admit. Anyways, that’s what the guys at office say. Final conclusion: Everything changed, in front of my eyes, very fast.
I write a lot of things for the newspaper for which I work. I use words such as, slowdown and recession in my articles. But if, someone asks me, what slowdown means to me personally, I would say — it’s something I can’t explain, but it’s something that I can feel and see in front of eyes. It’s happening like some eerie Shyamalan flick.
Leaving out Saurabh, all the other guys have or are leaving for
Colleagues are wary. Everyone is evaluating — situations, people and chances. I am not sure whether a financial crisis should change the way people think. A change in mindset is not the solution for a problem, which is so technical. Salaries haven’t come down for a major chunk of the working population in the country. True, some people have lost their jobs. But what percentage are they of the total Indian working population?
People who are unaffected have stopped spending. Shopkeepers are not selling therefore. Advertisers aren’t getting any orders since companies have clamped down costs. Everyone is getting affected because some dude somewhere said that times are bad, and it caused a kneejerk reaction. So, just imagine what would have happened if you had bought that expensive white shirt at the shop window?
I just wish I had.
2 comments:
I wish it were just a knee-jerk reaction.. its a lot more real than that dude, as your friends who have lost their jobs will testify..
It was nice to read your thoughts John..I have myself been wanting to hear from those in other industries about what they think/feel about the alleged recession we are in..Those working in the education industry are about now beginning to get affected (since academic calendars begin in June all hiring/firing decisions are also made end of May).
AS student intake slows down...contracts are being made tougher, evaluations are harder..seems like top managers need a reason to fire people/slash costs and so on..
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