Erase eSign Word Myself

Tell-tale… I mean, that’s obviously hard. If they were so easy to spot, you would know what they were because it would be glaringly obvious. They simply aren’t.Repetitive behaviour, stimming and avoiding eye contact are all clues, but could all be due to other conditions - as far as I know, you have to actually notice that the person struggles with social interaction and communication if you want a truly pathognomonic finding. And even if you DO notice that, that could also be subject to influence by many other factors.However, if you’re neurotypical and asking this question, aside from advising you to spend more time trying to understand HFA than diagnosing it (i.e. it would be better for you to learn how to treat/appropriately deal with people on the spectrum, because diagnosis is challenging, even for professionals, and requires an extensive battery of tests to diagnose with certainty), I’m going to say that you’ll notice immediately that the person is a little “off”. You may not know why.Perhaps it is their inability to correctly dress themselves, or pay appropriate attention to personal hygiene, or perhaps you are privy to the information that the only reason they are able to pass in a crowd is because someone is still picking out their clothes and forcing them to shower every day (and if you’re wondering, there is nobody to force me to shower every day, so I do it when I feel like it, which is not at the same rhythm as other people, or when I have to in order to interact with neurotypicals). You might notice that their expressions are stilted and stereotypical, and for sure you will notice the lack of eye contact, but I’ve noticed that neurotypicals tend to simply assume the person is NT and say things like “She’s aloof” or “She’s just shy” or my personal favourite “She has low self-confidence”. You’ll probably just get frustrated by the fact that they don’t know how to react to your facial expressions, advances, etc. - I’ve never had anyone actually pick up that I wasn’t able to correctly interpret their facial expressions. They just got upset that I couldn’t tell that they were upset or what it was about.The best way to find out in my opinion is to ask - if the person has been diagnosed, they will probably just tell you (unless they are ashamed of it, or if you ask in a professional environment where they have not disclosed that information, for example), and if they have not, it will probably help to prompt them to seek out a diagnosis. If that’s what they want. Some people are perfectly happy being HFA and not being diagnosed.I’ll end with a note about women - as a woman, even when I tell people that I have HFA/Asperger’s, people don’t believe me anyway. It should be obvious, but the effort that I put into preparing for social interactions is overlooked - people often assume that social interactions are “fun” for me. To be clear, they are not. Yes, I can take a shower, blowdry my hair, put on some decent clothes (which, FYI, my mother and sister have to help me buy) and spend a few hours being social, but rest assured, I will NEVER do that every single day, or even two days in a row. It is way too much effort. I would always rather be communicating with you with a screen in between us because that is way more efficient and comfortable for me than talking ever will be - and I don’t have to deal with your facial expressions, body language, variations in tone, winks, etc. and try to interpret them while also trying to listen to what you are saying. #justsaying

Autism is considered a spectrum disorder which means that each person is affected somewhat differently and can exhibit different symptoms or behaviors. An individual might exhibit some, none or all of the classical markers. they includeFlat affect - the person doesn’t show much emotion on their face or by body languageNarrow interests- The person has a fascination with a particular subject and will talk about them obsessively without noticing other people losing interest. The subject varies from person to person but could be trains, cars, boats, sports statistics, buildings or almost any subject but usually something with numeric information associated with it.trouble reading social queues- most people with autism exhibit this to some degree as this is a core feature used to classify people as autistic- This looks like the person not catching on to when someone else is upset about the topic under discussion and not changing subject when it is socially appropriate.Prosody- This is a technical term that means odd language use or unusual cadence and tempo when speaking. This can manifest in a lot of strange ways. some examples a person who grows up in the south but has no trace of a southern accept but does sound a bit like Elmer Fudd. A person growing up in the united states but having a strong English accent or dialect. The person is monotone and has little to no inflection in their speech. I have personally observed individuals diagnosed as autistic with all of these speech patterns. It can also manifest as odd word use that is atypical for the region they grow up in. A person using UK slang instead of american slang or simply not using or understanding slang.Obsessive need for order and routine. always needing to do the same thing at the same time each day or having to organize things in a particular way and not being able to tolerate change. This is a self comforting behavior and it tends to be more intense with increased stress.Conversely a person on the spectrum might exhibit a limited ability to create order or organize simple things. Think of the absentminded professor someone who understands complex things but can’t seem to find his shoes in the morning.Stimming - self stimulation behavior as a comforting mechanism. This looks like foot taping, humming, finger snapping or fidgeting. This is something that most autistic people do to some degree and gets worse with increased stress.Hypersensitivity- This is also a very common autistic feature and looks like the person finding certain common things very uncomfortable. Examples would be itchy fabrics, or synthetic fabrics (some describe them as feeling oily even when freshly washed), florescent lights or even conventional lights that flicker, hearing faint noises that others generally ignore (insects, power hum, other mechanical noises).Savantism - this is actually uncommon but there are some very famous examples in history and it is sometimes used as a diagnostic indicator in the absence of other information. - This means an unusual ability in a narrow subject. By far the most commonly observed is mathematical skills. The ability to perform calculations in ones head with out mechanical assistance. Callendrics is another frequent talent where the person is able to identify the day of the week for any date instantly. Exceptional memory for particular types of information some examples Memorizing a large number of places of pi (some individuals have memorized more than 10,000 places) Mozart was able to memorize and transcribe entire musical works after hearing them once, perfect pitch is another exceptional talent that autism sufferers exhibit much more often then the general population.Now any individual might only exhibit a few of these traits or might exhibit all of them but to different degrees this is what makes it a spectrum. I hope this is helpful but observation by a lay person is not a substitute for a detailed diagnosis and even Phd’s have misdiagnosed autism as a multitude of other mental illnesses or conditions including schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, antisocial personality disorder, sociopathy, depression, schizoid personality disorder or avoidant personality disorder. It is important to remember that the person with autism is not doing things to purposely annoy or disrespect others they can’t really help it because they don’t see that what they are doing is inappropriate. They also are often bullied, abused and taken advantage of simply because they are different and others believe it is ok to mistreat someone who is different. This is really a form of bigotry and should be stamped out.

Usually the women who have a crush on me, drops materials on the floor when they either speak to me or see me walking.A girl usually stands further from you or even some are closer to you but the movements she makes around you are based on unsureness. She might look at you for a minute while you dont notice her.A test: Give her your keys and let her hold them while you talk to her. Her hand should shake sometimes or a lot if she feels nervous.There is another type of girl who are really shy and does not even look at you and then later complains on why you are not seeking contact with her. If the guy are not even aware of her, how can he be the one making contact? That make no sense, but some thinks this way.Some girls are really obvious, licks their lips when you walk past by them or seeking your attention all the time but yet still nervous. Some tries to avoid you because they know how attractive and strong your energy are.Then there is the girl who rather texts you instead of talking in reality.Another way too see if a girl are nervous around you is to just jump randomly at her, in a unsuspected time but in a funny way. Not in a aggressive way but to prank her.If she loses her composure then she is nervous around you otherwise not. Be creative to find out.

Originally answered - Shilpi Roy's answer to Should I choose signNow or Goldman Sachs (India)?The answer is gonna be really long. Grab some snacks as it could take a while.I was the happiest person the day I was selected as a FTE (tech analyst position) at GS - a reputed fin-tech company which mostly hires tier-1 students, a dream for many. I heard from many people that GS offers package as high as 32lpa which was quite a big deal for me - or for anyone who might have been at my place.Then came the HR’s call. She offered me semester long internship in GS! I was glad that I don’t have to spend my last semester in college and will also earn some money. With the stipend as high as 75k and stay at Hilton hotel during intern, anybody is likely to go crazy and say “YES”.And so I did.The beginning (GS-Bengaluru office)Soon came 7th January. Day started off with amazing orientation and office visit. Then came the lunch buddy - GS assigns a buddy from your department to have lunch with you the day you join, let’s say he was Raghav (name changed).Raghav seemed to be a really smart guy. I asked him a few questions about GS being a fin-tech, is it easy to switch and other questions. He seemed to be out of place, not interested. A guy came who was an intern in a team in which Raghav used to work. He kept talking and giggling with him, completely ignoring my presence. Cool, maybe Raghav is a bad guy - who cares?Met with my manager and two other interns who were in the same department - GIR. He seemed like a chilled-out and thoughtful person. Let’s call him Rudra.Our whole department used to sit in a middle sized cabin which accommodated around 32–35 employees of GIR. My happiness knew no bounds! Great team, small cabin and friendly manager - what else could I ask for?Then came the next day. We were introduced to our team and had a lunch together. Oh no! Lunch here was not free - no big deal. Only 80rs/- per plate is affordable when you earn 75k per month, I thought.After having lunch, we began installing softwares required. Wait, you can’t install some softwares without manager’s permission. Fine! I messaged my manager and he granted the permission. He came later in the evening and gave 3 of us an interesting machine learning problem to solve - in a week, till we get our projects.He had three projects in mind, and he left it for us to decide which one we want to take. I took the one which I thought was more impactful and cool, also because we had a member of our team working for the project. My task was to integrate the backend stuff he wrote with the UI I was going to create. Also to help him with some of those backend stuffs later on.“You can take help from Varun, in case you need” said Rudra.So it began!1st MonthI started learning React.js for the UI I was going to implement from various websites. There were tons of tutorial there. After understanding some theory, I clicked on ‘try it on codepen’ - online editor.“You are restricted from using an external website - no permissions”What? I can’t even use some online editor. Okay that’s fine - we have pretty sensitive data in GS. Since it’s a finance based company, we have client data with us and user may copy and paste it online - someone might steal the data! All this made sense. ‘It’s fine, I’ll bring my own laptop tommorow’, I thought before leaving.I could see two teammates standing behind me from my peripheral vision. One who was writing the backend stuff for the project I was working upon, let’s call him Varun.Varun was a silent and sober guy - a hardworking one who speaks only when required. Another guy standing beside him was Raghav.“Hey!” I said in a low tone.“Did I do some crime? Why are these two here?” I wondered.“You brought your personal laptop, is everything fine here?” they asked.I told them about the restrictions. Raghav took my work PC and sent Rudra, my manager a request to approve codepen.I waited. One hour. Two hours. Codepen still not working. Fine for me since I have my own laptop. No worries.After 2 weeks Varun called me and started assigning tasks to do for the UI. I was full of enthusiasm and paid full attention to what he wanted. I started looking out for the cool libraries out there and found - material-ui.‘Perfect!’ I exclaimed.Started with the tasks, and was able to achieve the target next evening. It looked damn good! Varun will be happy. And so, I showed it to him.“Okay, font-size is a bit huge. And please change the app’s name - ELEGANT USER’S APP” (name changed). And so I did.“E-L-E-G-E-N-T U-S-E-R—S A-P-P”What a funny name, I thought. (The real one was funnier than the changed one)So days went, 1..2…3 and I completed 5–6 tasks. The basic UI (20%) was done. Then came Varun -“Shilpi, you did this using which library?”“Material-ui! It’s really good and..”“Okay, but make sure you can use it. Only specific libraries can be used at GS. Search xyz site and ensure if we can use it. If yes, proceed. Else use GS UI library”What did he just say. I worked on the UI for 2 weeks, and he is telling me now that I may not be able to use the material-ui library! No way..With my heart beating fast, I typed..X..Y….Z …..gs..comCtrl+F“M-A——T-E—-R—I—A”Boom! It’s there. I was delighted :)The next day I was late. I saw a message pop up. It was from Raghav.“Hey” it said.“Hey” I replied.“Please try to attend the daily standup. If you don’t, mail Rudra about your update :)” He replied.There hasn’t been a single day I was late. But okay, FINE.Then came the 5th day - friday. I got a message from Varun.‘Hi Shilpi, can you make another UI using GS-UI?’Oh No!. Again?.‘Just for the feel…we’ll show it to Rudra next week, he’ll choose which one we can use’*Slow Claps*Well played Varun. Why did he approve the material-ui one if he wanted it in GS-UI - I wondered.It’s fine, I can do it. I encouraged myself and went to the internal site - gs-ui-library. (name changed)Okay, fine. This looks good. Okay. Cool. Documentation.. documentation….uhmm.I searched for the whole day, no documentation. Just few codes and examples to understand how to display some component.Way uglier than material-ui - I thought. And a minute later, an evil idea came to my mind..