The Hindu : Kerala / Kochi News : Woman techies find life in the city dull

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Saturday, Jul 19, 2008
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Woman techies find life in the city dull

Shyama Rajagopal

The only entertainment here is films or television, they say

KOCHI: The changing lifestyle brought about by changes in the job profile and the aspirations of the young people has not yet become fashionable in the city, say women in the IT sector. Compared to the lifestyle led by women in other places like Bangalore or Hyderabad, there is little that women here have to look forward to in the weekends.

Rani Sree, who had an eight-year stint working in an IT firm in Bangalore earlier, feels that there are few places for women or a family to go for an outing. The only entertainment here is going for movies.

Priority of raising a family has made her switch from an IT job to a teaching job in an engineering college now. “It would be difficult to manage children’s affairs because of the late working hours in the IT sector”, she said. Settling down in Kochi, Ms. Sree misses the posh life the family had in Bangalore.

“It used to be hectic from Monday to Friday. Unwinding would begin from Friday evening. It would be either a get-together with friends or a visit to the Malls where children would enjoy themselves with a number of games for them in Childrens’ Play Area or we would spend the evening in a bowling alley, where again, children used to have a separate area to enjoy. Invariably, there would be a group of friends.

“If we managed to get a holiday on Friday, we would generally go visit some tourist spot or a resort”. The weekends were full of such activity for most of the people in Bangalore. The families in the apartment complex we stayed perhaps followed the same lifestyle as few children would be around during the weekends in the park attached to the apartments,” said Ms. Sree.

“Compared to the lifestyle that we had in Bangalore, we have nothing to do in the weekends here,” she added. “At the best we go shopping. But, then there is no place for children to have any fun. Sometimes we go for family visits during weekends,” she said.

The people here are yet to get used to the late working hours of the women in the IT sector, said Anu R., who grew up here and is working with a top IT firm in Bangalore.

She prefers to stay there as life offers more charm there with much more to look forward to during the weekends. Probably lifestyle will change in Kochi too, but it will definitely take a long time, she says.

Single women

For the single women, life in the city offers nothing besides an occasional movie, said Divya Sarah with an IT firm here. However, she is all praise for the infrastructure that her hostel provides. “We can take up a sport like badminton, do workouts, generally have fun with most of the people around joining for some gossip or even serious talk. There are few women around during the weekend as many prefer going home,” she says. Watching television becomes a major leisure activity, said Ms. Sarah. Compared to other IT cities, there are few paying guest accommodations here.

Reeja George of another top IT firm, has been in the city for the last three months after being in Chennai for the last 11 years. One can discover Kerala in its small tourist spots even if the lifestyle of other cities is absent here, she said. There are no places to go and spend your time during weekends like it was in Chennai — malls, multiplexes and innumerable eating joints, said Ms. George. Women from other States who are working in IT firms try to go to tourist spots during the weekends.

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