Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Work Wear Issues

So many unfinished, not worthy to be published post lying in my drafts. And here goes my latest attempt to write. When I joined my company nearly 1 and a half years back, there were no specific policy on work wear. As a matter of fact, we did have a 4 page pdf on what to and what not to wear to work place, HELL!!! no one bothered.On a regular working day, one could see strip/acid washed jeans, funky tees and all those not to be worn attires making rounds through the campus. I do know guys who have survived through meetings and deadlines in just 'A' jeans and their ever trust worthy black Rock-N-Roll tees. After I shifted my base to Cochin, things took an U-turn for good, people here dress to work in simple, understated work wears. I ditched my old ways and settled in for more work friendly attires. After numerous mixing , matching, filtering, deciding what to wear I absorbed in the idea of "wearing" your work.


I would still wear my Jeans and tees on those lazy mornings when wearing a  traditional wear was unfathomable. On some week days I stretched my jeans ability to survive any more dust and dirt. Last day we received a company mailer asking all employees to dress professionally to work. Jokes flew, and everyone was analyzing everyone else from head to toe. Some of my colleagues came running to me and pointed the mailer and asked " How will you survive from the week on?. No hanging earring, no crazy color combination, no that in your face shoes" and I had to reason with literally everyone , I mean what does work wear mean? Black and white devoid of any color? devoid of pretty prints?. 


On Monday I came to work wearing a brown kurta, white leggings , white golden border shawl and nude heels. The security was staring on my legs, may be they expected me to wear something as I wore the last Friday, my yellow sunny peeptoe. I smiled and went in wearing my confidence on my collar or rather my shawl. Hours later, a girl wearing an above knee length kurtha and black leggings from the same ODC came up to me and asked me if the security had warned me of wearing inappropriate dress. She narrated her conversation with the gaurds and it seems, leggings are inappropriate to be worn to work. HMMM!!!! even one of my team mate was complaining on how the security felt about her tight churi being work inappropriate. I pinged some of my Bangalore friends and asked if the same condition prevailed there and they gave me a super confused expression cause no one bothered to tell them that leggings were banned. That made me super red, I mean how can a tight churi, a below knee kurta, or a bright yellow dress be termed as work inappropriate?. The company policy does not site any of the above mentioned into banned lot. Banning something or asking us not to wear something just cause we are in south is bloody BULLSHIT. A sleeveless or a shorts being inappropriate in general public's eyes is no excuse to behave in a way they did. I was left off cause I had worn a shawl with my dress as my whole ensemble was passed off as a churidhar where as, the girl behind me with her leggings and short kurta caught the gaurd's eye. Asking us not to wear a sleeveless cause this is Kerala is bullshit. This is corporate Mr. security, and even if I turn up at work wearing  just knee length pencil skirt and a tucked in shirt u will have to let me in cause that my friend is a WORK WEAR.

2 comments:

Chandana said...

Leggings are not work appropriate??? Since when??
No skirts, no jeans, no leggings... what is left i wonder? :P

Thripti Aravind said...

@TheGirlAtFirstAvenue...the plain old salwar kameez:(...n tanx for dropping by :)