If you happen to see few people roaming regularly on streets at 3 or 4 in the morning in the months of September dressed in formals don’t think it’s a new dress code of dacoits to fool you. Those might be poor CA students returning home after a tough day (read night as well) at work. Yes this malnourished breed is known officially as Article assistants. They can be easily identified specially during the months of September; you can identify them with the ‘I-dont-care look’ they wear always during the year. That’s coz they have already many things to bother about.
So your half day actually begins with the evening snacks, your family has rarely seen you and remember your one month old face. Your home has been renamed as ‘Free Lodging and Boarding’ as you visit this place only for 5-6 hours of sleep during ‘the month’. Sleep? Forget about it when it’s about a week to go for the month end. You eat in office, sleep in office, do possibly all the things in office, you become RNOR of office and NOR at home!
The office chair literally becomes a ‘hot-seat’ as people hatch on it for at least 12-14 hours daily! Not that you can’t fall ill in this month, but you just can’t fall ill for the season. Ok, casual approved leave? Ha ha ha, it’s a wrong question. Forget about casual, approved, planned leaves. They just don’t exist in the September season. Only Ganpati bappa helps for two days depending when HE wants to celebrate his arrival and departure.
You haven’t chit-chatted with your so called friends since a month, you cannot and absolutely cannot assure where you gonna be at so and so date and at so and so time. Because you never really know at first place whether you’ll be in city or at some outstation client place.
It is like becoming stranger to the whole of the world. That one month you feel all of the things had to happen all together now only. So you are ill but can’t rest at home coz you can’t handover your half-done work. It’s your friend’s wedding or birthday but cant visit and so you get good ‘remarks’ (read bad words) from your friends.
Its one crazy month where everyone is counting each and every single day by hours and minutes to get over. As the days approach towards the due date; the pressure, excitement, tension build up exponentially. In the last week of September the situation is like you have been gifted with 2 brains and extra 2 hands. So there is no guarantee what you’ll eat in office for lunch, dinner, snacks or even you gotta be lucky to have your food in time and at peace.
I remember being in Mumbai for 4 days to go for the Due date. I posted on Facebook “In Mumbai for since 3 days :| “ .. Another CA-victim-friend of mine based in Mumbai commented “How dare you not call me or meet?” I had to reply.. “Bhai, have seen nothing of Mumbai except the Office premises and my Hotel Room!! “which fetched many likes. So it is the ping-pong game played from office to home, home to office during the Season.
This is really the phase where you find yourself, discover yourself. It happens so; that you never knew you had it in you. You are squeezed and squeezed and the juice is extracted. The working capacity increases like magic trick, the patience level enhances and so does the maturity level. With everyday you learn, you learn to say yes, you learn to say No (I don’t know yet how to do that), you learn to ask and you learn to teach. One very noticeable aspect is the communication network. The coordination amongst colleagues, the sharing and caring and lending the helping hand is inexplicable. The team sharing and caring cannot be put in words.
And since you become stranger to the whole world you are bound to become close to the people you spend so much time with. The office politics, the work pressure, the back bitching and you have it all.
The pressure cooker tension till midnight of 30th September/November (thanks to amendment) is hell like. The client is shouting, your team mates are shouting, your Boss is shouting and possibly everyone is shouting. The chaos is not realized because you are already a part of it. And as soon as you have filed that last Return on 30th September close to midnight you feel like you have climbed the Everest. The feeling, the joy, the relived and escaped soul soothes you to no extent. And you suddenly feel it was all worth it.
An experience is an experience! Handling the daily work pressure, the due dates staring in your face, you have it all in the month of September. No wonder why so many students sing ‘Wake me up when September ends’ to boost their morale. Let me sign off saying ‘have fun’ this Season, coz if you don’t enjoy the work, the season; then you’ve not realized your true potential, the true ‘You’.
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By: Niraj Mahajan
CA Final Student
CAclubindia