“What if I make the UI using gs-ui-library so ugly that Rudra and Varun both reject! That would be great!”The next week on friday, I was done with gs-ui-library. My code was asked to be removed from codesandbox by Varun - it’s illegal to put GS’s internal code there. I could hear Rudra laughing about how he is afraid of the interns bringing personal laptops here, and what will happen if someone names a variable as “GIR” and put it on github.I showed Rudra the material-ui one. He was impressed.“This looks good! But don’t keep the name as ‘ ELEGANT USERS APP’, instead keep it as ‘THE USERS SEARCH APP’ ” (name changed)“But Rudra, Varun has asked me to..”“I will ask him. We will decide and tell you”Fine. Keep the name as ‘The bla-bla app’. I don’t care.Varun was already gone by the time.I smirked. I won’t show the UI I made using gs-ui-library to Rudra!Next day Varun was on my desk. He asked whether I showed both the UI’s.“No, actually I forgot to show the other..”“See, the people above us will probably ask why we didn’t use GS-UI. That’s why I am saying so. I have no problem with material-ui. Just ask Rudra if he is fine with it. Rudra…”“Yes, Varun” replied Rudra.And then he showed both the UI’s to him. The ugly one. The good one.“I think it looks great - the ‘gs-ui-library’ one!” Rudra exclaimed.I shouted in my mind - “How can he..!”“See Shilpi, we don’t have any problem using material-ui one but the people for whom we are making the app will ask why we didn’t use the internal-gs library. Okay, tell me one thing - it does have all the components you require, right?”“Yes, Rudra” I sighed.“Seems like Shilpi wanted to use material-ui, haha” Rudra giggled and looked at Varun. I could hear the giggling from one if the two interns from behind - Tejas (name changed).He was also working on a UI, along with some backend stuff. He was using ‘gs-ui-library’ from day one. And so, he giggled.Rudra -1 .. Shilpi - 0This was the first time I went home feeling sad. Why didn’t they tell me 2 weeks ago? Now I will have to work on the other one. And the library has no documentation.Next week , Varun decided to keep the name as “ELEGENT-USERS-APP”. He refused Rudra.Varun -1.. Rudra- 0So I went back to my desk and began.“g-s-u-i-l-i-b-r-a-r-y” I typed.Gs-ui-library was a really terrible library. No documentation, made by mixture of other available libraries online. It was like an accidental product of some cross-breeding. A scientific failure.Anyways, I somehow learnt basic features which I could implement using the library. On the other hand, my machine was damn slow - for a reason I didn’t know.“Why are you using vs code? How did you get it!” asked Rudra who saw me coding on vscode.“I like it- it’s really good for react. Installed it from the store.”“Haha, use intellij, okay!” Rudra said in a serious tone.Wow. After making me work with the gs-ui-library, now he is snatching away the editor I love. Cool.I still continued with vs code. Varun was totally fine with it.I went to drink a glass of water. Didn’t bring my bottle that day. So took a ‘visitor’s cup’ from inside the drawers.“Ma’am, you can’t drink in that. It’s only for visitors” said a staff guy who saw that I was about to drink water from the visitor’s cup.I looked at him in shock.“Oh, it’s ok for today you can use it..Ma’am” he replied.Great. Block websites - facebook, gmail, codepen. Take my material-ui away. Don’t allow me to use vs-code. And also, don’t let me drink water at peace!I was pissed off. Huh!2nd MonthSo I started working on the integration part. Meanwhile we used to have meetings in which we were told about GIR and it’s functions. Rudra used to tell us about how fun the NAPA training is going to be, and how we will start hiding our id cards after the event.I completed the integration part in a week or so. Gave a weekly demo to Rudra.Next week was going to be a demo with Monica’s team (name changed). The finance guys for whom we were building the ‘ELEGANT USERS APP’. Varun was happy that I had completed the integration part and added 2 more features to implement.- feature1 & feature2Before the demo, we had a meeting with Monica just a week before. Rudra, Varun and I gathered in a room.“So Shilpi, how’s the work going? Are you liking it - the UI stuff? Aren’t you bored?” Rudra asked.“Hehe.. Actually yeah it’s a little boring. I hope backend stuff starts soon!” I honestly replied.“You know UI people make the most money.” Rudra smirked.“No, that’s a lie. Backend people make more money.” I replied.“Shilpi, that’s the case of technical firms. In financial firms like us, UI people earn more bonus.” said Varun.Soon came Monica. Varun and Monica proceeded on what she wants and what actually we have. It was a debate between them and I listened.Since the lunch time was over, Rudra and I went to the food-court outside to have one.“Shilpi, you know I was like you. The silent guy in the room. If someone else was at your place he would have asked a lot of questions! ”“I think it’s better to listen Rudra, than argue. I didn’t have much idea about what they were talking and the talk was mostly concerning Varun.”“See..it’s good very good. But to be at a place like GS…you know! The world is very mean, Shilpi. You need to speak more than you do work here! Many people don’t know much but they’ll get ahead of you because they speak. I was like you when I joined GS. In the group discussion round, when everyone was debating.. I just sat at the corner. HR came and asked each of us individually. If she hadn’t done that, I mayn’t be sitting here today”I gave it some thought. He was right.Some days later feature1 stopped working. I had no idea why, I was using an excellent library for feature1, of-course an external one. Varun himself has asked me to use an external for that case since we don’t have a gs library for that.But now. It wasn’t working.It took me a week to include the library - react-bootstrap-table2 with the project along with the features it had, and use it. And some magic happened. Now feature1 stops working. Damn!I woke up the whole night - till 4 am to make the feature1 work. The remote desktop worked very slow. In GS, we are not given laptops for security purposes. So we have to use remote desktop.It was damn slow but I was patient. I kept on trying and trying till I fell asleep early in the morning. Woke up around 12.An hour before demo with Monica’s team, I told Varun about it. He said it’s fine, we will show the demo without it.Tik…tikk….I wasn’t satisfied. I worked damn hard for 45 min and was able to make feature1 work!We went to give the demo. Varun pulled out a chair and sat before a PC.“Hi Monica!”“Hey Varun!”And so it started. The demo. The UI I made. The features I implemented. The integration. My two month’s hard work.All of them was presented by our VP, Mr.Varun!“Uhm…but we don’t need feature 1 and 2, Varun. You can remove it” said Monica.W-H-A-T! What did she just say. I went an hour back in time.I am sweating. I can feel I am nervous. This has to go good. I know well about the project, and I will make the feature-1 work! I will!Yes, I did. Only to lose the presentation as well as the feature.I rushed out of the room with the unhappy face which no one bothered about in the meeting room. I was silent and in hurry, it was weekly demo too today.“Haashh.. It went great!” exclaimed Varun who barely ever talked to me. Since like 1962!“Okay, but we have a weekly demo too!”The weekly demo got cancelled. Varun proceeded to tell me how we don’t need feature-1 and all the new features which Monica wanted. I remembered them all. One of them was a feature-X which was not possible technically. I tried making Varun understand and he did, after quite a while.Then came the mid-semester exam and I finally got a break!3rd MonthI went to my home after holidays. After 2 months, 1,40,000 was credited to my account. I bought clothes for mom and dad. I was delighted and ready to go back!Came back to office happily. Compiled the code.React-bootstrap-table2 library code - gone. Whole UI code changed in a week. My 2 week’s effort - 1 week for the library and 2 nd for other features went to ashes.Just in ONE SINGLE WEEK.~Varun committed the code 2 hours ago~~Varun committed the code yesterday~~Varun….~And so on.Varun started using an internal gs-ui-library library instead of react-bootstrap-table2. Instead of giving proper review comments, he changed my code by himself. Some backend stuff also came to me.I fetched the code from repo, the one Varun had implemented. And tried to understand.“You just have to implement feature-b-xyz, no need to go through whole code” he said.Fine.I added a new feature. Compiled and checked. Everything was working fine. Committed the code.Next day I came. Compiled the code.‘EXCEPTION THROWN’‘FAILED’And my PC hangs. For no reason why.I checked the code - it was changed. The integration part was changed. Feature XYZ was changed. And it stopped working.~Varun committed the code an hour ago~Why did he commit a code that fails? I wondered.This started happening daily. I had no idea why was this happening.The next series of days started with me coming late - 11:50, 12 or later than that. I used to mail Rudra about the update. Sometimes I was able to attend standup, sometime I wasn’t able to. My health started deteriorating.Everyday, Varun used to commit some changes. And it took a hell lot of time to update the project in intellij, go through his changes and do other changes. I was pretty much frustrated.Took 2 wfhs in 2 weeks. Logged in late many times. Had to push myself from bed everyday. Devoted my time to video games than gs work. Lost interest.Then I was given some backend part. I took WFH a day I wasn’t feeling well and learnt about apis stuff. Still some part of me wanted to do well and take interest in the work genuinely.We - all 3 interns received a mail from Rudra which we could never forget. Rudra had showed his ‘Rudra’ roop. The mail said -“You guys are not taking the work seriously. WFHs are not to be taken for granted. So many WFHs and late loggings. Not at all serious about your work. You guys need to have deliverables by the end of this month.I don’t care, work for your career not mine.”I was shocked. The friendly, giggling Rudra! I remembered the first time I met him. And the mail was quite a shock to all of us.Late loggings were targeted at me.WFHs for another one.But… Tejas? What did he do?As far as I remember, he was a hard working guy. Always on time. Never missed a standup. What did he do to receive the mail?Days after that, Varun took four wfhs in a row. Rudra was quiet. Nisha only came like twice in a week, Rudra said nothing.Why us? Why the interns? I wondered.One day I stayed at office till 8pm. I could hear Rudra talking about ‘The Elegant User’s App’ over a phone call.“We are building it again since the last UI was in angular. We wanted it in React.” he said to somebody over the call.Throughout my whole intern, I had one doubt in my mind.The app on which I was working upon was already built by someone and was functional too. But my manager wanted it to be built again since he wanted us to use a new technology.What’s the difference even if angular was used? What’s the need of rebuilding the app again from scratch? I wondered.And the next words I heard shattered me.“Yeah, Varun is working with some intern on ‘The Elegant User’s App’.”What did he say?The last two months were fully devoted to the UI. I went back in time.“Shilpi, if you want any help - Varun would be able to for this project.I was made to believe that it was an independent project, which it never was. I worked my ass off for three months only to hear that I am ‘some intern’ working under Varun and helping him building the UI.I got depressed.It was Holi’s festival - the festival of colours. I never really celebrated holi, hated to be coloured all over. We had a group for our department, and I wished everyone a “Happy Holi!”.Tejas replied with a “Happy holi” too.“Happy Forest Day” - stated an image I received on whatsapp. It was from Rudra. On the whatsapp group. This was his reply for “Happy Holi”.It's okay, don't respect our festival. But atleast don't disrespect it. Why was there even a need for reply?Needless to say, I didn’t go to office that day as sign of rebel (we didn’t have holiday on holi). Varun was already doing WFH. The “Happy Forest Day” frustrated me.Why Rudra why. You are better than that.“Niharika (name changed) is leaving GS” somebody whispered.Niharika, a very smart lady was in our department. She was mentoring an intern and sounded quite knowledgeable. Her sudden decision of leaving GS came as a shock to everyone.I had a last chat with her only when everyone was away for lunch. She had refused her farewell too I guess. She came to me and we had a decent chat. I asked her the reason of leaving. She wanted to switch the team maybe but it was taking a long time. Sweet and smart is all I could say for her. She had done work with JPMC & Morgan Stanley (US) and held a green card. A dedicated worker.After the lunch, she had a long meeting with Rudra. She was too firm with her decision.After she left, someone told me she bitched about many people in the team - specially Rudra. I was really sad. GS lost a good employee that day. And maybe, due to politics.Next day, GS was having an orientation for all new campus hires. It was one hell of a day. World-class hotel stay and world-class orientation.Varun was going out to the new office for 2 weeks. For some work.4th monthBefore Varun had left for the new office, he had asked me to attend telephonic standups for our team from 3–3:30. Now I used to attend 2 standups - the department one, and the team one. Full time waste activities!He had also asked me to get details of a task from Raghav and get it completed. I messaged him and he said he will be there at my desk in 5 min. Well, he never came. I asked him 2–3 times more to which he sent me a random link. I was disheartened and had nothing to do for 2 weeks.One day Rudra called me to fix some errors which he wasn’t able to fix by himself. He said he spent the whole night trying to fix those but didn’t know how to.I came to his desk. Those were linting errors!After having 10 years of experience, and you don’t even know what they are! Even if you know, please try to google. He was not getting what those line numbers represent. I explained him everything and fixed those.Soon, we got mails from hr regarding our joining dates and NAPA training, which is held in New York. I told the HR about my case, that I have courses left in college and I won’t be able to join on 3rd june.“Can I go to the training and join later after 12th july - when my courses are done” I asked.“No, you need to join as FTE. We will process your visa in june and you’ll go during july first week”“Okay” I replied.“Try to make your college understand, it’s important” is all she said.Next day, I refused. My college will never agree for me to take 2 week vacation during summer term.Rudra received a call from HR. I knew it was regarding me.He took me outside the cabin and asked why did I opted out of NAPA training. I told him everything - how my degree would be affected. He was ready to give WFH for 2 months. I was shocked. Again.Rudra was the most unpredictable mysterious guy I ever met. He was good and bad, at the same time. 2 months is a long time - and he agreed to give me WFH! He earned my respect.Then there was second meeting with Rudra. He told me everything - the work I’ll do as an FTE. Also, he never left a single moment he could get to brag about himself.