Farewell parties and the associated hazards

There has been a spate of Farewell parties at work. People travelling abroad, people quitting, people getting transferred, people moving to other projects and roles and so on.

Apart from good food (Usually Pizza Hut or the heppish Indian cuisine varieties) and a small hole in the pocket, its fun listening to some farewell speeches - Some too whacky, some too politically correct, some too diplomatic and some totally bizarre.

When I had joined the project a year ago, one dude (Lets call him 'S') got a hard-earned transfer. Poor dude had lived all his life in Bongland and Mumbai's brash and fast life did not seem to suit him and his bong sensibilities too well. After a year of trying, he finally managed to get a transfer. His speech goes something like this:
"hello ebrybody, Its been a bhery great learning experience phor me working in VOS (prononced "bhaws") project. From the day I joined this (we hereby call it XYZ company) company, my only dream was to get a transfer to Kolkata and I have finally fulfilled my dream."
*Wow..! Talk about ambitions in life.*

In another instance, it was a farewell party for these veterans in the team who were travelling abroad. Pizza Hut comes up with these most whackiest songs for birthdays and other occasions. Where else does one hear rap for a birthday song with emphatic "Yo's" as fillers wherever it fit in to the song or didn't fit. Anyways, we happened to see this bunch of college-going kids in another table, one of whom had her birthday and the Pizza Hut crew made the kid stand up on her chair and made her announce to the whole floor that it was her birthday and they broke into this "Happy Birthday Yo!" type jig. Taking cue from this, we promptly informed the crew that it was K and S's special day too (the dudes travelling abroad). The same exercise followed for them too. It was good fun to see them go red with embarassment yelling to the whole floor that they were travelling abroad on an assignment with the crew throwing some more yo's for them..:-)

The latest one was the funniest. It was this Project Manager who joined our team for a brief time and got himself transferred to Delhi eventually. He was a total joker who spoke first and thought (or probably never saw the need to think) later. He used to come up with vaguest ideas on things he had no inkling about. He had the most chauvinistic thoughts on working women and very openly voiced his opinions to the 'womenfolk' of the team. He claimed to be the best cricketer after Tendulkar and just that he was forced into a 9-5 job.*Thank god for Tendulkar, Mr. A would've been the poster-boy and driving that Ferrari* And he, evidently, thought that women do not like to play outdoor sports or keep fit and they are best doing cleaning washing or read books for recreation. *Like washing, cleaning does not involve any physical exercise as his supposedly sporty activities*

When he was not at his desk, which was most of the times, we knew where to find him - gym or the Table Tennis room of our workplace. Since he was new, he had a lot of questions and I, as a lead, used to explain rather patiently the works. Then he would throw a fit and start comparing how things were better in his ex-companies and how XYZ was making things more difficult. This had become a habit and after a while, I used to avoid him like plague or give him dirty glares or raise my voice to show my disapproval at his attitude. I, then, hit upon this bright idea and got him introduced to co-lead of the team who complimented him totally. A rather demure and meek guy called N who spoke less and thought more..:-)
This dude stopped bothering me after that and life was good.

Enough said about our boisterous, women-hating, sports-loving, ever-lamenting manager. Finally the day arrived to say good-bye to him and we asked him to come up with a farewell speech. He started off with all the pleasantries about what all XYZ and the team had given him. * Ha! Liar! *
Then he went on about all the hardships he faced and how things stabilized with time. He had a word or two about each of the 20 members in the team starting with me who according to him was helpful, a good listener but one who got irritated very soon.
*Well, I cant possibly fake a smile for every occasion when your rant-mode is switched on. I have more 'real' things to worry about than your machine being slow or meeting rooms being busy or women not playing Table Tennis*
Then he went on in a clockwise manner around the table passing un-wisecracks on all the team members finally ending with N. And he goes, "I was new to the company and was quite lost in learning the processes and getting hold of the projects... (rolling his eyes lovingly to meet N's) Aur maine N ko dekha...!"
Now we all knew what was with the women-hating tendencies...:-)