Life on a bench

“adhikam aayaal amrithum visham”
-Malayalam proverb meaning too much of anything is bad.

Every techie worth his salt would have spent at least some time on bench. To the uninitiated, IT companies do not have any "benches". Benching is the term used to signify that you are not in any project.

Usually this means that you get no back-breaking schedules. You do not need to attend totally useless meetings where somebody speaks and nobody listens. You don’t need to fill in your time sheet and most importantly nobody looks over your shoulder to see the “status” of the work.

A month on bench is considered ideal per year. It helps to rejuvenate body and soul. Renews your outlook on the industry and just about gets you raring to go for the next project.

Bench has its disadvantages too. Usually you don’t get a computer and free access to internet. Sometimes you don’t have a seat, let alone a bench! And under most circumstances you can only go to the library and re-read some crap magazine that you have already re-read twice. Sometimes I wonder whether this is somebody’s doing (The library thing you know). I have never been in a library for the whole duration of my college days and now with nothing to study and no notes to make, I suddenly find myself in the library more and more!

An even better situation is when you are in a project and still do not have anything to do. To achieve this “perfect” state you need to do some real good deeds all along your many incarnations. In this situation you enjoy all the benefits of “benching” while you suffer none of its ill effects. I must have been one real nice guy in my previous incarnation coz, I find myself in this very pleasurable situation currently.

The pictures pasted below should give you a rather reasonable idea about what we are up to in these days of peace and quiet.



Problem is that even this “perfect” state can get to your nerves after about 3 months of doing nothing.