“You will be working under Varun. He will be the team lead. Your work is XYZ-AHSH-PPOS…..”“Be as mature as me. I can make complex things simple easily. Learn it from me.” he said.Varun. No!!The silent guy. Who took away all the presentations. Even during our team standups over calls, he used to answer when some guy asked me about the project. My code was changed everyday. All the torture I faced last month. And now- I’ll be working under him. Wow.I told Rudra - how my code was changed everyday, how I was not told about the changes Varun did in the backend and still expected my code would run successfully. He listened to me for a while and then said -“When I was a NAPA, I used to ensure that I get 0 review comments”“I don’t get review comments, Rudra. My code gets changed, and it’s hard to understand it everyday without help of Varun.”“It’s a good thing, right? You will learn something from what the change he does. It’s good for you.”Cool. I have to look at the new code and somehow “learn without doing”. Interesting.I worked till 9 pm that day. Before Rudra left, he smiled at me sarcastically.“Shilpi, still working?”“Yeah Rudra, I came little late today.”“Varun changing your code and you changing his code.!”“Yes. That’s what is happening.”And then, he laughed maniacally.This was not the first time he did this. He used to laugh at me sarcastically many times after giving me the UI project.Next week, Varun was here. My virtual desktop was not working and I had no idea why. Called help-desk 5 times that day.“REBOOT!”“TRY IT FROM A DIFFERENT MACHINE!”“IT SHOWS ‘AVAILABLE’ ON MY MACHINE!”was all the response I got from 5 different help-desk-assistants.Took a day off the next day. Saw a mail. Varun had given presentation to our MD that day. UI presentation, which was supposed to be given by me.Next week, same schedule. Help-desk people failed miserably.I tried remote desktop and was able to open my outlook. My inbox was full of -“DISK CAPACITY OVER 95%! CLEAN IT!”I got it. But in order to clean it, I had to login to the virtual computer which I wasn’t able to. It was a deadlock.Soon I was assigned a new virtual computer. My whole local setup - was erased.My whole enthusiasm had turned to ashes at that point. Came late, went early. Stopped attending stand-ups. Late Loggings. WFHs. OOO. No updates. No weekly updates. Nothing to do next since Raghav didn’t help. Frustrated as hell.Our department was hiring more and more people. I had nowhere to sit. No one to talk to.The only friend I had in bengaluru left 2 weeks ago.Please note that I’ve nothing against GS. The management there is really good, they care about their employees. I don’t think any company could’ve given me 2 months WFH and I do respect Rudra a lot for that!The experience may vary from person to person, someone may find GS a very good place, based on the traits he/she has or the team he is working with. But for a shy person like me, who loves to code sitting at the corner of the room - GS is not the place. It was me who was not able to adapt to the culture there.This answer was written by me when I was still an intern. I had no idea what this could do to my life.Next day after I wrote this, I was called by the Head HR of Employee Relations in GS - Devika. I thought she had called me in order to discuss why am I choosing signNow over Goldman but this wasn’t the case.“I read your answer on Quora about Goldman..”“I’ll remove it!” I replied with the speed of light.“No..I don’t want you to take it down, Just tell me the issues you had”And she pretended to listen. Both of us knew why she called me here - to take the answer down.“See, these days many people are on social media and it is affecting how people see us. Probably, some interns wouldn’t want to work with us after reading the answer. Therefore I want you to remove it”“Also, please remember this meeting is confidential. DO NOT tell anyone from your team about it!” she said just before I left.And that was it. I deleted this answer.I saw Rudra’s text on my whatsapp. He asked whether I have a desk to sit, and when will I signNow on my desk. I knew something was fishy since he never ever bothered about.I finished the work and went home.The next day, I woke up to 10 calls from the HR and lots of messages. I asked what happened.I told her I have already deleted the answer, but there was something else. I wasn’t able to login from home. My remote desktop was taken away from me and I had no idea why.And then, came Monday.13th May 2019The day started off with my phone full of Devika’s texts. She insisted that I directly come to the meeting room first instead of going to the GIR cabin.I went to her cabin where she was sitting. And soon the harassment started.“What was your motive behind putting such kind of answers on quora, tell me what was in your mind”“I am sorry, Devika. I’ve already taken them down.”“Didn’t you knew about the firm’s policy? You knew it very well right? Still you put the experience on Quora?”“I was frustrated. So much that it didn’t occur to me at that time. But yes, I knew it.”She wrote it down on a paper.“You put it on social media, and don’t expect your manager to read it? Wake up! Everyone in your dept knows what you did okay! You are always saying that ‘don’t inform my manager about it’.. you know what, infact Rudra only informed us about this. He was the one who forwarded the answer.”I sighed. He knew about it the whole time. Still acted as friendly on thursday.“You can take action against me if you want to. I can’t say anything else.”“We are a very big firm. Many people are there writing these kind of negative - one sided answers. We don’t care”If she didn’t care, why was I sitting here?“I have talked to both Rudra and Varun. Now I know about their perspectives too. Did you inform your manager that you were on leave? No, you didn’t.”“Yes, I was really depressed and woke up at 5 eve..”“You were completely one-sided in your answer. Such a judgemental answer it was! You never wrote what you did!” she exclaimed.“Devika, I did. I wrote I was depressed and was late for standups. I wrote that I took WFH and..”“That was completely in another way!” she interrupted.And then she gave me a tough look.“I have tracked down your whole information, when do you come and leave, wfh etc. I don’t think it’s too much. You were also 1 hour late on the GS event, I heard”I wasn’t. What was she saying?“No, I was a minute late. You can ask my friend who was sitting there.”“Also, you were absent on 4 presentations Varun gave, right?”I was shocked. What did she just say? I was present in 3 of them, I remembered. Now I felt something was really wrong. Varun probably gave her false information about me.“No, I was there for 3 of them” I replied in a low voice.“And you weren’t allowed to give?” She raised her eyebrows.“I didn’t ask him, neither did he offer.. he just took the chair and..Did Varun said I was absent? I wasn’t!” I defended myself.“Oh yes you weren’t, I know. When did I say you were absent? You are just misunderstanding me” she replied and wrote down some points.And now she started lying too about things she said earlier! I was shocked to the core.“They said bad things about me, didn’t they.” I asked.“No, infact they praised you for technical aspects. ‘She did all her tasks which we assigned.’ ‘Used to find solutions of the problem till the very end.’” she read it from the paper she had.But what about the other aspects? I was sure they had said something worse about me. I wondered what was that except me coming late.“GS-UI-LIBRARY!!” she exclaimed.“This is what you wrote about the library. Seriously!”I looked down. I couldn’t say anything except sorry.“Rudra even let you choose jersey for cricket match, didn’t he?”“Yes he did.” I sighed.“What you think what made your experience bad? Was it yourself? Why put it on social media, and didn’t contact us. What about the HCM?”I was late and silent. The only faults.“Does anybody in your team knows about it?” she asked hoping that nobody knows.“No, just me and the interns.” I replied.“And what did you write? Niharika left because of politics..? Did you talk to her? Who told you?” she almost shouted.“I got to know that from a teammate.” I replied in low tone.“So you will put anything you hear on social media??” she tried to overpower me.“If I were your signNow HR and I read this answer on Quora.. you know I’d have..” Devika scolded in a rude tone.She would have taken my offer back. That’s what she meant.“I have already deleted it , Devika. I said sorry, what else can I do? ” I almost cried.“These things never happened with me at signNow. But people here..”I broke down. Couldn’t speak much.“What even if you deleted? 1000s of people saw it. All the people on your floor saw it. They may have copied it, downloaded it. It had so confidential information!”“And yeah, put this conversation there too!!” She said in a very rude tone.“I won’t. You know I won’t.” I whispered.“Anyways Shilpi, now it’d be too awkward for you to go there. We have already stopped your remote access. We don’t want you to work anymore. Since you’ve already rejected the offer too, no discussion related to it. You can submit the id card to me.”“Okay.”I cried a lot in the cab. Rudra knew it all the time. Why didn’t he himself fire me instead of sending a rude HR. And those two also lied a lot about me. The tone of HR was totally different when I met her on Thursday. And today she was really harassing me.It took me a while to understand - all this was planned by Rudra. He choose the rudest and senior-most HR to deal with my case and harass me, just to get back at me.2 interns were joining today and space was very less in the small GIR cabin. And he knew very well I completed all my work the last week itself. Win-Win situation for Rudra!Varun and Rudra lied to HR. It was evident from the way she treated me. I was made to be feel like a garbage - just because I was late at the office!I cried for an hour. And then, I edited and restored this answer.Next day I came to know none of the interns or people in my team knew about this! I was fired secretly. The HR lied the whole time.All because Rudra didn’t want to see my face in GIR!Do I fear them? Not at all.“I will survive, Tracy thought. I face mine enemies naked, and my courage is my shield.” ― Sidney Sheldon (if tomorrow comes)Many people want me to take this answer down or go anonymous. I have done nothing wrong. Those who have, they should hide their faces behind “anonymous” mask.If GS has some problem with the answer, they are free to take action against me. I am not bonded by any legal agreement and atleast deserved decent exit process.

I'll answer your question, but first I need to explain all of human civilisation in 2 minutes with the aid of a cartoon snake. Humans like to think we're a clever lot. Yet those magnificent, mighty brains that allow us to split the atom and touch the moon are the same stupid brains that can't start an assignment until the day before it's due. We evolved from primitive creatures, but we never quite shed ourselves of their legacy. You know the clever, rational part of your brain you think of as your human consciousness? Let's call him Albert. He lives in your brain alongside an impulsive baby reptile called Rex: You know how you can't help but notice if a stranger is tongue-wettingly gorgeous? That's Rex, and no matter how hard you try, you can never turn him off. He's your instinct, your impulse, your love and your fear. We like to think of Albert as "our true self" - the conscious part of our brain. He's the talking, reasoning part. When we decide to go to the gym or write that term paper, Albert made that decision. But Albert is old, easily exhausted, and switches off all the time. Your brain is locked in a battle of wills between a sleepy professor and an impulsive reptile with unlimited energy. You may as well hand Rex the steering wheel. Rex does listen to Albert. Like a child, he will do a lot of what he's told, as long as he doesn't disagree too much. But if Rex desperately yearns to crash on the sofa to watch Survivor and eat Cheetos, that's what you're going to do. The incredible ascension of mankind that surrounds us is largely possible because we've developed systems to nurture the Rex's in our brains, to subdue, soothe and subvert them. Much of this system we call "civilisation". Widely available food and shelter take care of a lot. So does a system of law, and justice. Mandatory education. Entertainment. Monogamy. All of it calms Rex down for long enough for Albert to do something useful - like discover penicillin, or invent Cheetos. Now let's look at your procrastination. You're making a decision with your conscious mind and wondering why you're not carrying it out. The truth is your daily decision maker - Rex - is not nearly so mature. Imagine you had to constantly convince a young child to do what you wanted. For simple actions, asserting your authority might be enough. "It's time for dinner". But if that child doesn't want to do something, it won't listen. You need to cajole it: * Forget logic. Once you've decided to do something, logic and rationale won't help you. Your inner reptile can be placated, scared and excited. But it doesn't speak with language and cannot be reasoned with. * Comfort matters. If you're hungry, tired or depressed your baby reptile will rebel. Fail to take care of yourself, and he'll wail and scream and refuse to do a damn thing you say. That's what he's for. Eat, sleep and make time for fun. * Nurture discipline. Build a routine of positive and negative reinforcement. If you want a child to eat their vegetables, don't give them dessert first. Reward yourself for successes, and set up assured punishments for your failure. Classic examples include committing to a public goal, or working in a team - social pressure can influence Rex. * Incite emotion. Your reptile brain responds to emotion. That is its language. So get yourself pumped, or terrified. Motivational talks, movies and articles can work, for a while. I use dramatic music (one of my favourite playlists is called Music to conquer worlds by [ http://open.spotify.com/user/oliveremberton/playlist/4ifk7EG0SLkV0En6s0ds7g ]). Picture the bliss associated with getting something done, or the horrors of failing. Make your imagination vivid enough that it shakes you. We use similar tricks on children for a reason: "brush your teeth or they'll fall out". * Force a start. The most important thing you can do is start. Much of Rex's instincts are to avoid change, and once you begin something those instincts start to tip into your favour. With enough time, you can even convince Rex to love doing the things he hated. There's a reason we force kids to go to school or to try piano lessons. * Bias your environment. Rex is short sighted and not terribly bright. If he sees a Facebook icon, he'll want it. It's like showing a child the start of a cool TV program immediately before bedtime. Design your environment to be free from such distractions: sign out of instant messenger, turn off notifications, turn off email. Have separate places for work and fun, and ideally separate computers (or at least accounts). Once you know what to look for, you'll start to recognise the patterns and control them. There's an impulsive baby reptile in your brain, and unfortunately he has the steering wheel. If you can be a good parent to him he'll mostly do what you say, and serve you well. Just remember who's in charge. Enjoyed this? There's more of me on Facebook [ https://www.facebook.com/ocemberton ], Twitter [ https://twitter.com/oliveremberton ] and my blog [ http://oliveremberton.com/ ].

