if <> QAE then?..

(For the non-amazonians, QAE - Quality Assurance engineer aka Test Engineer aka Bugger!)

Sometimes I wonder, If I was not in "IT" what would I be doing? Am I destined to be a QAE? Ofcourse not! I rather not blame destiny for "What I am today" and for "What I wanted to be"...As a matter of fact, back in school, I intended to do something which was not-so-popular, not-the-IN-thing-to-do, not-something-which-brings-fame. During my 10th grade I was almost convinced to stop my "boring schooling" and do something different. I was impatient, I wanted to get where I wanted to as fast as I could. I was busy applying in other interesting places, preparing for entrance exams and aptitude tests. I was just not set to go the mundane way!...

However,the appearance of the big fat book of sample question papers from NIFT made me sick (Initially)! They had all kinds of questions, which according to me, were not relevant to what they teach! I remember troubling my favourite Maths teacher for cracking the "problem solving" questions (Ironic! I ask Problem solving questions in interviews these days). The only part of the paper which i really enjoyed practising was drawing. Draw a construction site, a showroom entrance, a jewelry store, a fly over, moods on a toothbrush! - More than problem solving my brains worked better here! I had a flair for art (I think i still do, somewhere in one corner of me)

If you haven't guessed it yet, I wanted to be a fashion designer! Somebody (an ignorant) said, "Why do you wanna spend rest of your life doing tailoring?? " i.e. after seeing my NIFT application. - She had no clue who a fashion designer was and compared it to being a tailor. Guess what, I was already a tailor much before 10th grade. I was an "asst. tailor" to my mom and I needed no degree to be a professional tailor. Tailoring did spark the passion for fashion designing in me, but both are not the same!

So, if i had cleared the entrance exam, I would have had a Bachelor in Fashion designing than a Bachelor in Computer Applications. I would have studied 2 years less and started a boutique before I got my first job as a "Trainee in Marketing"! The "SAK" fashion store in Spencer plaza would have been mine. I would have designed some outfits for few of my "actor" friends. I would have played with dyes, needles, pearls, appliques, threads and ribbons and not the mouse, keyboard, laptop, RSA tokens, chat apps and websites! I would have been a "Fashion Designer Sakina" than an "IT Professional Sakina"!

Hey! That does not mean I dont like what I do right now! I was just talking about my Original Plan A which is now a Plan B of my life!