@ Fusionopolis

Time: 3:50 PM

Place: Cubicle S14-42, IHPC, Fusionopolis

IHPC (The place I am interning at) has moved from Science Park II (behind PGP) to Fusionopolis. I was really excited about it; well, mostly because we got a 3-day holiday and today we had orientation at the new place, which meant, along with the weekend, a 6-day break. Yay. But I was also a little excited about Fusionopolis.

For the orientation, we were supposed to meet at 9 am in the lobby. At 8.48 am I was at the Biopolis  bus stop, rain was pouring, the place was thronged with people making it impossible to budge or even so much as breathe. Just then I learnt that to take the shuttle bus, I had to cross the road. It rained harder. A cab went by.

Four and a half minutes later I was at the portico of Fusionopolis. I had googled about the place earlier and I was superhyper to get in and explore all that I had read about it and actually make real all the things I had imagined I would do there. I fantasized about the sky gardens, the pool, the theater, sighhh….  and more importantly, the transfer to a new terrain earmarked the new options that presented themselves for lunch- the new foodcourt, Raj, Holland V et al. The anticipation was killing me. An annoyingly bright smile decided to plaster itself onto my face. I entered the building.

For a moment I thought I was in some murky alley. The place was dark and there was no one around. Not even a fly or crow. : P. Not a soul. I retraced my steps outside and looked at the huge bright sign that ran across the building. Yes, Fusionopolis only. I went in again. The giant hallway was lifeless save 2 trees right in the middle. They looked diseased. There were big aluminum pipes running all over the place; the roof was… well, barely there, the pillars were unpainted. In the few places that were not inundated with random debris, I could see that the floor had not been polished. The air smelled of varnish. I walked further down the hall and took a left. I entered a maze of metal pipes, metal sheets, heavy machinery, yellow headgears, construction workers, metal pipes, and more metal pipes and even more metal pipes. Walking past the maddening paraphernalia, I got into the dilapidated skeleton of an elevator. Its walls were embellished with mosaics of multi-colored cardboard which were in turn embellished with intriguing modern art in bright markers. The mosaics solemnly bore life’s messages such as “I make in China and he make in Indonesia. ” in the speech bubble of, what I assume, is a teddy bear.

I reached the 16^th storey in 5.4556121 seconds (I actually had bit of a head rush in the uberquick funride). I took a right turn and went into the lobby, where the gloomy face of the HR manager indicated that the access cards were not ready yet. This meant whoever left the room cannot come back in. Super. Then came the cubicle allocation, the collection of keys, the filling up of 1000 futile forms, declarations and other such blahs. The interns’ office was on the 14^th storey. The staff offices were spread over the 15^th and 16^th storey, across the north and south towers. The gates connecting the towers were shut. No one knew where their respective supervisor was, and hence began the hunting. The lucky ones (like me) located their supervisor in just 25 minutes, while for others it took longer and some others are still looking for theirs.

The reallocation of cubicles implied that I had new neighbors to bug. Yay. I started the computer. No student domain. I submitted my time sheet and tried again. Worked. I tried starting the software. Error. I couldn’t log onto the host computer. “Its ok”, my supervisor consoled. “The server is down anyway and so all simulations are incredibly slow. They are going to shut it down at 4 o clock too. Just mail helpdesk. They fixed my computer as well. They’ll be here in a jiffy.” 20000 jiffies have passed and I am still waiting.

I truly believe that all the pains of the world can be relieved by a cup of piping hot schwarzer Kaffee .I went into the pantry. There was a dispenser, a refrigerator, a microwave – all meticulously tucked away in their cartons.Very good. I came back to my desk and sat down, trying to do my report. People were wandering all about carrying heavy loads, not so heavy loads, and just loads and I was not able to concentrate a wee bit. Lunch hour came. We went exploring the area for food. We were fooled by a sign that said foodcourt ->. Following the arrow, we found ourselves in the midst of metal pipes, plastic wrappers, dirt, wooden slabs and other such construction junk again. So a very hungry and consequently angry mob took the bus to Holland Village (with a little detour to Cold Storage) and enjoyed a 2 hour lunch to make the unpleasantries of the day go away.

Post-lunch period is just another word for lethargy and why should today be any different. I was finally getting somewhere with my report when the HR manager walked in and announced that the access cards were still not ready. She also instructed us to lock our belongings carefully; especially any kind of food for, the place had rats.

Now when I am sitting in my very snug chair (it’s really blissfully cozy with full pushback) and think about the day that I have had, that stupid smile refuses to leave my face. I had a brilliant day. Sure, the sky garden has only one plant (and I’m not sure if that’s even supposed to be there because it looks more like a weed), the pool is now used for storing construction material, the theater is – um… ok… out of all the obscure structures in the building I really could not make out which one was the potential theater – however, the CHANGE is refreshing. It’s a new place to discover, a new town in itself, a new office to loiter up and down, a new desk to work on, a new chair to swing on, a new locker to struggle with, a new carpet with abstract designs to recognize patterns in, a window to stare through, a new alert tone of the elevator and a new smell of the whole place. I may have overlooked the fact that Fusionopolis will not be ready until October and right now it may not be more than a half finished construction site,but it kicks ass. And I love the change. By the time it becomes a routine I’ll be done with my internship.

Oh and speaking of change I was bored with the theme and decided to change it.