Anne Boleyn once had a relationship with Henry Percy, an “understanding” that didn’t equate to a formal engagement, but there’s little doubt the couple wanted to marry. If things had transpired just a little differently, she might have gotten married and lived out her life quietly as the Countess of Northumberland.Percy was born in 1502 and was the eldest son of the Earl of Northumberland. His father seems to have disliked him and favored Percy's younger brothers, who were more vigorous in constitution. In contrast, Percy was "soft," emotional, delicate of health, and bookish, more suited to life in the royal court than in rugged Northumbria.As a young boy, he was sent to the household of Cardinal Wolsey. It was sort of like the Tudor version of a finishing school. Young people were sent to join the households of other nobles to learn the courtly arts and complete their educations. Anne had been sent away very young to the court of Margaret of Austria for much the same reason, but then she had been sent to France to serve first at the court of Mary Tudor, and then at that of Queen Claude.Now, she was back in England, a polished and sophisticated young woman who was likely in the household of her aunt, the Duchess of Norfolk. (She wouldn't be appointed to the household of Queen Katharine until much later.)When the cardinal went to court, wrote Wolsey’s biographer, George Cavendish, Percy would linger with the ladies in the queen’s chamber. That’s where he met Anne Boleyn.We know Anne was at court by February 1522, because she is recorded as playing the part of Perseverance in a court masque. It’s believed Anne had been recalled from the French court because her father was negotiating a marriage for her with James Butler, Earl of Ormond. Anne’s father and Ormond had an ongoing inheritance dispute that the marriage was intended to solve.Anne Boleyn’s grandmother was Lady Margaret Butler, daughter of the 7th Earl of Ormond. When the earl died, he had no sons, and so the daughters split the inheritance. Thomas Boleyn felt he should have inherited the Ormond title through his mother, but a cousin actually living on the lands, Piers Butler, more-or-less claimed the title for his own, and there wasn’t much Thomas Boleyn could do about it, considering Piers Butler had the backing of the Irish lords.Cardinal Wolsey may have been the one who suggested the idea of marrying Anne to Piers Butler’s son, James, as a way of settling the dispute. It’s uncertain of whether Anne knew about these negotiations at the time. Cavendish says she didn’t, and from what we know of Anne’s moral standards, she wouldn’t have begun a relationship with Percy if she knew she was about to be married to another man. As strange as it seems to us today, the opinion of the bride was considered to be so inconsequential that she wouldn't even be informed the marriage was being negotiated until it was a "done deal."Just how far this relationship with Percy went is a matter of speculation. Cavendish writes that a secret love grew between Anne and Percy, and they agreed to marry.In the Tudor era, a betrothal was legally binding. It could be as simple as saying in front of witnesses that the couple intended to marry, or for the upper classes, drawing up contracts which detailed the financial obligations involved. Subsequent marriages were invalid if it was determined that either party had been pre-contracted to another person without it being invalidated by a papal dispensation.Did Anne and Percy ever say the “magic words?” Both later swore that there had never been a legally binding betrothal between them. Both of them were trained courtiers who knew how to communicate without technically ever saying dangerous words. It’s entirely possible they had an "understanding" without ever crossing that line.When Henry VIII sought a dispensation to marry Anne, he included wording that would dissolve any pre-contracts Anne may have had with another man, even though neither of Anne’s negotiated unions had ever signNowed the technical point."...to be dispensed to marry any other woman whatever, even though she has already contracted marriage with another, as long as she has not consummated it with carnal coupula..."Cavendish claims it was the king who discovered the relationship between Anne and Percy and ordered Wolsey to break it off because he wanted Anne for himself. But all evidence points to the king becoming interested in Anne in late 1525/early 1526, years after this incident occurs.In reality, it was likely Anne’s father and the cardinal who put a stop to the match. The cardinal would likely have been concerned at seeing the solution to the irksome Boleyn-Butler inheritance issue being dismantled, and Thomas Boleyn likely wouldn’t have wanted to see his daughter entangled with a man of high title, but low financial prospects. Percy’s family also had a match in mind for him, and were likely displeased he was putting that at risk.Cavendish records that Wolsey summoned Percy and chastised him in front of a hall full of servants, and disparaged Anne - something he was unlikely to do if the king was actually driving the situation because of his own interest in Anne."I marvel not a little of thy peevish folly, that thou wouldest tangle and ensure thyself with a foolish girl yonder in the court, I mean Anne Boleyn. Dost thou not consider the estate that God hath called thee unto in this world? For after the death of thy noble father, thou art most like to inherit and possess one of the most worthiest earldoms of this realm. […] Ye have not only offended your natural father, but also your most gracious sovereign lord, and matched yourself with one, such as neither the king, nor yet your father will be agreeable with the matter. And hereof I put you out of doubt, that I will send for your father, and at his coming, he shall either break this unadvised contract, or else disinherit thee for ever. The king’s majesty himself will complain to thy father on thee, and require no less at his hands than I have said; whose Highness intended to have preferred [betrothed] her unto another person, with whom the king hath travailed already, and being almost at a point with the same person, although she knoweth it not, yet hath the king, most like a politic and prudent prince, conveyed the matter in such sort, that she, upon the king’s motion, will be, I doubt not, right glad and agreeable to the same."According to Cavendish, Percy wept and protested:"… in this matter I have gone so far, before many so worthy witnesses, that I know not how to avoid myself nor to discharge my conscience."Wolsey then responded that he and the king knew what to do in such circumstances, and ordered Percy never to speak to Anne again or face the wrath of the king.Anne was sent home to Hever for about a year, and Percy fell ill soon after the cardinal forced him to break it off with Anne. It sounds like his health was adversely affected by his depression, because throughout his life, illness usually followed periods of sadness. And there was a lot of sadness in Percy's life.The cardinal didn't want to have to worry about his unruly charge trying to contact Anne, so he arranged with Percy's father to have him sent north, to take up command over some of his father's dominions. Percy, wracked with fever, made it part of the way on horseback, and then had to be transported on a litter - essentially an enclosed bed carried by men or supported between horses.Percy was put in command of some of his father's troops who had been fighting battles on the border with Scotland. It was a task Percy seems to have disliked and he was not particularly competent at it. His illness was aggravated by the Northern climate, and the hardy Northumbrians scoffed at his lack of enthusiasm. It was a dangerous time to have an ineffective commander, because the Scots were particularly agitated and aggressive.Percy submitted to the cardinal's directives and married the bride his father had picked for him, Mary Talbot. The House of Percy says that Mary was unattractive in both body and demeanor, but the book is very unsympathetic to her. She and Percy simply weren't suited, but they had little choice but to obey the people who had power over their lives.Their families had been planning the marriage since 1516, but it wasn’t concluded until after the Anne Boleyn incident. We’re unsure of the date - it occurred sometime between 1523 and 1526.She had no dowry, which was probably the real reason her marriage had been somewhat difficult to arrange. All she brought to the marriage with Percy was her impeccable bloodline.Their wedding was a miserly affair that didn't start their future together well. Traditionally, the poor living on the lands of a noble would get the leftovers from the bountiful wedding feast, a way for the commoners to join in the celebrations, even if from afar. But Wolsey forbade the expenditure. The "feast" was instead a simple dinner, with just enough food to feed the household. The locals went away from the gates hungry, and they blamed Percy and his bride for it.To say it was an was an unhappy union from the start is a gross understatement. Quite simply put, the couple heartily despised one another.Percy was “sick in mind and body.” It sounds like he was depressed over his situation. Percy's father died in 1527, and Percy inherited a mess. His father had always chided him as a spendthrift, but the truth of the matter was that his father, known as the "Magnificent Earl," had been the one with the extravagant ways. Money had to be borrowed to bury the earl decently because the earldom was so deeply in debt - they owed £10,000 to the crown alone. Perhaps that's why Percy gave up and surrendered his finances to Wolsey.The cardinal received the income from it to pay the debts and gave the couple a pitifully meager allowance of six shillings and ten pence apiece. Had this been just pocket money, it would have been sufficient, but they had to pay for all of their food and drink from this sum, leaving very little for anything else. Mary's entire wardrobe at this time was valued at £49 - jewelry and all - a pitiful showing for a countess. (Anne Boleyn, by contrast, paid more for a single nightgown.)Percy's brothers were constantly nagging him for money, and were resentful when he didn't share much with them. The financial pressures could not have helped the situation between Percy and his wife.Wolsey employed the servants - and possibly even Percy’s new wife - as spies to keep a close eye on Percy’s activities. Brenan writes that they lied to the cardinal about Percy’s spendthrift ways, and so Percy was constantly harangued with chastising letters.Worse, Percy was faced with insurgents and outlaws on the borders of his lands that he was expected to combat and bring to heel. His depression and lack of enthusiasm for warfare against the rampaging Scots were seen as unmanly. His younger brothers were more skillful in this area, leading many to wish one of them was the earl instead of Percy. The brothers often commanded the Percy forces, a situation which would cause some difficulty in a few years. The money the crown paid him for keeping men at arms to fight the Scots and rebels wasn't enough to cover the expenses, driving his estate further into debt.Organizing force against them was one thing, but when he had to execute them, it was quite another. One young boy stirred his pity, but he feared his own influence wasn’t enough to obtain mercy. He entreated friends to approach the king on his behalf. They were successful and the boy’s life was spared, but this got Percy in further difficulty with Wolsey."You should not use so cantellous and colourable dealing with one that thus tenderly hath brought you up and set you forward…"He visited London to report on the state of his lands to the king and cardinal in 1528, and one wonders if he thought he might run into a certain girl with "beautiful black eyes" who was now engaged to the king. But Percy never encountered Anne on this visit. Anne had fallen ill herself of the "sweating sickness" and was at home recovering at Hever while Percy was in London.Like his health, Percy’s relationship with his wife, Mary Talbot, never improved. In 1529, she became pregnant and fled back to her father’s home. Her child was stillborn, and Mary herself almost died. Wolsey persuaded her to return to her husband after she recovered, but Mary became convinced that Percy was going to have her poisoned.Wolsey never had a chance to sort out that one because the king decided the cardinal wasn’t working in his best interest to get him the annulment he wanted so he could marry Anne Boleyn. Percy was the one sent to arrest the cardinal, the man who had managed his affairs and treated him like a child all of these years. By all accounts, Percy treated Wolsey kindly as he escorted the cardinal toward what would probably have been his doom. But Wolsey died before he could face the king’s “justice.”Soon afterward, Mary Talbot sought an annulment of her own, having gone back to her father’s house again. Apparently, during one of her quarrels with her husband, Percy had mentioned he had once wanted to marry Anne Boleyn. Mary took that as an admission of a pre-contract between himself and Anne, and if she could force the issue, it might be a way out of her detested marriage.Anne Boleyn decided to confront the matter head on, and asked the king to launch an investigation into it. Percy was summoned before the council. There, before the Archbishop of Canterbury, he solemnly swore on the host that there had never been a betrothal between himself and Anne Boleyn.Was he telling the truth? Some writers have posited that Percy gallantly denied his betrothal to Anne so she could marry the king, even though it meant condemning himself to continue a hellacious marriage with his hated wife. But the real answer is likely more mundane. Anne and Percy probably had an understanding, but didn’t go so far as to technically commit themselves. Percy swore it on the sacrament, which wasn’t a thing undertaken lightly in those days. It’s highly unlikely he would have lied on the host and risked the damnation of his soul.Only a scant three years after Anne’s marriage to the king, she was charged with adultery and treason. As a peer, Percy was summoned to be a juror in her trial. Percy had to know she was doomed, just like the cardinal he had escorted a few years before, and there was nothing he could do to save her. What emotional cost this may have had to him, we will never know, but it is recorded that after he said the required word, “guilty,” he collapsed and had to be carried from the court.His ordeal was not over. After the jury dutifully found Anne guilty, the king decided he wanted an annulment. His marriage would be ended by a blade in only a few short days, but Henry was determined to erase the marriage completely and bastardize his daughter, Elizabeth, too. (Ironically, if Anne was never married to Henry, she couldn’t have committed adultery, but no one stopped to question that little technicality.) Percy was dragged out again and asked whether or not there was a pre-contract.This time, there was likely a good deal of pressure on Percy to “admit” there was. Percy held firm. He wrote a statement, addressed to Cromwell:"I perceave by Sir Reginald Carneby that ther is a supposed Pre-contract between the Queen and me. Wherfor I was not only examined upon my othe before the Archbishoppes of Canterburie and York, but also reccaved the blessed Sacrament upon the sayme, before the Duke of Norfolk, and others of the Kynges hignes Council learned in spiritual law; assuring you, Mr. Secretary, by the said othe and bessed bodye, which affore I receaved, and herafter entend to receave, that the same may be to my damnation if there were any contract or promise of marriage betweane her and me.At Newingtone Grene, the XII daye of May, in the 28th year of the reigne of our Soveraigne Lord, King Henry the VIII. Your assured NORTHUMBERLAND."It ultimately didn’t matter. What the king wanted, he would get. Cranmer was sent to the Tower to speak to Anne and emerged with the “evidence” he needed to annul the king’s marriage. What it was is unknown. The document merely states that she admitted to an impediment that was “unknown” to the king at the time of their marriage.Anne went to the scaffold, stripped of her titles of queen and wife. She was once again simply Anne Boleyn, as she had been in those heady days of 1522, when Percy had fallen in love with the girl who had beautiful black eyes.He returned home after Anne's execution, "sick in body and mind." He tried to do his duty and keep order in his lands. He refused to join the rebels of the Pilgrimage of Grace, even when both of his brothers did. His brothers demanded he join them, or surrender command of the earldom's forces to them.Percy, who had been too ill to rise from his bed when his brothers approached him, refused both demands. William Stapleton later wrote that he saw the earl after the confrontation with his brothers."[H]e fell in weeping, ever wishing himself out of the world."Outside, the mob was howling for them to cut off Percy's head and make his younger brother Thomas the earl. The leader of the rebels, Robert Aske, may have been alarmed by the vehemence of the men in the field against Percy. He sent to earl to York, possibly for Percy's own protection, but also to get him out of the way as the younger brothers led the Northumbrians who sided with the rebels, some 6,000 men, it's said. Percy was more-or-less a prisoner in one of his own manors.The rebellion failed and his brothers were attained as traitors after the rebellion was crushed. One of them was eventually pardoned, but the elder, Thomas, was executed.Taking stock of his own life, he realized it was highly unlikely he’d have children of his own. He had intended to leave his earldom to the children of his brother, but their father was an attained traitor, and they could no longer inherit. The estate would revert to the crown when Percy died.Percy tried the only thing he could to help his nephews. Instead of waiting for his death, he gave the estate to the king outright. In this way, he bypassed the inheritance rules that barred the boys from getting the estate, and prayed the king or the next monarch might be kind enough to confer the estate on them if they earned favor. Percy also hoped that by gifting the king his vast holdings, the king might be generous enough to pay off his debts, or perhaps allow him the income from one of his earldom’s offices, so he didn’t have to live in such miserable poverty. He was so ill, he had to be carried by litter to sign the legal documents gifting the earldom to the king.Counting on Henry VIII's magnanimity was never a good idea, even under the best of circumstances. The petty king refused to pay even the interest on Percy's debts. Percy, living in abject poverty, asked if he could at least have the rest of the salary that was due to him from one of his offices. This wasn't a favor - it was his by right. But the king refused even that, leaving Percy penniless.He had been allowed to remain in one of his estate houses, Hackney. But he had nothing to live on except money he managed to beg from his few remaining friends. He had only two elderly servants to attend to him, and his confessor. They were with the "Unhappy Earl" when he died on June 29, 1537.Cromwell had to chide money from the king to pay for Percy's funeral, saying there'd be a public scandal if he didn't at least bury the man decently. His funeral was a sad affair. The House of Percy states:"No person of the name of Percy was present, nor did any of Lady Northumberland's relatives attend."He had a grave marker over his tomb, but it disappeared by the 1760s. Today, no trace remains of his tomb.Mary Talbot was left with nothing from her marriage. She tried to beg the king for her dower rights, but the king replied that since Mary hadn't brought a dowry to the marriage she didn't deserve anything. Still, she persisted, and the king finally granted her some lands from dissolved monasteries in the area to give her a small income.Mary never remarried. She got in a spot of trouble later in her life for retaining the Roman Catholic faith and having masses said in her home. She was rumored to be a supporter of Mary Queen of Scots. She died in 1572, and was buried in Sheffield Church - pointedly not at the side of her hated husband.Percy would have been glad to know that the estate of his ancestors was eventually granted to his nephews during the reign of Queen Mary.

