Saturday, January 11, 2014

Volunteering

Him: "So how long have you been associated with this NGO?"
Me: "A year now, what about you?"
Him: "This is my first visit actually. I got a call from Arvind last week asking if I would like to volunteer with his organisation sometime. I said pehle tho let me come and take a look at the facilities and the kind of work you do..."
Me:"Oh ok"
Him:"It's important to be very clear you know, so that's why I'm here to see what his NGO does. If I have to give time on weekends, and you know how that is, we work on weekdays and weekends are to relax..."
I had a vague sense that I should have hovered around 'where do you work-where do you live-how do you commute-so much traffic' type small talk. I wouldn't have had to listen to this guy's philosophy of work then.
Me: "So, busy job eh? Where do you work?"
He didn't take the bait though.
Him: "At a bank. So this better be worth it. It needs to be meaningful. And you know what I'm most worried about?"
That you have priced your weekend time out of the market, so now no one wants to spend weekends with you and you will die alone on a Sunday afternoon. He didn't wait for a response.
Him: "About political affiliation. Know what I mean? The last, the absolute last thing I want is to be a piece of someone's political agenda."
What in hell's name was this guy yapping about? What did volunteering to play football with some slum children have to do with politics?
Him: "Or even worse, religious propaganda. You know? Like, we need to see if their sources of funding are clean."
Who's we?
Me: "So how do you plan on contributing in case, you know, they 'pass' your screening?"
Him: "I like to take my time, I'll probably be an observer for a bit"
He wants to watch some kids play football and add that as his CV point.
Him: "I think it'll probably be inputs on systems and processes. I'm an MBA"
Do you know the difference between a system and a process even? Your brain and your mouth, for example, form a system. Establishing that you're an opinionated non-value adder everytime you open your mouth to talk, is a process.
Me: "Right, so you'll watch the games on weekends..."
Him: "Not right away. I think I have some free slots in March - I hope to get more actively involved then. All that's if I find the organisation neutral, if you know what I mean. Hahahaha"
Me: "Haha haha"
I have no spine. My knowing half laugh meant I'm now a co-conspirator in this religio-politico meaningfulness NGO audit where this weirdo will decide whether the NGO is worth the zero value that he brings to the table. That does it. I do not want this guy to ever turn up again.
Me: "Why are our free t-shirts saffron-green. Hmm, wonder if that means something"
Him: "You think? Noooo I don't think so...you think? Hmm"

2 comments:

Sethu said...

nice :)

Will he turn up? ;)

Anonymous said...

Sounds familiar. Can such 'Himss" be thrown into a bottomless pit or you think the pit will file a PIL on stopping abuse ??