An Engineer’s Story

(Our Choices makes Us)

There was once a little kid named Kamli, who wanted to be an engineer. He had a friend Abhi, who wanted to be a doctor. They studied in a school where they never saw much of doctors or engineers. Now Kamli was very poor in Mathematics. It was widely circulated that once when a teacher had asked him, “if 2 plus two is four then how much is four plus four”, he had said, “Sir, you solve the easy ones and give me the tough ones to solve.” Maybe, it was a bad joke, but it depicted that he sucked at Mathematics. He grew up all his life saying he wanted to be an engineer.

The word “reengine” is the reverse of “engineer”.

 You can also say it is the perfect anagram of engineer. And what does it mean? Nothing! Same as, engineer, which didn’t mean anything to Kamli. And why he said he wanted to be an “engineer”, was because it sounded cool.

His friend Abhi, though good in Mathematics never wanted to be an engineer. He wanted to be a doctor.

“Rotcod” is the reverse and perfect anagram of “Doctor”. 

And it means nothing. And to Abhi, Doctor meant nothing, either. He said the “Doctor” word as his friend had said the "Engineer" word, to sound cool. Only life would teach them the meaning of the two words.

Abhi grew up, and he did become a doctor. But his first wife was mathematics. And he didn’t much like his profession. He was never happy with his job. All the time his mind wandered.

Kamli took to study engineering. It was the easiest thing to be an Engineer. It was said, that Engineers and dogs had become so common and rampant in the country, that if you took two pebbles and threw it, one would fall on a dog, and the other would hit an engineer.

Whereas Abhi loved to code, and read research papers on Mathematics, Kamli loved to fiddle his spare hours body building. Abhi had a good income and his family was happy. But he was unhappy with his work, and his mind always wandered to Mathematics, Einstein, Newton, Ramanujan, Euler, etc.

He read Andrew Wiles work on Fermat’s Last theorem.

Fermat’s last Theorem had been a puzzle among mathematicians for around three hundred years, until Wiles proved it. And he sighed. His great love had been snatched away from him; his life was without a soul.

Mathematics was so beautiful. It was so exact, but again so elusive. Only with an esoteric mind would understand the realms of abstract hidden in the layers. Only whom God had specially made with the most inquisitive mind and also a superior mind would dare to delve deep into the depth of Mathematics. After all, how many people in the world could understand Andrew Wiles proof? Hardly a few hundred among billions.

And what was a doctor’s job? Just to write prescription after writing a series of investigation! No imagination, no challenges, nothing…Well saving a life was important, but that didn’t interest him.

Kamli’s work was hectic. And the salary he was paid was low. He had to bear the frustrations of a common man’s life. He had to slog all day in his office and do nonsense work, which he couldn’t understand. Later, he thought he had become more of his boss’ servant than an engineer.

He loved modelling. He used to go to the gym regularly and had carved out a fine figure out of himself.

One day, Kamli could no longer tolerate his boss reprimanding, and decided to quit his job. He had faced enough of insults and tolerating another dose would kill his existence as a human. Life had hit him hard. He wanted to do what he loved. He decided to make a career in modelling.

He took part in modelling contests, and even thought of being an actor. But he sucked at saying dialogues, and this time he didn’t do the mistake of choosing what he thought was beyond his ability. Acting was not in his blood, and saying he was an actor just to sound cool, would cause another wreckage in his life.

After a lot of experimenting and failures, Kamli decided to become a gym trainer. He knew he would earn less, but he was the best in that art, and he would be a master of his job. So, Kamli joined a gym and became a trainer. He was paid very low, hardly being able to survive. But he loved his job. And he was satisfied. He met wonderful people at the gym. And one day, while he was giving lessons, someone asked him, why didn’t he open his own gym? And then someone from the gym decided to finance him.

So, Kamli with his financer’s support opened his own Gym. And his old students came to him. And gradually, the members in his Gym grew in number. He was now a master of his job as well as the place.

One day, he sent a message request to his friend Abhi who happened to be in the same city, to come to his gym. Well, it was a mistake on his part, but it happened to be a good mistake. Abhi did come, and they hugged each other.

“So nice to see you,” said Abhi.

They talked of old days, and about their present work. Kamli told Abhi, how he was a disappointed engineer, and had given up hopes in life. But his passion for Gym made him seek a new life. Now he was working on what he loved.

Abhi listened to him in awe. “You quit an office job to be a gym trainer?” he asked in wonder.

“Yes, my friend.”

“And here I am stuck playing doctor-doctor with sick people. Ha, it feels a great relief to see live and kicking people. You know what, I believed all my life would be spent telling people that they are not really sick.”

Kamli was surprised. “You don’t mean to say, you don’t like your job. I will eat my head, if I hear you say so!”

“My friend, we all have our choices. What seems to be a dream to someone maybe a curse to someone else!”

Then Abhi also made a decision. He would quit his job. Join a school, teach mathematics to kids, and pursue what he loved – mathematics.