The answer is gonna be really long. Grab some snacks as it could take a while.After interning at both signNow and Goldman, without a blink of an eye I can say - choose signNow.Going back a year before, my answer was different. Probably because I was unaware of how Goldman would turn out to be.I was the happiest person the day I was selected as an FTE at GS - a reputed fin-tech company which mostly hires tier-1 students, a dream for many. I had heard from many people that GS offers package as high as 32lpa which was quite a big deal for me - or for anyone who might have been at my place.As for signNow, I wanted a PPO since I really worked my ass off there - and was given one 6 days after I got offer from GS. I couldn’t be any happier.Soon came the phase of deciding - what should I choose? I didn’t know about the salary of GS but I had an idea that it definitely pays more than signNow. And that was enough for me - a reputed firm with lots of money!Then came the HR’s call. She offered me semester long internship in GS! I was glad that I don’t have to spend my last semester in college and will also earn some money. With the stipend as high as 75k and stay at Hilton hotel during intern, anybody is likely to go crazy and say “YES”.And so I did.I decided to take my decision after completing the semester long internship there, whether to go with signNow or continue with Goldman.The beginningSoon came 7th January. Day started off with amazing orientation and a beautiful office visit. Then came the lunch buddy - GS assigns a buddy from your department to have lunch with you the day you join, let’s say he was Raghav (name changed).Raghav seemed to be a really smart guy. I asked him a few questions about GS being a fin-tech, is it easy to switch and other questions. He seemed to be out of place, not interested. A guy came who was an intern in a team in which Raghav used to work. He kept talking and giggling with him, completely ignoring my presence. Cool, maybe Raghav is a badass - who cares?Met with my manager and two other interns who were in the same department - ZIR(changed). He seemed like a chilled-out and thoughtful person. Let’s call him Rudra.Our whole department used to sit in a middle sized cabin which accommodated around 32–35 employees of ZIR. My happiness knew no bounds! Great team, small cabin and friendly manager - what else could I ask for?Then came the next day. We were introduced to our team and had a lunch together. Oh no! Lunch here was not free - no big deal. Only 80rs/- per plate is affordable when you earn 75k per month, I thought.After having lunch, we began installing softwares required. Wait, you can’t install some softwares without manager’s permission. Fine! I messaged my manager and he granted the permission. He came later in the evening and gave 3 of us an interesting machine learning problem to solve - in a week, till we get our projects.He had three projects in mind, and he left it for us to decide which one we wan’t to take. I took the one which I thought was more impactful and cool, also because we had a member of our team working for the project. My task was to integrate the backend stuff he wrote with the UI I was going to create. Also to help him with some of those backend stuffs later on.“You can take help from Varun, in case you need” said Rudra.So it began!1st MonthI started learning React.js for the UI I was going to implement from various websites. There were tons of tutorial there. After understanding some theory, I clicked on ‘try it on codepen’ - online editor.“You are restricted from using an external website - no permissions”What? I can’t even use some online editor. Okay that’s fine - we have pretty sensitive data in GS. Since it’s a finance based company, we have client data with us and user may copy and paste it online - someone might steal the data! All this made sense. ‘It’s fine, I’ll bring my own laptop tommorow’, I thought before leaving.I could see two teammates standing behind me from my peripheral vision. One who was writing the backend stuff for the project I was working upon, let’s call him Varun.Varun was a silent and sober guy - a hardworking one who speaks only when required. Another guy standing beside him was Raghav.“Hey!” I said in a low tone. Did I do some crime? Why are these two here.. I wondered.“You brought your personal laptop, is everything fine here?” they asked.I told them about the restrictions. Raghav took my work PC and sent Rudra, my manager a request to approve codepen.I waited. One hour. Two hours. Codepen still not working. Fine for me since I have my own laptop. No worries.After 2 weeks Varun called me and started assigning tasks to do for the UI. I was full of enthusiasm and paid full attention to what he wanted. I started looking out for the cool libraries out there and found - material-ui.‘Perfect!’ I exclaimed.Started with the tasks, and was able to achieve the target next evening. It looked damn good! Varun will be happy. And so, I showed it to him.“Okay, font-size is a bit huge. And please change the app’s name - ELEGANT USER’S APP” (name changed). And so I did.“E-L-E-G-E-N-T U-S-E-R—S A-P-P”What a funny name, I thought. (The real one was funnier than the changed one)So days went, 1..2…3 and I completed 5–6 tasks. The basic UI (20%) was done. Then came Varun -“Shilpi, you did this using which library?”“Material-ui! It’s really good and..”“Okay, but make sure you can use it. Only specific libraries can be used at GS. Search xyz site and ensure if we can use it. If yes, proceed. Else use GS UI library”What did he just say. I worked on the UI for 2 weeks, and he is telling me now that I may not be able to use the material-ui library! No way..With my heart beating fast, I typed..X…Y….Z….gs..comCtrl+F“M-A——T-E—-R—I—A”Boom! It’s there. I was delighted :)The next day I was late. I saw a message pop up. It was from Raghav.“Hey” it said.“Hey” I replied.’“Please try to attend the daily standup. If you do, mail Rudra about your update :)” He replied.There hasn’t been a single day I was late. But okay, FINE.Then came the 5th day - friday. I got a message from Varun.‘Hi Shilpi, can you make another UI using GS-UI?’OH NO!. Again?.‘Just for the feel…we’ll show it to Rudra next week, he’ll choose which one we can use’*Slow Claps*. Well played Varun. Why did he approve the material-ui one if he wanted it in GS-UI - I wondered.It’s fine, I can do it. I encouraged myself and went to the internal site - gs-ui-library. (name changed)Okay, fine. This looks good. Okay. Cool. Documentation.. documentation….uhmm.I searched for the whole day, no documentation. Just few codes and examples to understand how to display some component.Way uglier than material-ui - I thought. And a minute later, an evil idea came to my mind..“What if I make the UI using gs-ui-library so ugly that Rudra and Varun both reject!” That would be great!The next week on friday, I was done with gs-ui-library. My code was asked to be removed from codesandbox by Varun - it’s illegal to put GS’s internal code there. I could hear Rudra laughing about how he is afraid of the interns bringing personal laptops here, and what will happen if someone names a variable as “ZIR” and put it on github.I showed Rudra the material-ui one. He was impressed.“This looks good! But don’t keep the name as ‘ ELEGANT USERS APP’, instead keep it as ‘THE USERS SEARCH APP’ ” (name changed)“But Rudra, Varun has asked me to..”“I will ask him. We will decide and tell you”Fine. Keep the name as ‘The bla bla app”. I don’t care.Varun was already gone by the time. I smirked. I won’t show the UI I made using gs-ui-library to Rudra!Next day Varun was on my desk. He asked whether I showed both the UI’s.“No, actually I forgot to show the other..”“See, the people above us will probably ask why we didn’t use GS-UI. That’s why I am saying so. I have no problem with material-ui. Just ask Rudra if he is fine with it. Rudra…”“Yes, Varun” replied Rudra.And then he showed both the UI’s to him. The ugly one. The good one.“I think it looks great - the ‘gs-ui-library’ one!” Rudra exclaimed.I shouted in my mind - “How can he..!”“See Shilpi, we don’t have any problem using material-ui one but the people for whom we are making the app will ask why we didn’t use the internal-gs library. Okay, tell me one thing - it does have all the components you require, right?”“Yes, Rudra” I sighed.“Seems like Shilpi wanted to use material-ui, haha” Rudra giggled and looked at Varun. I could hear the giggling from one of the two interns from behind - Tejas (name changed).He was also working on a UI, along with some backend stuff. He was using ‘gs-ui-library’ from day one. And so, he giggled.Rudra -1 .. Shilpi- 0This was the first time I went home feeling sad. Why didn’t they tell me 2 weeks ago? Now I will have to work on the other one. And the library has no documentation.“g-s-u-i-l-i-b-r-a-r-y” I typed.Gs-ui-library was a really terrible library. No documentation, made by mixture of other available libraries online. It was like an accidental product of some cross-breeding. A scientific failure.Anyways, I somehow learnt basic features which I could implement using the library. On the other hand, my machine was damn slow - for a reason I didn’t know.“Why are you using vs code? How did you get it!” asked Rudra who saw me coding on vscode.“I like it- it’s really good for react. Installed it from the store.”“Haha, use intellij, okay!” Rudra said in a serious tone.Wow. After making me work with the gs-ui-library, now he is snatching away the editor I love. Cool.I still continued with vs code. Varun was totally fine with it.I went to drink a glass of water. Didn’t bring my bottle that day. So took a ‘visitor’s cup’ from inside the drawers.“Ma’am, you can’t drink in that. It’s only for visitors” said a guy who saw I was about to drink water.“Oh, it’s ok for today you can use it..Ma’am”Great. Block websites - facebook, gmail, codepen. Take my material-ui away. Don’t allow me to use vs-code. And also, don’t let me drink water at peace!I was pissed off. Huh!2nd MonthWe were having a cricket match on saturday! Rudra asked me if I want to play - since he wanted a female player as per the rules. He just wanted me to throw the ball for an over or so since it was the rule. I agreed - afterall he was my manager.I came back home, exhausted. Wasn’t allowed to bat :( even when the guy players were noob too. Whatever, I don’t care. I said to myself.So I started working on the integration part. Meanwhile we used to have meetings in which we were told about ZIR and it’s functions. Rudra used to tell us about how fun the NAPA training is going to be, and how we will start hiding our id cards after the event.I completed the integration part in a week or so. Gave a weekly demo to Rudra.Next week was going to be a demo with Monica’s team (name changed). The finance guys for whom we were building the ‘ELEGANT USERS APP’. Varun was happy that I had completed the integration part and added 2 more features to implement.- feature1 & feature2Before the demo, we had a meeting with Monica just a week before. Rudra, Varun and I gathered in a room. Varun and Monica proceeded on what she wants and what actually we have. It was a debate between them and I listened.Since the lunch time was over, Rudra and I went to the food-court outside to have one.“Shilpi, you know I was like you. The silent guy in the room. If someone else was at your place he would have asked a lot of questions! ”“I think it’s better to listen Rudra, than argue. I didn’t have much idea about what they were talking and the talk was mostly concerning Varun.”“See..it’s good very good. But to be at a place like GS…you know! The world is very mean,Shilpi. You need to speak more than you do work here! Many people don’t know much but they’ll get ahead of you because they speak. I was like you when I joined GS. In the group discussion round, when everyone was debating.. I just sat at the corner. HR came and asked each of us individually. If she hadn’t done that, I mayn’t be sitting here today”I gave it some thought. He was right.Some days later feature1 stopped working. I had no idea why, I was using an excellent library for feature1, off-course an external one. Varun himself has asked me to use an external for that case since we don’t have a gs library for that.But now. It wasn’t working.It took me a week to include the library - react-bootstrap-table2 with the project along with the features it had, and use it. And some magic happened. Now feature1 stops working. Damn!I woke up the whole night - till 4 am to make the feature1 work. The remote desktop worked very slow. In GS, we are not given laptops for security purposes. So we have to use remote desktop.It was damn slow but I was patient. I kept on trying and trying till I fell asleep early in the morning. Woke up around 12.An hour before demo with Monica’s team, I told Varun about it. He said it’s fine, we will show the demo without it.Tik…tikk….I wasn’t satisfied. I worked damn hard for 45 min and was able to make feature1 work!We went to give the demo. Varun pulled out a chair and sat before a PC.“Hi Monica!”“Hey Varun!”And so it started. The demo. The UI I made. The features I implemented. The integration. My two month’s hard work.All of them was presented by our VP, Mr.Varun!“Uhm…but we don’t need feature 1 and 2, Varun. You can remove it” said Monica.W-H-A-T! What did she just say. I went an hour back in time.I am sweating. I can feel I am nervous. This has to go good. I know well about the project, and I will make the feature-1 work! I will!Yes, I did. Only to loose the presentation as well as the feature.I rushed out of the room with the unhappy face which no one bothered about in the meeting room. I was silent and in hurry, it was weekly demo too today.“Haashh.. It went great!” exclaimed Varun who barely ever talked to me. Since like 1962!“Okay, but we have a weekly demo too!”The weekly demo got cancelled. Varun proceeded to tell me how we don’t need feature-1 and all the new features which Monica wanted. I remembered them all. One of them was a feature-X which was not possible technically. I tried making Varun understand and he did, after quite a while.Then came the mid-semester exam and I finally got a break!3rd MonthI went to my home after holidays. After 2 months, 1,40,000 was credited to my account. I buyed clothes for mom and dad. I was delighted and ready to go back!Meanwhile, an acquaintance of mine who did intern at signNow called me. She also had an offer from both the companies but was unable to decide. I told her all pros and cons, and how I was going to join GS. Being a Delhite, she wanted to join signNow.After a while, I thought. I should maybe negotiate!It was a disaster. The HR told me clearly that they pay all the FTE’s equally regardless of how many offers they had. I asked him about the work I’d be given but he didn’t tell.After 8 days, I refused. Probably the biggest mistake I did.Came back to office happily. Compiled the code.React-bootstrap-table2 library code - gone. Whole UI code changed in a week. My 2 week’s effort - 1 week for the library and 2 nd for other features went to ashes.Just in ONE SINGLE WEEK.~Varun committed the code 2 hours ago~~Varun committed the code yesterday~~Varun….~And so on.Varun started using an internal gs-ui-library library instead of react-bootstrap-table2. Instead of giving proper review comments, he changed my code by himself. Some backend stuff also came to me.I fetched the code from repo, the one Varun had implemented. And tried to understand.