Control Engineering

Habit is either the best of servants or the worst of masters.

After three months into my first stint, I realize that meeting sales targets traveling all day in KSRTC buses, in tiny villages, in this ceaseless rainfall, in places where all you get in the name of vegetarian food is a Kerala porotha and pazhampuri,,,, ain’t easy :(

Esp. if you’re in a country where you don’t know the language. Esp. if you are a girl. Esp. if you’ve screwed up habits!
Lore says, Control is the key to success. I don’t disagree.

• I love drinking water. I used to drink lots and lots and lots of it before I realized, I was searching for a clean loo every two hours while doing the market. The thought of using a public toilet killed me. Once I made my salesman sit in a coffee shop, while I used the washroom. My (water) drinking habits were getting too much to handle. Mornings would be spent answering the million dollar question, "where would I get a clean place to pee in this little town if I need to??" Thus, I decided to control my water intake. Now my early mornings and late evenings are spent savoring the liquid :) I hate to admit, but I envy indian men when it comes to this. They pee anywhere, everywhere. Shamelessly. They don't even need a clean place (I've never met any guy searching for one!!).
  

• Another place where I quickly need to get my control mechanisms working, is my back slapping habit. I somewhere am of the contention, that if people are really relishing their work, they’d do a lot of real hard back slapping to each other. I realized how culturally insensitive I was the first time I hit my mallu salesman on the back. He instantly moved away several meters and till date refuses to work with me coz he is a brahmachari!!

• Thirdly and most importantly, it’s the parlance. They don’t understand when I ask them for directions in hindi or english but they’d give me a dirty look when I use the F word. I’ve learnt that there are some not-to-be-uttered-words (even when you know the other person doesn’t know your language) like sex, daroo, love, kiss to name a few. Hindi Gaalis like BC, MC, C*****, G***** should never-never-never be used. They eat drink sleep in Malayalam but abuse in hindi. And I..., gotta control baby!

I listen to Janet chechi’s song, for inspiration nowadays:

This is a story about control, my control
Control of what I say, control of what I do
And this time Im gonna do it my way
I hope you enjoy this as much as I do
Are we ready? I am? cause its all about control
And Ive got lots of it

- Janet Jackson, Control