Free If Truth Be Told: A Monk's Memoir by Om Swami Page B

two weeks. If they like your work, they may extend it by another two weeks.'
'Awesome!'
'Your interview is on Wednesday.'
              On Wednesday, I called in sick at AWP. They didn’t mind; I was doing free work after all. I went for my interview with Trading Technology Australia (TTA). This was a small financial software company based downtown. The directors of the company, Gregory Rostron and Joe Maisano, interviewed me. Greg was a Swiss-German who had moved to Australia a long time ago. Joe was of Italian descent but born and raised in Australia.
    After the interview, they offered me the position of a computer programmer. I double-checked that my work experience was going to be in programming, and was assured it was. I asked if I would get to code in C++, and they said that C++ was what they generally used. Though I wasn’t going to be paid for this work, I was offered a weekly railway pass.
    Now, I was faced with a great dilemma. On the one hand, I had a full-time job offer from AWP and they were ready to pay me, but there was no growth or intellectual challenge. On the other hand, TTA was offering an unpaid opportunity for just two weeks with no guaranteed prospects, but the work was in programming, my area of focus and ambition. If I chose TTA, I could be back to square one in a couple of weeks, calling companies for work experience. With AWP, I could still be copying and pasting files a year later. 'What’s the worst that can happen?' I asked myself.
     

5

$15 To $250,000

 
    I reported at the Trading Technology Australia office on Monday. After introducing me to the small team of developers, Joe gave me my first assignment and asked me to build a contact management software.
    'A contact management software?' I was a little surprised at this instruction because I thought I was going to work on their financial software.
    'Yes, I need an application to manage my list of prospective and existing customers.'
    He took me to a computer. 'We have VB loaded on this machine.'
    'VB?'
    'Yes. Don’t you know Visual Basic?'
    I had made it clear in the interview that I only knew C++.
    'Umm, I don’t, but I can try and learn.'
    That was that. I sat staring at the screen, not knowing what to do. My computer wasn’t connected to the Internet, which meant I couldn’t access any reference material from the web to guide me. I knew that if I couldn’t code the system, I would be shown the door at the end of two weeks, if not earlier.
    The easy job scene at AWP kept intruding into my thoughts, but I was here now, and had to quickly find a solution. I was already down to my last six hundred dollars. At lunchtime, I went out and bought a book on Visual Basic. Four days later, I showed him the full version of my contact management software.
    'This is good, mate,' Joe said. 'How come you said you didn't know VB?'
    'I didn't really.'
    'And you coded this entire software in four days?'
    'Well, yes.'
    'I'd heard Indians are great programmers . Four days! Amazing.'
    'Thanks, Joe. I still need to make many improvements. It's the first version.'
    'Go for it, mate.'
    He looked at Greg, raised four fingers and said, 'Four days!'
    The following Thursday, they extended my work experience for two more weeks.
    By the third week at TTA, Greg and Joe had gained enough confidence in me to assign me their flagship product called Ringer. Designed for the financial markets, Ringer was a highly complex and sophisticated piece of software that allowed bonds, forex and options traders to buy and sell based on market movements. Working with a small team of developers, my task was software maintenance. Towards the end of my month there, they offered me a permanent part-time job at $15 an hour—twenty hours a week as per my visa conditions.
    I wanted to work more than twenty hours though, but without violating my visa. I approached Greg and Joe.             
    'It’s fine if you pay me for only twenty hours but I would