“You just have to implement feature-b-xyz, no need to go through whole code” he said.Fine.The next series of days started with me coming late - 11:50, 12 or later than that. I used to mail Rudra about the update. Sometimes I was able to attend standup, sometime I wasn’t able to. My health started detoriating.Everyday, Varun used to commit some changes. And it took a hell lot of time to update the project in intellij, go through his changes and do other changes. I was pretty much frustrated.Took 2 wfhs in 2 weeks. Logged in late many times. Had to push myself from bed everyday. Devoted my time to video games than gs work. Lost interest.Then I was given some backend part. I took WFH a day I wasn’t feeling well and learnt about apis stuff. Still some part of me wanted to do well and take interest in the work genuinely.We - all 3 interns received a mail from Rudra which we could never forget. Rudra had showed his ‘Rudra’ roop. The mail said -“You guys are not taking the work seriously. WFHs are not to be taken for granted. So many WFHs and late loggings. Not at all serious about your work. You guys need to have deliverables by the end of this month.I don’t care, work for your career not mine.”I was shocked. The friendly, giggling Rudra! I remembered the first time I met him. And the mail was quite a shock to all of us.Late loggings & WFHs were targeted at me.But… Tejas? What did he do?As far as I remember, he was a hard working guy. Always on time. Never missed a standup. What did he do to receive the mail?Days after that, Varun took 4WFHs in a row. Rudra was quiet. Nisha only came like twice in a week, Rudra said nothing. Why us? Why the interns? I wondered.One day I stayed at office till 8pm. I could hear Rudra talking about ‘The Elegant User’s App’ over a phone call.“We are building it again since the last UI was in angular. We wanted it in React.” he said to somebody over the call.Throughout my whole intern, I had one doubt in my mind.The app on which I was working upon was already built by someone and was functional too. But my manager wanted it to be built again since he wanted us to use a new technology.What’s the difference even if angular was used? What’s the need of rebuilding the app again from scratch? I wondered.And the next words I heard shattered me.“Yeah, Varun is working with some intern on ‘The Elegant User’s App’.”What did he say?The last two months were fully devoted to the UI. I went back in time.“Shilpi, if you want any help - Varun would be able to for this project.I was made to believe that it was an independent project, which it never was. I worked my ass off for three months only to hear that I am ‘some intern’ working under Varun and helping him building the UI.I got depressed.It was Holi’s festival - the festival of colours. I never really celebrated holi, hated to be coloured all over. We had a group for our department, and I wished everyone a “Happy Holi!”.Tejas replied with a “Happy holi” too.“Happy Forest Day” - stated an image I received on whatsapp. It was from Rudra. On the whatsapp group. This was his reply for “Happy Holi”.Needless to say, I didn’t go to office that day as sign of rebel ( we didn’t have holiday on holi). Varun was already doing WFH. The “Happy Forest Day” frustrated me. Why Rudra why. You are better than that.“Niharika (name changed) is leaving GS” somebody whisphered.Niharika, a very smart lady was in our department. She was mentoring an intern and sounded quite knowledgable. Her sudden decision of leaving GS came as a shock to everyone.I had a last chat with her only when everyone was away for lunch. She had refused her farewell too I guess. She came to me and we had a decent chat. I asked her the reason of leaving. She wanted to switch the team maybe but it was taking a long time. Sweet and smart is all I could say for her. She had done work with JPMC & Morgan Stanely (US) and held a green card. A dedicated worker.After the lunch, she had a long meeting with Rudra. She was too firm with her decision.After she left, someone told me she bitched about many people in the team - specially Rudra. I was really sad. GS lost a good employee that day. And maybe, due to politics.Next day, GS was having an orientation for all new campus hires. It was one hell of a day. World-class hotel stay and world-class orientation.Varun was going out to the new office for 2 weeks. For some work.4th monthBefore Varun had left for the new office, he had asked me to attend telephonic standups for our team from 3–3:30. Now I used to attend 2 standups - the department one, and the team one. Full time waste activities!He had also asked me to get details of a task from Raghav and get it completed. I messaged him and he said he will be there at my desk in 5 min. Well, he never came. I asked him 2–3 times more to which he sent me a random link. I was disheartened and had nothing to do for 2 weeks.I mailed the tpo of my college, he was ready to talk to signNow’s HR and get my offer back. I was relieved.Soon, we got mails from hr regarding our joining dates and NAPA training, which is held in New York. I told the HR about my case, that I have courses left in college and I won’t be able to join on 3rd june.“Can I go to the training and join later after 12th july - when my courses are done” I asked.“No, you need to join as FTE. We will process your visa in june and you’ll go during july first week”“Okay” I replied.“Try to make your college understand, it’s important” is all she said.Next day, I refused. My college will never agree for me to take 2 week vacation during summer term.Rudra received a call from HR. I knew it was regarding me.He took me outside the cabin and asked why did I opted out of NAPA training. I told him everything - how my degree would be affected. He was ready to give WFH for 2 months. I was shocked. Again.What will I do now! Rudra was the most unpredictable mysterious guy I ever met. He was good and bad, at the same time. 2 months is a long time - and he agreed to give me WFH! He earned my respect.Now I was in dilemma. signNow. GS. signNow. GS.What to do?On the other hand, I made my tpo talk to signNow’s HR. And now, Rudra is turning to be a nice guy. I will choose GS. I was firm this time.Then there was second meeting with Rudra. He told me everything - the work I’ll do as an FTE. Also, he never left a single moment he could get to brag about himself.“You will be working under Varun. He will be the team lead. Your work is XYZ-AHSH-PPOS…..”“Be as mature as me. I can make complex things simple easily. Learn it from me.” he said.Varun. No!!The simple guy. Who took away all the presentations. Even during our team standups, he used to answer when some guy asked me about the project. My code was changed everyday. All the torture I faced last month. And now- I’ll be working under him. Wow.I told Rudra - how my code was changed everyday, how I was not told about the changes Varun did in the backend and still expected my code would run successfully. He listened to me for a while and then said -“When I was a NAPA, I used to ensure that I get 0 review comments”“I don’t get review comments, Rudra. My code gets changed, and it’s hard to understand it everyday without help of Varun.”“It’s a good thing, right? You will learn something from what the change he does. It’s good for you.”Cool. I have to look at the new code and somehow “learn without doing”. Interesting.I worked till 9 pm that day. Before Rudra left, he smiled at me sarcastically.“Shilpi, still working?”“Yeah Rudra, I came little late today.”“Varun changing your code and you changing his code.!”“Yes. That’s what is happening.”And then, he laughed maniacally.This was not the first time he did this. He used to laugh at me sarcastically many times after giving me the UI project.Next week, Varun was here. My virtual desktop was not working and I had no idea why. Called help-desk 5 times that day.“REBOOT!”“TRY IT FROM A DIFFERENT MACHINE!”“IT SHOWS ‘AVAILABLE’ ON MY MACHINE!”was all the response I got from 5 different help-desk-assistants.Took a day off the next day. Saw a mail. Varun had given presentation to our MD that day. UI presentation, which was supposed to be given by me.Next week, same schedule. Help-desk people failed miserably.I tried remote desktop and was able to open my outlook. My inbox was full of -“DISK CAPACITY OVER 95%! CLEAN IT!”I got it. But in order to clean it, I had to login to the virtual computer which I wasn’t able to. It was a deadlock.Soon I was assigned a new virtual computer. My whole local setup - was erased.My whole enthusiasm had turned to ashes at that point. Came late, went early. Stopped attending standups. Late Loggings. WFHs. OOO. No updates. No weekly updates. Nothing to do next since Raghav didn’t help. Frustrated as hell.Our department was hiring more and more people. I had nowhere to sit. No one to talk to. The only friend I had in bangalore left 2 weeks ago.And then came end-term exams.5th monthStill no mail from signNow. What do I do.I mailed the HR.I don’t care about my ego now. I just can’t work like this. A place where I am depressed everyday.And I got a positive response.I’ll be joining signNow in july. I don’t care about NAPA training. I just don’t.I am happy with less base salary.Why did I write the whole story? What’s the point of writing the whole experience when I could have just compared both the companies?Because I wanted you to feel the way I felt at each moment during my intern, why did I take the decision I took. Why did I take a rejected offer back.From my story you are well aware that -GS is a company for people who are confident, who may lack in technical terms but if they speak about their work just like Rudra told me, they will be successful in long run. You can’t sit at a corner desk everyday without networking and grow in GS but you can, at signNow. One of the main reasons of me leaving.Tejas was working on unapproved project. The project may not be approved by the MD and his struggle for 4 months could turn to ashes. This could never happen in a tech company like signNow where we have approved projects.Forget free food, they don’t even provide glasses to drink coffee/water. On the other hand, signNow has free food and glasses too.People focus on deliverables, no learning in my case. During my intern at signNow, more focus was on learning.You won’t receive appreciation. Tejas worked his ass off only to get scoldings from Rudra. While at signNow, I was really appreciated for the work I did by both - my mentor & manager.People focus on stupidest things - “ELEGANT USERS APP” v/s “THE USERS SEARCH APP” is more important here. Whereas at signNow people devote their time to efficiency and readability.Meetings, meetings and more meetings! A signNow part of the day goes in meetings at GS. Not the case in signNow, they respect developer’s time.Strats position -32lpa. Tech analyst-22lpa. No more words! At signNow, we get equal salary - 22lpa as fresher no matter whether we are an iitian or not.Varun, a person totally noob in react used to review my code. Sometimes it was really hard to make him understand. Never happened at signNow where my mentor knew Javascript & C++ in depth.No help from peers - everyone busy in their own world. Raghav was the smartest person in my team. He could’ve helped me but he didn’t. Never happened with me in signNow - people were more approachable and ever-ready to help.Features changing - worked my ass off on feature1 only to get it removed later on. Only if Monica had told earlier she doesn’t want one. In signNow, it rarely happened that a feature which we don’t need is implemented.Too much into internal code - “use gs-ui-library” “use intellij”. I want freedom. Which is there at signNow.Restrictions - can’t do much without manager’s permission. Not the case at signNow.No recognition - all the work I did was presented by Varun at last. While at signNow, I gave 2 badass presentations and was much appreciated by manager.Blocked sites - gmail, facebook and some coding sites are blocked.The only pros were - less working hours & luxurious hotel stay. And of course the huge stipend of 75k!Please note that I’ve nothing against GS. The management there is really good, they care about their employees. I don’t think any company could’ve given me 2 months WFH and I do respect Rudra a lot for that!The experience may vary from person to person, someone may find GS a very good place, based on the traits he/she has or the team he is working with. But for a shy person like me, who loves to code sitting at the corner of the room - GS is not the place. It was me who was not able to adapt to the culture there. The reason being - having a previous internship experience at signNow, which taught me what freedom is. If I didn’t have any previous experience, maybe I could’ve adjusted there assuming - “This is how it is everywhere, and this is how it works!”Irony is, the question was asked by me about a year ago. And today, I have appropriate answer to it!This answer was written by me when I was still an intern. I had no idea what this could do to my life.Next day after I wrote this, I was called by the Vice-president HR of GS - Devika. I thought she had called me in order to discuss why am I choosing signNow over Goldman but this wasn’t the case.“I read your answer on quora about goldman..”“I’ll remove it!” I replied with the speed of light.“No..I don’t want you to take it down, Just tell me the issues you had”And she pretended to listen. Both of us knew why she called me here - to take the answer down.“See, these days many people are on social media and it is affecting how people see us. Probably, some interns wouldn’t want to work with us after reading the answer. Therefore I want you to remove it”“Also, please remember this meeting is confidential. DO NOT tell anyone from your team about it!” she said just before I left.And that was it. I deleted this answer.I saw Rudra’s text on my whatsapp. He asked whether I have a desk to sit, and when will I signNow on my desk.I finished the work and went home.The next day, I woke up to 10 calls from the HR and lots of messages. I asked what happened.I told her I have already deleted the answer, but there was something else. I wasn’t able to login from home. My remote desktop was taken away from me and I had no idea why.And then, came Monday.I went to her cabin where she was sitting. And soon the harassment started.“What was your motive behind putting such kind of answers on quora, tell me what was in your mind”“I am sorry, Devika. I’ve already taken them down.”“Didn’t you knew about the firm’s policy? You knew it very well right? Still you put the experience on quora?”“I was frustrated. So much that it didn’t occur to me at that time. But yes, I knew it.”She wrote it down on a paper.“You put it on social media, and don’t expect your manager to read it? Wake up! Everyone in your dept knows what you did okay! You are always saying that ‘don’t inform my manager about it’.. you know what, infact Rudra only told me about this. He was the one who forwarded the answer.”I sighed. He knew about it the whole time. Still acted as friendly.“We are a very big firm. Many people are there writing these kind of negative - one sided answers. We don’t care”If she didn’t care, why was I sitting here.“I have talked to both Rudra and Varun. Now I know about their perspectives too. Did you inform your manager that you were on leave? No, you didn’t.”“Yes, I was really depressed and woke up at 5 eve..”“And what did you wrote? Niharika left because of politics..? Did you talk to her? Who told you?”“The intern who knew her told me”“And you put it on social media??”She gave me a tough look.“I have tracked down your whole information, when do you come and leave, wfh etc. I don’t think it’s too much. You were also 1 hour late on the GS event, I heard”I wasn’t. What was she saying?“No, I was a minute late. You can ask my friend who was sitting there.”“Also, you were absent on 4 presentations Varun gave, right?”“No, I was there for 3 of them”“And you weren’t allowed to give?”