This is the winning entry in the recently held blog writing contest. The theme was the December offsite, and the entries were judged by a team of journalists. Written by Anuja Shah of team Bluetterflies.
Since my first day at Blue Lotus I have being hearing of the so called ‘offsite’. For the most part, Isha who sits besides me would narrate what an experience it was to be in Lonavala amidst the mountains, drenched in water, rappelling the cliff and getting stuck on top with nowhere to go. At this time to me it all sounded too scary and risky….. But nevertheless she said it was worth all the fun.
But I still was skeptical. It was not only she but most of the office was looking forward for the next offsite speculating what is it going to be like this time. I really didn’t bother. Days passed, months passed and on one fine day of December I received a mail from Tapash (training manager) that we are soon heading for our next offsite which to my astonishment was compulsory for all the employees. I was thinking of ways and means to avoid it. But the HR team of Blue Lotus turned out to be smarter than I thought. The consequences for not attending the offsite were, WE WOULD BE MARKED ABSENT FOR THREE DAYS. And to add icing on the cake, we were unaware of the destination, staying facility and the activity for which this three day camp was arranged. I mean c’mon this was preposterous. My situation was uncanny but finally gave up fighting my twin self and began packing.
And finally arrived the ‘D-Day’, on December 13th Team Blue (employees of network offices) from different parts of the country started flanking the Mumbai office at different intervals during the day. I mean it felt like attending a marriage reception. That entire day no one worked but people greeted each other with great passion. Finally it was time to board the bus. With no clue where we were headed and what’s in stored for us, maximum apprehension at the back of our minds we set to make a long journey.
At around 11.30 pm, two and a half hours behind schedule (all thanks to our problematic bus that broke down twice) our bus began to slow down at a place known as Talegaon. It was pitch dark outside and to make matters worse it was freezing cold. At first we could only hear horses neigh nearby but shortly to our dismay we could see them all around us. In my mind I was excited but scared of what next is going to happen to us. I picked up my luggage and walked ahead to the source of light.
Too sleepy but sound I was trying to understand where had we landed ourselves. Soon I realized I was standing outside a stable with tens of horses making world’s weirdest and loudest noises. I tried to calm myself by holding Vandy (Vandana) tightly. Luckily Vandy and I were sharing the same dorm. Looking at the place I figured that we for sure are not staying in a three star hotel room. After school this was the first time in five years I was staying in a dormitory.
Within ten minutes we were supposed to report outside for a small briefing by Mouli sir (CEO of Blue Lotus) followed by Dinner. As we gathered outside on the ground we were introduced to Mr. Junaid Merchant and Mr. Rohan (trainers) whom we were told would take are of us for the next three days. Thinking it was not as bad as we thought Vandy and I peacefully went off to sleep. Little did I know the coming day I would be facing the worst horror of my life.
I got up early in the morning at 7 am. The morning looked beautiful in Talegaon. As I stepped outside to feel the cool breeze on my face I was horrified to see one. two…four mid sized dogs and one huge dog (as tall as a man) walking around. Shocked as I was already to see that human sized dog, then there was Junaid who said that since we were around 80 of us we would be split into two groups and every group will train dogs and horses for one and a half day each. Training horses was fine as I have always fancied horse ridding but training DOGS sent shivers down my spine.
After the briefing I quietly approached Junaid and asked him if I could choose to only train horses and not dogs. I explained him how much I feared dogs and have actually had a dog running behind me when I was a kid. My parents disliked dogs as much as I did. Probably mom disliked more as one of her brothers died because a stray dog bit him when he was very young.
Understanding my problem Junaid just told me to give him two days where he would rid me my fear and assured me I would be unhurt, so much so I will start loving dogs by the time we leave for Mumbai. Seeing his confidence I accepted it as a challenge. We were the first group to deal with dogs and Shirin (his wife) handed a small brown and white coloured Cocker Spaniel called Maxxy to our team (Aaron, Sachin, Isha, Arnab myself).
For the first forty five minutes Shirin told us how dogs can help humans communicate, learn and understand better by showing us techniques how to train dogs to do simple things like walking it, making it sit, sleep and lastly jump. At first I did not want to touch Maxxy at all. I strongly refuted but she held my hand and put a biscuit on my palm and put my palm under Maxxy’s mouth. I thought she was out of her mind and my palm would nicely have small dog bit holes. But as I squinted to see, Maxxy just licked my palm without even touching his canines to my palm.
I was relieved. Then she told me to tap it’s head and rub it’s back. With little hesitation I touched Maxxy’s head and back, it felt so soft just like my beloved cushion. And just minutes later I was playing with Maxxy as though it was my pet. Junaid couldn’t believe his eyes. He felt he had over promised me by saying two days, whereas I got pally with Maxxy only within few hours. Moreover I could not believe my self playing with a dog, an animal I gravely disliked once upon a time. People watching me would not say that this is the same Anuja who would scream at the sight of a dog.
Later throughout the training session Maxxy liked my feet, sniffed my hands and I merrily played with me. He was a slow learner. But some how would listen to my commands. Initially he would see his female friends and get excited and would want to run behind them. But he slowly started obeying commands. We made Maxxy do various tricks which he did gracefully though slowly.
At the end of the activity I learnt two very important lessons in my life, one being patient. Golden rule of life, if you ever want to achieve something in life learn to be patient. A dog is like your new born baby who does not understand what you speak but only understands actions. It takes a good amount of effort to make a dog trust you and obey your commands. Second lesson was hard work. Never give up in life. You fail only when you stop trying. To make Maxxy do tricks was extremely difficult as he was a very restless dog and was missing his owner. We had a competition where the dog’s team that stood last would go back to Mumbai that very moment. We had very little hope from Maxxy. But we never stopped trying. With only one thing in mind, ‘So what if we loose at least we tried’ this kept us going. And to our amazement we stood second last. At least we did not loose.
I bring back with me from that wonderful session unforgettable memories, where a dog taught me how to make life at work more organized and productive. Today at work I follow these rules and aspire to achieve my goals……….. All thanks to Junaid today I am not scared of dogs anymore. At the same time I am very grateful to Blue Lotus for organizing this camp which has in a lot of ways changed my perceptions towards life. I feel proud to be a part of this wonderful initiative and am already agitated for the next ‘Offsite’.
- Anuja Shah
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