Account 1

My high school had really weird timings. Infact I guess most schools in India have got weird timings, or maybe all schools start pretty early, and if it is so, I guess they should all change it. Anyways, my school starting pretty early at 7 am in morning meant that most of the children won’t be able to wake up early enough to have breakfast on dining table. They would either munch on the way to school or some other way. Near my school was this little shop. It was the only shop opened so early in the morning. It sold burgers, sandwiches and other fast snacks. I never liked those guys, cause the quality of their food was below average and the cost they used to sell it for was way more than the usual, and lastly, they didn’t even treat us well. But we had no other choice, as it was the only shop opened so early and we were hungry.

Eventually, one day we saw another shop, just as small and standing right opposite to this one. The vendor was smiling and the shop also looked pretty neat and nice, obviously it was new. I couldn’t resist visiting it. Luckily, the food quality was just as good as average. I mean, even though it was average, it felt good, also the price were usual. So this shop was cheaper yet better qualitatively as compared to the old shop. It didn’t take two days for the new shop to steal all the crowd from the old one. Well, the old shop vendors did decrease the price but it didn’t help them much, cause children didn’t forget the ill-mannered staff. I don’t know if they improved quality as I never tried them again.

Account 2

Recently my Omnia was giving me a lot of troubles, so I had to send it to Samsung Service Center. They told me it will take around 15 days to get fixed as they need to replace the touch panel. I couldn’t afford to lose the calls I would get during this time, so I decided to buy a temporary cell phone for these days. Of coarse, I was looking for a pretty cheap phone for only 15 days. During my lunch hour, I saw a big Vodafone board, visited that shop, asked them for the specific Vodafone model I was looking for. He said that he is not an official Vodafone retailer and the board is only there for promotional purposes. So he didn’t have the model I was looking for, but  he offered me to check out some other models. I thanked him for offering and asked him if he can guide me to the nearest Vodafone store. He bluntly said he don’t know. I didn’t like that. Anyways, I came out, I asked another shopkeeper about Vodafone store, and he told me that it was just four shops away. Now, there is no way that the previous shop keeper didn’t know where the Vodafone store is. He just didn’t want me to go to a competitor, or worse, he was showing the frustration that I wasn’t interested in the phones he was showing to me. Anyways, I found the store and bought the phone (and eventually lost it after 15 days). Now my Omnia is back in Service Center, and this time for over 30 days. I had to buy a new phone, and I didn’t want to buy the same model from Vodafone again, but while still being random, I was careful enough not to buy from that shopkeeper who didn’t help me find Vodafone store last time. Because I don’t like him.

Account 3

I am very fond of Delhi Chaats. I am not talking about the Delhi Chaat that we get here in Mumbai. I am talking about the various chaats that we can get only in Delhi. You have to taste it to realize that something can even be so tasty. Anyways, I tried almost all shops in Mumbai looking for that taste but couldn’t find it. I found it once in some shop in Infinity Mall in Andheri and it was almost nice. Unfortunately my luck doomed and the mall caught fire one day, and was burnt badly and closed. Later when it reopened, the specific shop didn’t. I was since looking for another place to feed my appetite for Delhi Chaats. Finally I came across this shop in Inorbit Mall in Vashi, called Only Parathas, and it was my lucky day. Now I just need to show them my face and they already know my order. I must have showed this place to tens of my friends. I am sure those shopkeepers must have made some jokes about me and my fancy for Delhi Chaats.

So last week, I visited them with my brother and a friend and ordered 3 plates of Tikki Chaat and Bisleri and 3 Red Bulls. They only has 1 chilled Red Bull and the other two were just not as chilled as one would like. We told them to keep it in freezer by the time when order is ready, but the shopkeeper replied that he will rather get us chilled Red Bulls from another shop, and so he did the very next minute. Not to mention he was proudly smiling at his own customer service when he said that. Now I normally tend to hate people who are proud, but I would rather flatter someone with pride if it means a better customer service to me. I like this guy anywhichways though.

Moral

• Just because you don’t have competitors today, doesn’t mean you will never have them.
• Don’t just sell your products/service; make a relationship with your customers. It helps against competitors.
• One of the ways to make a prospect your customer without being able to sell the product is by giving remarkable customer service.
• Don’t hesitate to recommend a competitor if that is what best suits the needs of your customer. They won’t forget the source. Most people never remember the great article they read online, but always remember they found it trough Google.
• Whatever you do, good or evil, there is always a blogger somewhere writing about you .