“I didn’t ask him, neither did he offer.. he just took the chair and..Did Varun said I was absent? I wasn’t!”“Oh yes you weren’t, I know. When did I say you were absent? You are just misunderstanding me” she replied and wrote down some points.“GS-UI-LIBRARY!!” she excalimed.“This is what you wrote about the library.Seriously!”I looked down. I couldn’t say anything except sorry.“You didn’t write about any wrong you did, completely one-sided answer. I got to know about other people’s perspective after talking to them.”“Yes I was late sometimes, and didn’t confront anyone.”“Rudra even let you choose jersey for cricket match, didn’t he”“Yes he did.”“What you think what made your experience bad? Was it yourself? Why put it on social media, and didn’t contact us”I was late and silent. The only faults.“If I were your signNow HR and I read this answer on quora.. you know I’d have..” Devika scolded in a rude tone.She would have taken my offer back. That’s what she meant.“I have already deleted it , Devika” I almost cried.“These things never happened with me at signNow. But people here..”I broke down. Couldn’t speak much.“What even if you deleted? 1000s of people saw it. All the people on your floor saw it. They may have copied it, downloaded it. It had so confidential information!”“And yeah, put this conversation there too!!” She said in a very rude tone.“I won’t. You know I won’t. ” I whispered.“Anyways Shilpi, now it’d be too awkward for you to go there. We have already stopped your remote access. You can submit the id card to me.”“Okay.”I cried a lot in the cab. Rudra knew it all the time. Why didn’t he himself fire me instead of sending a rude HR. And those two also lied a lot about me. The tone of HR was totally different when I met her on thursday. And today she was really harassing me.It took me a while to understand - all this was planned by Rudra. He choose the rudest and senior-most HR to deal with my case and harass me, just to get back at me., 2 interns were joining today and space was very less in the little cabin. And he knew very well I completed all my work the last week itself. Win-Win situation for Rudra!Varun and Rudra lied to HR. It was evident from the way she treated me. I was made to be feel like a garbage - just because I was late at the office!I cried for an hour. And then, I edited and restored this answer.Do I fear them? Not at all.“I will survive, Tracy thought. I face mine enemies naked, and my courage is my shield.” ― Sidney Sheldon (if tomorrow comes)

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Result : Selected, All India Rank - 4 (ISRO 2018)I want to give not only a very detailed experience but also some tips from my side. I have tried to write in such a way that you feel as if you are in interview hall. Because of all this you might feel this interview experience is a bit long but it's only for people very serious about ISRO. Going through the full experience will definitely give you a competitive edge. My contact informations including my whatsapp number is given at the end. Feel free to approach me. Now let's begin.  It was 17th August 2018, 8:00 am ISRO guest house, Chennai.  This year there was no interview center at Bangalore, only Delhi, Kolkata and Chennai and all who had written test centers at Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Kerela, Andhra Pradesh and maybe Orissa had their interview center at Chennai.  I was wearing a white shirt, a black pair of trousers, black belt, black pair of shoes with plain black socks and a plain and sober grey tie. Please put on a tie, this is what candidates don't understand, ISRO is almost like a private firm. Here looks, appearance, proper dressing sense and smartness matters, that is why in interview panel there are members from HR present. Without tie, it is not formal, your top button is not closed and your collars are not properly upright. First 10 minutes are deciding for any interview and for first 10 seconds all they are going to observe is your appearance. Candidates who do not take care of these tiny details will say tomorrow that their luck was bad. Its not about luck, it's about taking care of the tiniest details.  My name was first on the list on that day so I signNowed 15 min before the time mentioned in call letter (7:45am).I expected 8:00 to be time for start of verification of documents just like in case of BARC, but ISRO people are not playing around, they do not have classic government job mentality of working 9 to 5 and 5 days a week. So they actually started the interviews 10-15 minutes before 8:00 as few students arrived as early as 7:00 and completed the document verification before me so even though my name was first on the list, 6-7 candidates got interviewed before me (Actually, I liked it... I didn't wanted to be the first but also I didn't wanted to wait for 4-5 hours). So sometime before 10 a.m. I was asked to get into the interview room. Even for me who has already cleared BARC last year, who has already spent days and nights among biggest scientists of this country for the past one year, it was a cereal moment when I slightly opened the door and saw the world on the other side. I got the first glimpse of INDIAN SPACE RESEARCH ORGANIZATION. That moment I'll never forget for the rest of my life. I know a lot of you folks are confused, if I already was in BARC then why did I go for ISRO? Right? See it has something to do with passion. I know exactly what I want, I know exactly which field of engineering fascinates me. It is aerospace engineering and rocket science. This was never possible in BARC and that is why even after failing twice in ISRO written test(May 2017 & Dec 2017) I went for ICRB exam the third time and this time I made it happen. @ the door Me: May I come in sir? I3: yes please (from now on interviewer 1=I1, interviewer 2=I2 and so on) I went and stood near the only chair on my side. It was a gigantic hall. A completely different setup than BARC interview panel. There was a giant rectangular table between me and all the interviewers, there was atleast 7 feet distance between me and the closest interviewer (12 o'clock),so they had a mic for every person attached to the table. There were around 10 interviewers out of which one was a lady but I think including her, two were from HR, because they were monitoring the way I speak and the way I present. I teach a lot about how to be confident, how to have good speaking skills and body posture on youtube so I had a good idea of how to present myself (so those two were continuously impressed and were smiling). I2: Ashish Ramj... Ranjo... Rajm... Me: Sir, Ashish Ranjan. I2: Ok Ashish, please sit down. I sat down (I had my documents left outside), I only had a pen in my right pant pocket which I had borrowed from a very humble fellow candidate because just in the rarest occasion of you need to wright or sign something you should not be in a position where you do not have a pen. Unfortunately this thought did not came to my mind when I left for interview center but fortunately I found a good person who had an extra pen. I2 : Ok Ashish please introduce yourself. Me : Sir, my full name is Ashish Ranjan (exactly like I introduce myself in my unacademy introduction videos but fortunately I leashed myself from saying the next line I say in my videos, "I cleared BARC 2017....", that would have raised a lot of unnecessary questions and I wanted most of the questions from technical side so that I can show my skills in engineering and not my background because I knew that's what the majority of the marking out of 100 is going to be for) I was born and raised in Ranchi, Jharkhand. From there I did my schooling. In 10th standard I got a CGPA of 9.2 and in 12th I had a percentage of 75.5 percent. Till then I did not had much direction in my life but when I started my btech in Sikkim Manipal Institute of technology something changed. I found engineering very interesting, I started to spend more and more time in learning more about engineering, by the end of 4 years I had a CGPA of 9.57 and a bronze medal from my university (by now they are so interested in my story of how an average student became a topper and so impressed by my high CGPA that it slipped their mind that I hid one very important fact.... I never mentioned which year I passed out or which year I joined b.tech. I was 2016 passout, I didn't wanted to mention that I worked at BARC but then I had a more than 2 years gap and that wouldn't have looked good). Throughout my btech, I never wasted time, I was hungry for knowledge so I utilised all my semester breaks to do internships. By the end of 4 years I had done around 5 internships and also I did classes on some designing softwares.(All along I was making eye contact with each of the interviewer, the "light house effect" and the "spot light effect" which I talk about in my videos, because no interviewer should feel left out, this is something that I learned by giving 8-10 viva sessions in my days at BARC training school. You must understand that interviewers are also humans at the end of the day and wherever there are humans there are emotions and remember this: "humans take decisions emotionally and justify them by logic" so I wanted to make every interviewer feel good because I knew everyone had some percentage of my marks that would get me in. Now I took a look at them and tried to find by their expression if they wanted to know more. Everyone looked interested. I knew if they were bored they would have interrupted me. So I continued with my hobbies) I am also a lot into public speaking so I like to enhance my communication skills and I like to work on it everyday (at this point of time making spotlight eye contact with HR lady. She smiled) and I'm also into sports (making spotlight eye contact with the male HR) like track and field. Male HR: What sports?(with a smile)  Me: sir track and field like 100m race, 400m race.  He looked at me like he wanted to know more, everyone is looking at me to know more. I knew I had them. Now it's time to play my ace. That's when I dropped the nuke.... Me: I also have been a lot into martial arts. I am a black belt in shotokan karate(with a smile)  Done! Now everyone has my attention. Male HR : (smiling) That is great Ashish. Female HR: (smiling) we would have never guessed that. Me : (smiling) I know mam.  Remember it is very important to smile. Do not act like a scared student over there, act like a confident and friendly future colleague, because that's who they are looking to hire.  I2: Ok Ashish what are your favourite subjects? Me: Sir my favourite subjects are Fluid Mechanics, Strength of Materials, Machine design... also I'm comfortable with Theory of machine and material science....and also heat transfer. (I knew that in ISRO interview there is one member from each subject, even theory of machine, material science and manufacturing. So I wanted to involve as much interviewers as possible.There is a probability that there will be 2 difficult (abstract) question out of 10, 8 questions will be easy textbook type. So if everyone is saying 4 favourite subjects and getting 2 difficult questions, you can say 6 favourite subject and get 3 difficult questions. Probability increased as now there is a higher chance that atleast 1 will be from one of your stronger subjects and you'll be able to answer it and that would definitely impress them. Plus on top of that you are getting double the number of easy questions, so for more number of time you'll be playing on your front foot. If you are not able to answer questions from one subject but show smartness and confidence, other interviewer might think let me test him/her with my subject, maybe he/she is good at that. But all of it will work only if you spent time working on all subject for a month. It is a difficult path but it is the only sure shot path to ISRO and the only way to deal with the uncertainty that is associated with every step of ISRO. What all of these will do definitely is that it will make your interview last longer (my interview lasted for over half an hour, which is very unusual for ISRO as most of the isro interviews go upto maximum of 20 minutes). Now what longer interview does is that it reduces the luck factor as longer you are infront of them more is the chances of you being able to show your skill in engineering. Female HR: (giggling) lot of favourite subjects.  Me:(with a smile) I like mechanical engineering. (rehearsed line to show them I am an all-rounder and comfortable with inter-disciplinary tasks which is what all core companies want)  Till now everything was rehearsed, I rehearsed that I would say these things 5-10 times infront mirror as I knew these two questions they would definitely ask. I knew from this point onwards rest of the interview is all about engineering skills and improvising, but doing this first step perfectly ensures that now they are looking forward to hire you, now all you have to do is not make a blunder. I2: Ok Ashish, please go to the board. I saw a 6ft. by 4 ft. white board behind me with a chair left of me on which two marker pens and an Eraser/duster was kept. As far as what I remember about the surrounding, the lighting of the room was not very bright, not as bright as it could have been, but above the board there was a white light which was making that area very bright. All this was increasing the feel in me that this is it... I worked for it for one and a half year and now I'm here, I'm in control and time to show them what I've got. I took care of how I stand, made sure that I'm standing up straight... Chest out, back straight but just enough to make it look natural. These are things that I practiced infront of mirror few days before the interview and also something that I've always been attentive about. I2: Draw two vertical lines. I did. I2: draw two horizontal lines in between them. I did I2:make vertical lines as fixed supports.and upper horizontal line is steel, lower horizontal line is aluminium bar. Tell me the stresses in them if temperature is increased from 20 C to 100 C Me: (writing all the information he was giving me on board, I wrote delta T=80 C) Sir due to increase in temperature this bar will try to elongate but the rigid support will not let it so there will be compressive reactions applied by the supports so there will be compressive stress. (while writing on board) sir, thermal stain epsilon =delta T*alpha so thermal stress will be alpha *deltaT*E, E being the Young's modules.  I2: so what is the value? Which of them will have higher stress? Me: Sir that depends on the values of Young's modulus and thermal expansion coefficient.  I2: what are the values?  Me: sir Young's modulus of Aluminium is 69Gpa( this number was easiest to remember for obvious reasons ;) ) for mild steel it is 200 GPa. I don't remember the exact values of thermal expansion coefficients for these materials but I know that it's of the order of 10^(-6) and for steel it is around 10.I don't remember for aluminium.  I2: take it 3 times the thermal coefficient of steel and take Young's modulus of aluminium as 70 and that for steel as 210. Me: Ok sir now we can compare. Let's first find for aluminium. (writing on board and speaking simultaneously) so stress in aluminium is alphaA*80*210=3*alphaS*80*70=16800*alphaS(on the side I did the calculation very quickly, I wrote 21*8 and directly wrote the answer as 16800 within fraction of seconds)  I3: Why did you Wright 21?what is 8? Me: Sir 7*3=21. I2: what is 8? Me: sir I have taken 8 from 80....I'm just doing the calculation.  I4: Oh.. Final answer likh dia isne. They were surprised that I did this calculation so fast, they forgot that this is nothing compared to the proficiency in hand and mental calculation we need to clear written exam.  