Depression grips me because my future appeared bleak

Within a few days of joining ATTI and starting to go to Moitra & Co at the airport for practical classes, I began to suffer from depression. The future began to look bleak because the number of opportunities for regular employment in the profession was very restricted. From discussions it became clear that unless one had suitable contacts, one could not aspire to become a ground engineer in any major airline. The discouragement came from old hands at the game who we would meet in a makeshift tea shop outside the airport boundary. They worked in Indian Airlines and were elderly persons who still struggled to acquire an AME license. They made fun of us and explained how each of them were frustrated persons.
Looking at their plight, I began to wonder whether I had made the right choice or had made a big blunder in opting for this institute but, then, I gathered confidence when I met another gentleman who stayed in my neighborhood. He was a ground engineer in Indian Airlines and every morning the car would come to pick him up. He had worked his way up.
He and the men I met in the tea shop were two sides of the same coin.
Anyway, to boost my morale, after classes I would walk down the tarmac, peeping into the hangars where people were at work and go into the lounge of Kolkata Airport. I could see the huge aircraft of international airlines like BOAC, Lufthansa, Japan Air Lines, and KLM lined up at the far end of the runway. Most of them were Boeing-707 which had at that time been inducted into service.
After spending some time in the lounge browsing through magazines and, once in a while, purchasing a copy of some magazine, I would take a bus to Shyambazar to take in a Bengali movie just to get my mind away from unwanted thoughts. (to be continued …)

Tasting life in the raw at ATTI

My joining the Air Technical Training Institute ATTI was a major change in my life and it presented me with hundreds of chances of tasting life in the raw. It was a world of reality, a world where no one yielded an inch, a world where everyone had to fight and struggle to get a foothold, or at least a toe grip.
Within a few days of my joining ATTI, it dawned on me that the field that I had chosen was one that was riddled with thorns. I would get a certificate from the Institute and for employment, I would have to pass the AME License exams – if I tried hard enough, I could get at least an X-license on Direct Reading (DR) Compass. That would be the easiest, because for other AME Licenses in the A, B, C, and D category, I would have to get experience in working physically on aircraft and on their engines.
That is what ground engineering was all about, it was engineering related to aircraft on the ground and was the certification that had to be given by the engineer before the aircraft could take off. A major responsibility where experience mattered most.
And – it was here that I was stumped because, as per the terms of the Institute, they would arrange for me to join a flying club or a small airline company after completion of my 3-year course to gain six months experience. After that I would be on my own.
Of course, I also had the option to appear for examinations conducted by the Aeronautical Society of India and a pass in that would make me equivalent to a graduate in aeronautical engineering. That was the only bright light at the end of an otherwise dark tunnel for me. (to be continued …)