Tuesday, May 23, 2006

Have a Nice Day!

In a different place, with a different set of friends, I guess my non-academic bachelor days are back into action. That means so back are those leg pulling sessions which we used to have in the past. Every evening, from different corners of Bangalore South, we get together in one of those umpteen Malayalee restaurants in and around Koramangala for dinner. Fortunately as of now I am able to get out from my office at 6 pm itself primarily because these are my initial days in the office. So here is something which came out in one of those dinner sessions.

One of my friends, lets call him O, works for a bank in Bangalore. His main job is to sit idle most of the times a year, ogle ‘attractive’ customers, and then fire up his ass to meet the revenue targets end of the year. So according to O, its hell of a time when it nears March since March 31st is the end of a financial year. Meeting targets, if not approaching people like me and coax us to take loans from his bank, employing people having muscle-packed body to collect money from defaulters and what not. Even for a guy like me who has zero banking knowledge and who thinks the much hyped ‘core banking solution’ sums up to not more than inserting a card, catch the money thrown on your face by the ATM machine and clean your hands with the paper that pops out from the machine as if using a tissue paper, it all seems to be so very eventful.

To continue the story, lemme introduce one more friend of mine to you. Let’s call him J. So one fine morning, close to 12 pm, when J reached his office, squeezing his bike through the Bangalore traffic, fully worn-out and marginally escaped from Lucifer’s hand at times, and opened his mailbox, he saw a forward from O. Since the subject of the mail was ‘Have a Nice Day’ J didn’t think twice before opening it. That was where it all started.

The first slide of the presentation was really interesting. Well, if a beautiful girl with a much more beautiful smile holding a bouquet in her hand wished you good day then even if it’s a photo, no man could say that it wasn’t interesting. J wasn’t an exception either. And he fell for the trap.

The twist happened in the next slide. It said that you would become lucky and would get all the material pleasures you wanted if you take a loan from the bank where O worked!

The third slide was even worse. It said “If you don’t wheedle five people to take loans from the aforementioned bank within two days then you will get injured in an accident with in the next five days!”

These followed in the subsequent slides.

“If you don’t cajole five people with in the next three days then you will die after falling from the terrace in the next six days!”

“If you discard this mail and don’t forward it to 10 people then you will lose 1 lakh from your bank account. Or else you will be raided by the income tax department!”

Heard that from the next day onwards there were long queues in front of O’s bank! He got a promotion this year for exceeding the targets! And J is paying EMIs of two loans!

PS: Purely a work of fiction.


17 comments:

venus said...

O's manipulative emails!!! Income tax dept would surely work when 2% of the indian population pays income tax and they also try their best for how not to pay!!

good to hear from you, hope you are enjoying your new place, work, friends, etc..

Sarah said...

Hey: glad to see your new post.. chain mail to chain email to threatening emails!!.who said we are not progressive??
Sarah

Mind Curry said...

that was funny..these days i dont even open such chain mails.. its terrible to get forced into something.

good imagination!

Dhanush | ധനുഷ് said...

Nice one friend. I too happen to be in South Bangalore, and dont ask O to fwd that mail :)

First time here. Enjoyed very much

Anonymous said...

pretty interestin' :)

Sujith said...

> venus
ha ha.. he turned out to be a master marketing strategist :p yes new place, new friends and new work. it is interesting as of now. :-)

> immigrant in canada
first of all, ee neenda peru onnu cheruthakkikkoode?

ha ha. my friend oru paavam aanu kettu. these things didnt happen in reality.

> mind curry
and u know hw ppl fall for it. especially for mails like 'u will get a nokia phone if u send this to 15 ppl' so on and so forth. :-)

> dhanush
welcome to uncertainty man.. i will sure tell O not to fwd that mail to ya :p

> intangy
hey why 'intangy'? something bad happened?

Invincible said...

:)
Those silly emails :D

Good to read u r finding 'it' interesting.

Sarah said...

sarah nnu vilichoode?

Praveen said...

nice one jithu, never knew that you were in bangalore, where are you put up?

divya said...

well well well!so orkut isn't all that worthless, i learn, for it is via orkut that i land up here-a real creative blog...exceptional narration(or shud i say fabrication) in this post and the rest equally impressive...keep it goin'!cheerz!rock on!!

Sujith said...

> invincible
ha ha.. lets see man :p

> sarah
ini muthal :-)

> praveen
yes man, i am here now. my office is in Embassy Golf Links Biz Park, Off Intermediate Ring Road, Domlur.

> divya
hey, welcome to uncertainty. :-) and thanx very much for those inspiring words :-)

silverine said...

We had a Tax presentation in our company. It was offered to help us plan our investments at the beginning of the year itself.I thought it was very helpful move by HR. After the presentation they distributed forms so that we could fill it and start the process of making investments in Insurance. Turned out the Presentation was sponsored by an Insurance MNC and they walked away with a pile of Investments.

I couldn't resist congratulating the Insurance guys for the very clever and bundled marketing tactic!!

chupru said...

(After the increment letters were handed out)
My Boss: Anoop with XYZ salary you should think of investing.

Me: Yes sir, I was thinking the same too.

My Boss: Good, this is my brothers number call him. He works with XYZ insurance.

Me: argh.. thank you my mentor.

kickassso said...

good un;)
Personally, i hate foreards and have filters to banish them to oblivion!
In other news, Im joining a job too soon:)

mrudhu said...

clever marketing strategies...kudos to O for that!!the man's got to definitely aim higher,there might be firms which would benifit from the shrewdness..hehe..

pophabhi said...

Great post!! :)
And me too in south of Bangalore. Just like Dhanu told - dont send those emails to me too...Warn Mr.O!!

Sarah said...

over a month and no update.. sad sarah!