HR male : (smiling) Ha ha sahi kr raha hai. You continue.  Me: so now the stress in steel bar. Stress =alphaS*80*210=16800alphaS I was a little confused seeing that the value is same.  Me:Ok sir so what we have is that Young's modulus of steel is three times...(was interrupted)  I2:Which one has more stress?  Me: Sir, stresses will be equal.  I2: OK. (looking at I3, indicating him to ask his question)  I3: Ok, do you know what keys are.  Me: Sir, keys are mechanical elements used to have constant velocity rati... (my voice fading)  {It was a very easy topic for me because it is the second chapter I teach on unacademy in my course of machine design but for some reason I got tongue tied but I pulled my self back, I gave myself time to breathe and think but at the same time made sure that interviewers don't have to wait, so I started to draw a shaft-hub assembly on board} Me:(while drawing) So if I have a shaft and over it we have a hub like a gear or a bearing then if we add a key then both shaft and hub will have same angular velocity, there will be positive drive which means there will be no slip.  I3: How do you design a key?  Me: A rotating shaft transmits torque to hub through key. Key will have tangential force. So we consider what we call a "sunk key", that means it is inserted within groves in both shaft and hub (drawing and explaining simultaneously) then let us consider a rectangular key of length l, width b and height t(I drew a fresh isometric view of key alone). Now we can design it by both crushing and shearing. So designing it by crushing first, let us say that sigmaC is the crushing strength of the material then crushing area will be this (showing on diagram) i.e. l*t/2. So cruising strength will be sigmaC*l*t/2,this is the maximum tangential load the key can take based on crushing, if we multiply it with radius of shaft, we will get the maximum torque it can take, if we again multiply it with angular velocity we can find out the maximum power it can transmit.  {for this 2-3 minutes, I forgot about the rest of the world, I completely got into my teaching mode, nobody questioned anything, they were all just nodding and smiling, it was an easy question but it doesn't matter what the question is, it matters how well you explain it. I've said this before in my BARC preparation videos, these are top scientists of this country you are dealing with, for them everything is easy like ABCD, for them design of key is easy and so is finite element method, so explain any question you get to the fullest}  I3:Ok ok(looked very satisfied)  {But I didn't stop, I thought let's finish it perfectly, 18 months of preparation, 6 years of struggle, I'm not taking any chances, I'll present my 100%} Me: We can also design it based on shear, so for that the tangential force will be same but shear area now will be(showing it on diagram) b*l, so we have to know the shear strength of the material and we can again find the maximum tangential load and subsequently maximum torque in similar manner.  I3:ok ok.  I4:have you studied engineering drawing?  {this is the thing about ISRO, they can ask questions even from subjects you didn't mention as favourite subject. I mentioned 6 subjects but still they went for 7th. What they didn't knew is that I was prepared for 11 subjects. I had already prepared engineering drawing along with all of production, refrigeration and air conditioning, engineering mechanics and obviously thermodynamics, in the last 2 months. You see the contrast in BARC & ISRO interviews? In BARC you say 5 subjects and you prepare for 4 according to my strategy that I shared on youtube. In ISRO on the other hand, you say 5-6 subjects and prepare for 11-12 subjects.}  Me: Yes sir.  I4:Why do we need engineering drawing?  Me: Whatever a designer designs, engineering drawing is used to convey it to the manufacturer.  I4: Suppose you have to produce this glass (there was a glass on my side of the table) how will you do it? What will be the engineering drawing? Show us on board.  Me:Sir should I draw the projections? top view, front view etc.?  I4: Yes.  Me: (Drawing and explaining) I am going to use Indian standard. In India we use 3rd angl..sorry 1st angle projection so I'm going to draw according to it.  I4: What?  Me: Sir, we use first angle projection in India.  Male HR: Is it so? (with a big smile on his face) Me: Yes sir, Indian companies use first angle projection and American companies use third angle projection. (they looked satisfied so I turned back to the board and continued drawing and explaining) So according to first angle projection, top view will be below front view and right view will be on left hand side of front view. So the front view will be like this (drawing a rectangular shape with its lower edge touching the horizontal plane. I also drew the hidden lines to show that glass has some thickness and that it is a hollow cylinder, drew projection lines towards left hand side plane to draw right view but stopped knowing that it will be same as front view and I didn't want to waste their time as I knew what they wanted to see are the front view and top view)  Some Interviewer from back: It would be same right? (talking about the right view)  Me: (without turning) yes sir.(continued drawing, drew two concentric circles using projections of front view and stopped).  I4: So how will you show concentricity?  Me: Like this sir(I drew two mutually perpendicular center lines, those with alternate long and short lines) I5: So how will you show a concentricity tolerance of let us say //some value I do not remember // microns?  Me: (thinking for a second) sir it looks like this (drew two small concentric circles. 2 years ago when I was an intern at TATA Cummins, my guide forced me to go through geometric dimensioning and tolerancing, but it was impossible to remember all that now) I do not remember completely, I studied this a long time ago in Geometric dimensioning and Tolerancing (I later found out that the symbol I drew was actually correct, its just that it was a bit incomplete)  I4:Ok ok(looked satisfied)  {Till now it was perfect and I knew that if you are giving perfect answers to normal questions, they are going to get into more advanced and abstract questions because now they would like to push your limits. Honestly the easy questions lasted longer than I expected. By now I knew I had done more than enough to get in, the interview is over, I am selected, if they continue, it will be only be because they want to have a little fun}  I1:You said material science right?  Me: Yes sir.  I1: In what way do we classify materials?  Me: (A little confused about where to start? as this question has infinite number of answers) Sir, we can classify materials as ductile and brittle.  I1: and?  Me: (Thinking for a second or two) and we also classify it as isotropic and orthotropic.  I1: and?  Me: There are lot of ways to classify Materia...  I1: have you heard of metallic and non metallic materials?  Me: yes sir, metallic materials have free electrons in it where as non metallic materials has no free electrons.  I1: Can you give me some examples of both?  Me: Sir examples of non-metallic materials are plastic, polymers, ceramics.  I1: and non metallic?  Me: Steel, copper, aluminium etc.  (such a silly question, I think by the end of me answering, he also realised it 7 so he said along with me)  I1: Cooper, steel etc right?  Me: yes sir, copper steel, aluminium etc.  I1: can you draw the stress strain curve of mild steel, cast iron and aluminium?  Me: yes sir. (turning towards the board and going to the left most part of it) so first I'll draw for mild steel.  I1: No no.. In same graph.  Me: ok sir (drew x and y axis at center of the board) on x axis we will have stress...Engineering stress (I didn't wanted to play that game of I'll say stress then you'll ask which stress then I'll say engineering stress then you'll ask what is other kind, what is it.... And so on... Because this interview had already gone way longer than I expected. At that point I just wanted to show all the excellence I have. By directly writing engineering stress, I had answered all those 6-8 questions perfectly in fraction of a second in their head, thus my impression improved and their time saved. It's a win win trick you play only when you know you are already on positive side because now they are confident about your skill in engineering, now they won't even ask... They'll just assume that you know it. That is the difference between 9/10 and 10/10. If you are 9/10 people will think there's something else you might not know and if you are 10/10 people will think you know everything. So I continued drawing, without wasting any time I drew three curves.  I1: Now where will concrete lie?  Me: (I drew a line near cast iron but with a larger slope)  I1: will it be stronger than cast iron?  Me : No sir, it will depend on young's modulus. Slope of this line is young's modulus.  I1: so is it stronger than cast iron?  Me: No sir(drawing a line with lesser slope) all I am saying is that concrete is brittle so it will have similar curve... There will be no yielding.  I1: So where will it lie?  Me: Sir it depends on young's modulus of concrete,I don't remember the value.  I1: OK.  I6: you said heat transfer right?  Me: yes sir.  I6: draw a pipe?  Me: (drew two parallel lines)  I6: no the other side.  Me: front view?  I6: yes.  Me: (drew two concentric circles)  I6: there is hot fluid passing. Tell me the modes of heat transfer.  Me: convection-conduction-convection.  I6: Now put an insulation.  Me: (I did)  I6: Now tell me the modes of heat transfer.  Me: convection-conduction-conduction-convection I6: Now remove the insulation. Now this pipe is buried underground. Soil is maintained at 25 C. Tell me the modes of heat transfer.  Me: convection-conduction-conduction I6: No, that pipe wall is maintained at 75 C.  Me: There will be conduction taking place as soil is solid. There is no chance of convection. Since the temperature difference is large there might be considerable radiation. (this was an abstract question, these questions have no answers, you have to show your thinking capacity here, that's it)  I7: Ok coming to fluid mechanics.  (At this time I was surprised by the time they are investing on me)  Me: yes sir.  I7: have you seen air balloon? Why does it fly?  Me: it is because of the buoyancy effect. The weight of the air it displaces is more than the its own weight.  I7: So it will keep on going up into the outer space?  ( A long time ago I had heard this question when I was still undergraduate, I knew it will stop at a particular height but never gave it a thought on why it will stop)  Me: No sir it will stop at a particular height (with full confidence... hoping he doesn't ask why)  I7: Why?  Me:(thinking for a second, pretending that I'm gathering my words) Sir as we keep on going to higher altitudes the air becomes thinner and thus we have lower density, thus at some point weight of fluid displaced will equate to weight of balloon and it stops.  I7: so have you seen that we use heat source placed at the bottom of balloon?  Me: yes sir.  I7: Why do we use it?  Me: To heat the air. Hotter air will have lesser density.  I7: That hole is made very small. Why? Why can't we have a larger hole?  Me: Sir, so that we don't have to heat a lot lot of air.  I7: No we are heating the same amount of air anyways.  Me: (paused for few seconds, thinking) Sir I'll have to think about it.  I7: Why can't we have it like a parachute?  Me: (thinking)  I7: why cant we have a big hole?  Me: (Drew a semi sphere, convex upwards) like this?  I7: Yes, exactly.  Me: (Thinking. Somehow I knew I was taking more time than what they have, but they were unexpectedly giving me time to think and kept giving me hints, this was because of the strong base I created and also they were considerate about the fact that I have been standing and explaining for the last 30-40 minutes, I must have gotten tired) It will be difficult to manufacture (just didn't wanted to be dumb so I said something. This is very important, if I stood dumb for 10 more seconds, interview would have ended right there and what's worse? It would have ended at a bad note. So I said something so that they might think that I am trying)  I7: We don't care about manufacturing cost. Have you studied about stability of a body?  {Now that's all I needed}  Me: Yes sir, ok I get it. For stability of submerged body of center of buoyancy should be above center of gravity of the body.  I7:why?  Me: If we tilt the body in any direction, there will be a restoring couple (showed it with diagram). So this principle is used here.  I7:How?  Me: Making a spherical shape must ensure the balloon to have G below B.  I7:(looking for more)  Me:(thinking for a second and then I finally got it, I got the answer. A submerged body can only be unstable if it has a differential density. What a smaller fire hole does is that it decreases the region directly in contact with the fire, i.e. it reduces the volume with sudden drop of density. Thus it helps in maintaining a relatively more uniform density so that the balloon remains stable in case of winds and bad weather. All these were running in my head. I forgot that I was in interview room, I just found the question amazing and was thrilled that I was able to get to the answer. That's when I exclaimed at a voice louder than any they had heard by me in the last 45 min...It was like a 'Eureka!' ) YES (took the marker pen and turned to the board) If I have balloon in the shape of a sphere (Drew a strong circle quickly, as soon as I did this, they knew that I've got it)  I7: Ok Ashish you can go. Me:(nodded, kept the pen on chair) thankyou everyone (I exited from the door)  I checked the time, it was way past 10:30. A guy (another candidate) followed me, he asked "what are they asking?" I said it all depends on your subjects. He said "your interview lasted very long". I asked, "how long?". "much more than half an hour" he said. I replied "it didn't feel like it, I have to go upstairs to return this pen". I returned the pen and went out thinking time to get some highlights in my hair. The interview lasted crazy long when compared to how long ISRO interviews usually last (10-20 minutes). I didn't see time before getting in but with my experience in previous interviews and taking a look at how much time they spent only on introduction and then the fact that they asked questions from SIX subjects that too lengthy ones, I think it was easily close to an hour. I was very confident I'm getting selected just like the day I was when BARC 2017 interview was over. One thing I'm sure of is that you cannot fool yourself, after the interview you either know you got selected or you know you didn't. There's nothing in between and that day I knew that I did it. Being in BARC for 1 year made me realise one thing... that I'm not a scientist.... I do not shine the brightest when it comes to Engineering. Where I excel is in making a full proof strategy for beating one of the most difficult competitions. That's how I cracked BARC and that's how I cracked ISRO and I want the world to know that anyone can do it if they have a proper strategy, dedication and a little bit of craziness.  If you went through my full interview experience then obviously you are very serious about this job. Find more of my guidance videos on my Youtube channel : Torq4712 Feel free to approach me at : Instagram, twitter, unacademy at : ashish_torq Gmail: torque4712@gmail.com  Whatsapp: 7042830765 (please don't call without messaging first) All I want to do is help my juniors. I want to bring the most authentic knowledge to all interested aspirants for free. This path is tough and I appreciate everyone who has the courage to travel it. All the best.