.. and you deserve everything you think that you should get, and once you realize that you deserve it, it is not impossible to get it. Some people say he cheated in his exams, some people say she slept to get the job, some people say they conspired to overthrow the throne. People say he cheated, stole, robbed, lied, sinned to get all the things he has, they say he doesn’t deserve it. I think he deserve it. If he did it and got away with that, he do deserve it. Deserving something has nothing to do with anything more than it has to do with having the balls of making the choice.

They say his father was millionaire. Sure he does deserve it, his forefather bought that right for him. They went out of their way to deserve so much that the effect lasts till generations.

They say he had a jack, they say he got lucky, they say it was over-hyped by media. Why him? Why not you? Did he do something you didn’t.

They say it happened to him, they say the accident made him famous. It’s right, that happens sometimes, so you say the fame he got out of escaping that accident is something he doesn’t deserve. You are right. He won’t be able to live upto this fame if he don’t deserve it. It won’t land him into a great job, won’t get him any commercial ads, won’t get him hired as V.P. for Facebook. If he deserve all this, he will still have to do something relevant, if he doesn’t deserve it, his name will simply fade as soon as it came into limelight.

Things which make noise, initially catch attention, but soon get discarded; but good music is forever, although people may take sometime to appreciate it.

• Love
• Sex
• Education
• Society
• God
• HIV
• Self Esteem
• Macs
• Twitter
• Alcohol
• Babies
• Chocolate
• Paris Hilton
• MSN Messenger
• Success
• Amitabh Bachhan
• Iphone/Ipods
• Actors
• GF-BF
• RPG
• SEO
• Pschology
• Own’s Conscience
• Sachin Tendulkar
• A written word

I felt really important when I received my first private cabin at my workplace. It bundled with a dedicated phone, lappy, all stationary and a litter bin. It made me feel grown up and happy.

Some days back, I found two litter bins below my table. It gave me mixed feelings. Good feeling that I got two dedicated litter bins now and bad feeling that probably am too dirty for one bin.

Today I realized that there are four litter bins in my cabin, one at each corner and I feel trashed already. It looks a bit funny to me, but not as much that I can enjoy everyday.

Some things are best when in limits.

Someone sent me this via mail. I really liked it so now you can read it here..

Old Version

The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long building his house and laying up supplies for the winter.

The grasshopper thinks the ant’s a fool and laughs & dances & plays the summer away.

Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed.

The grasshopper has no food or shelter so he dies out in the cold.

New Version

The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter.

The grasshopper thinks the ant’s a fool and laughs & dances & plays the summer away. Come winter, the shivering grasshopper calls a press conference and demands to know why the ant should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others are cold and starving.

NDTV, BBC, CNN show up to provide pictures of the shivering grasshopper next to a video of the ant in his comfortable home with a table filled with food.

The World is stunned by the sharp contrast. How can this be that this poor grasshopper is allowed to suffer so?

Arundhati Roy stages a demonstration in front of the ant’s house.

Medha Patkar goes on a fast along with other grasshoppers demanding that grasshoppers be relocated to warmer climates during winter.

Amnesty International and Koffi Annan criticize the Indian Government for not upholding the fundamental rights of the grasshopper.

The Internet is flooded with online petitions seeking support to the grasshopper (many promising Heaven and Everlasting Peace for prompt support as against the wrath of God for non-compliance).

Opposition MP’s stage a walkout.

Left parties call for “Bharat Bandh” in West Bengal and Kerala demanding a Judicial Enquiry. CPM in Kerala immediately passes a law preventing Ants from working hard in the heat so as to bring about equality of poverty among ants and grasshoppers.

Finally, the Judicial Committee drafts the Prevention of Terrorism Against Grasshoppers Act [POTAGA]“, with effect from the beginning of the winter.

Arjun Singh makes Special Reservation for GrassHopper in educational  Insititutions & in Govt Services.

The ant is fined for failing to comply with POTAGA and, having nothing left to pay his retroactive taxes, his home is confiscated by the Government and handed over to the grasshopper in a ceremony covered by NDTV.

Arundhati Roy calls it “a triumph of justice”.
Lalu calls it ‘Socialistic Justice’.
CPM calls it the ‘revolutionary resurgence of the downtrodden’
Koffi Annan invites the grasshopper to address the UN General Assembly.

Many years later…The ant has since migrated to the US and set up a multibillion dollar company in silicon valley.

100s of grasshoppers still die of starvation despite reservation somewhere in India ..

As a result loosing lot of hard working ants and feeding the grasshoppers, India is still a developing country……