I want to establish a restaurant

Alternate careers…well, doesn’t that pair of words sound like something really new and special? Just like something out of the world or out of the box or out of the sky…kinda, I don’t know. Whatever the #millenials terms we get to hear nowadays. Thankfully, I am part of the newest Z Generation. Now, when I first heard these two words- ‘Alternate Career’, my first instinct was that it was something you can do alongside your major career, such as you can be a biologist and have that as your major occupation, while also painting boards for dramas as your side or alternate career. Perhaps, you could be a professional singer and also a mathematics tutor as your alternate career. But then I got a chance to research further about it, and I finally realized that it was really a lot more different than my boundary of thinking and imagination.

An alternate career could and would only work for someone who actually wants to try out for more. It is for someone who is tired, irritated and frustrated of the boring 9-5 jobs and wants to explore and do something different and hopefully better in life. It can mean doing anything, from wine-tasting to radio-jockeying.

This term doesn’t mean doing something alongside your career as I earlier assumed. It is a slap on the face to me, telling me how my assumptions aren’t always right, as I usually expect them to be. This term means taking a break from your major career. It means doing something that you have wanted to do since a very long time, and finally putting your regular job on pause for some time and actually working towards something that you care about. This doesn’t mean that you don’t care about your job or anything mean or selfish like that. It just denotes that an alternate career option is something that you can seek out, whenever you feel like it. And for all my opinion is worth, I believe that that is something really great, wonderful and intellectual. That, to be honest, is something out of the box, sky or world as I said before.

Now, if I, a mere teenager, had to choose something as an alternate career, then I would most surely go for opening a restaurant. That is, if I had the money. But I’m sure that after several years of working, I could capably save enough to open a small place of eating and chatting and enjoying for people. I think I have pretty good management skills and I have a great taste in Indo-Chinese food too. I know there are people out there who think that Dirty Chinese is a just a made-up cuisine by Indians, and is nothing like Chinese food and it is just a cross between some roadside and five-star restaurant food. But, I really don’t care about what people think anymore. I think that by my twenty-seventh birthday (which is fourteen years away) I would have established a good restaurant having minimal (around 5-12 dishes) on the menu and around half a dozen of staff workers, lead by a good chef. I don’t care if it is elegant or really large or grand. I know I might make it sound like a cliché, but I seriously and honestly don’t really care about that. I would just want it to be to be happy. I would like a dedicated staff, who enjoy doing what they do, instead of doing it due to some sort of necessity. I would not crave a lot of appreciation from the customers. Instead, I would like them to smile and enjoy their time at my restaurant.

That’s all; I have to offer you, on my choice of an alternate career option, for me. 🙂

Author: Shreeja Mukherjee, Lucknow