The best days in my life were when I was jobless.

30th June 2005 was the date when I landed in Pune for job search. Well, I was not the only one who was there; there were many engineering graduates like me who came down to Pune for the same reason. Mixed emotions were popping up as I was entering Pune. For the first time I was going away from my home so I was thrilled and a bit nervous.

One of my friend (who claimed to knowing each and every lane of Pune) was accompanying me. Luckily my friend's brother also used to stay in Pune so we decided to be with him until we find some shelter. Well, my friends’ claim of knowing every lane turned false when the cleaner of our bus said "Sab ko Pune station utarna padega. Bus aage Shaniwar Wada tak nahi jayega." My friend became immensely tense as he did not know how to reach Kothrud (an area in Pune) from Pune station (or may be his claim made him tense). He called up his brother...we went to his house...spent a few days out there...and got a 1 BHK flat in Kothrud Deopt. We settled down there and then search began.

Being a fresh engineering graduate and having a desire of getting a job in IT makes you learn a few things that are absolutely stupid. Some of these things are Quantitative Aptitude, English Vocabulary, Data Interpretation, Logical Reasoning. Why would an IT company requires the knowledge of English Synonyms and Antonyms? Those words are hardly used in routine English communication. But to be COMPETENT enough and to clear the first exam we used to do all preparations.

Our daily routine used to be like getting up at 8 in morning. Have some tea in any "Amrut-tulya" (yeah that’s how people call tea stall in Pune), study some programming language and a lot of aptitude preparations. Literally we used to eat books like Word Power made easy, quantitative aptitude by R.S. Agrawal and Abhijeet Guha. All these books used to be our companion throughout the day.

Evening time used to be really special for us because the entire jobless people used to have a sort of fair at Bandal Capital (a shopping center in Kothrud Depot). That place was the forum to discuss the various openings in companies. We used to see all sort of emotions there...someone really happy after getting a job....someone sad because he got rejected from the final HR round of interview and everyone consoling him....and some stupid shouting like "Mai aa raha hu...mere liye jagah rakhna..." after seeing any company bus.

There were many nights when some friend's SMS used to strike cell phones "IBM walk-in at Hadapsar @ 9 AM will see you at Kothrud Depot @ 6 AM." So everyone getting ready in formals…carrying a certificate file in hand...doing some puja before leaving, praying for a job and the PMT (Pune municipal transport) bus to Hadapsar will have all jobless people like us. It used to be a thrill while going any walk-in because these walk-ins mostly used to be some rumors. Many times it happened we went there and company HR said "I am sorry but this walk-in is for experienced people only...please give us your Resume if there's any opening we will call you." and we used to return back with sad faces and expecting some call from the company. But in no time we understood collecting resumes is just a formality and no interview call would come.

There used to be laughter all around while returning from such a walk-in. It was all great days, we were jobless but we had all the fun in life. Learnt a lot those days including money management...a month's expenditure should not exceed XYZ amount. Saving money for Lonavala, Khandala trips etc.

Those days are really close to my heart. So when ever I go to Pune I don't miss a visit to Bandal Capital. Sometimes I meet some old friend who used to be there with us and remembering the job search days always leaves us smiling. I am not longer jobless but whenever I see people doing the same thing which we used to do at that place, it takes me back in my fun filled jobless days. And my heart says "Only faces have changed, emotions are the same..."