Au revoir

My first day in the ranks of the unemployed. More about that later. For now, here is a letter of good bye i mailed to everyone on my last day of work...


As a designer you're often a nomad or a gypsy, going from place to place and from one day to
another looking for meaning, fun and satisfaction in your work. You're looking for the feeling of looking
around you and seeing the things you've helped create or give form to. On the way,
sometimes you make long stopovers and sometimes short ones. And every now and then
you think you've found a place you can stay forever. But a few weeks or months down the line
and you realise that it is what you love about a place that holds you back from moving on. I
would know. My stopover at the Education and Stationery business was one of those,
where i found a place at work i could call home.

But designers come with a one flaw (amongst many others). A manufacturing defect :) An
insatiable need to see, experience and do newer and more things. So once again, i find
myself plotting a new course with one long last look at everything here that has become
familiar and dear...colleagues who have become friends, spaces that have become
comfortable, lunch partners who have shared meals, stories and lives, teammates who
have shared work insights, how-to-survive here tips :) and given generously of their time
and themselves. In the two years fours months that i have spent here lines have merged
and when i look around i know why good-byes' are the hardest part.

It would be a cliche to say i enjoyed my tenure here. And a bigger cliche to say that I learnt
a lot more here than i did at design school...both about people and about design. But
sometimes a cliche says it best. So,thank you everyone who has willingly or unwittingly
been a part of my learning and experience. i wish you all as much luck and good times
as i am hoping i find, as i chart out the course to starting my own design firm.


With warm regards,
Shikha