ajish - the spiritual journey of a confused copywriter

Ajish Jacob

Copywriter sans Experience

jacob.ajish@gmail.com

This is me; a well fed, well read, happy-go-lucky,cheerful sort of fellow.

And this is my story

Well, part of it anyway…

Near the end of high school, in 2002,my long-suffering father asked me,

Ajish, it’s near the end of high school; have you given any thought to what you want to study in college?

Of course I hadn’t,so I quickly went through the (very short) listof available options

Hmm…

Engineering?… Nah, I suck at maths.

Medicine?… Who wants to cut up deadbodies for FOUR years?!

Having summarily dispensed with the “popular” subjects,I thought to myself, I need something that sounds

interesting; something Exotic and mysterious; that’s sure toget the chicks all excited.*

*This was much before I came upon the anonymous quote, “Love is blind but it can smell the money.”

So I said,

Psychology!

…

Shortly afterwards, I landed at Zakir Husain College, Delhi University,for a course in B.A. (Hons.) Psychology

After the final-year exams, my father resumed his (bad) impression of Karan Thapar on HARDtalk

Ajish, it’s after the final-year exams; what now?

This time however, I had an answer ready,

I’m gonna get a job till the results are announced!

My dad though, to use the colloquial expression, ‘mere bhi baap nikle’

Ok, where?

I hadn’t thought that far ahead…

…

Luckily for me, the next day in the newspaper, I saw

American Express©

Wants YOU!

Feeling very proud that they wanted me personally, off I went, to the consultancy whose address was given in the ad. There was a test,

Followed by an interview,

So Ajish, tell me a bit about yourself.

Well… uhh… my name is Ajish Jacob… but you already knew that obviously…

This was my first interview…

And… well… uhh… I’ve done my 12th in Paris under the International Baccalaureate system…

It didn’t go too well…

Uhh… then… uhhh… I did my graduation here in Psychology… uhhh… from Zakir Husain College, Delhi University…

Actually, it was pretty bad…

…

I finally decided that shutting up was probably the best option.

…

…Ok!... So, how did you find out about this job opportunity?

As I mentally prepared to get the hell out of there, the interviewer recovered from the shock…

I saw an ad in the paper!

This was an easy one…

You read the paper?!

It seemed she was surprised I was literate at all…

…

I’ve hated interviews ever since.

But I must have scared them with my bulk, because soon afterwards, I joined Amex as a ‘Disputes Analyst’

What was supposed to be a short stint before PG, lasted three years, till 2008. In that time, I became seriously bored with what I was doing.

So I applied for and got through, an Internal Job Posting for ‘Business Analyst’, with the Amex Travel department. This meant that I would exchange

For

Ennui set in much quicker this time; in a mere six months.

This time however, I knew vaguely, what I wanted to do; something more interesting and creative.

It took me another year to work up the courage to quit.

But when I did, it was liberating.I felt like my old self again.

Figuring that after four years of drudgery,I deserved one, I took a break for a while...

Got together with an old friendand went on photography expeditions around Delhi…

Caught up on my reading, TV shows and movies…

Helped another friend with her Final Video Project in Jamia…

And added ‘Basic Cooking’ to my non-existent repertoire of life skills.

Then, when it came to deciding my next career,I was stumped.

Dude, you’re funny, well, sometimes… and have always been good with words; you should go into copywriting!

So I asked a friend, who said

Instead of blindly running into it, I did some research,

It sounded exciting and looked like it was something I would enjoy doing.

So I dove headlong into the task of making the most kick-ass resume anyone had ever seen.

Dude, you should put something up on slideshare!

Which is when another friend suggested,

Initially I thought,

But for a PPT I’d need good drawing skills as well, which I don’t have…

But then I thought,

Hell, if Randall Munroe can be good with just stick figures, then so can I!

Sometime later, I found myself staring at a blank slide…

Ajish Jacob

Copywriter sans Experience

jacob.ajish@gmail.com

Which I then proceeded to fill with this,

And the rest, as they say, is history…