The understatement of the century - Customer service in India has got nothing to do with customer and it should not be called a service. There may be some exceptions but I am sure they exist for the sole purpose of proving the rule. How difficult must it be to purchase a simple water filter? I thought that I will be able to walk in to the local outlet of Vijay Sales, select one, pay for it and be able to walk with it in no time. No such luck!

After going through the 5-6 models on offer, wading through terms such as RO (Reverse Osmosis! I still have no clue what it means!) and debating about the capacity, I finally zeroed in on one, only to be informed by the salesman that they don't keep any in inventory so it will have to be delivered from their warehouse. Part of me understood the rationale (and economics!) behind not keeping any inventory in the store but that didn't prevent me from groaning, almost visibly. The salesman must have noticed it because he said, almost apologetically - "it will be delivered tomorrow for sure.'. Yeah right! I have heard that song before!

But there wasn't much to be done except to grin and bear it. 'Can the delivery be made after 5pm? We are going out in the morning' I said pleadingly to the guy at the payment desk, all the while praying that a burglar wasn't within an earshot. 'Yes mam, don't worry. They will call you before they come'. He assured me and I hoped that they won't leave a little 'We missed you' note behind. I further hoped that I won't be miles away when they call. Superman is no relation of mine.

Cut to next day. I wasn't naive to expect the doorbell to ring exactly at 5pm. But around 6:30, I started becoming restless. I fished out the receipt, located the customer care number, dialed it and poured out my sad story. 'Your query is about the delivery. We won't have any information. You will have to call the store you did purchase from'. The guy kept rambling on to the same tune. Frustrated, I said 'Can you please give me the store number?'. As he dictated the number I realized that it was printed on the receipt and I could have easily found it if I had taken the time to look for it. I dialed that number and repeated the yarn to the first human voice that came on line. She switched me to another human where I had to repeat the story. Can someone please put in a place a system in which a frustrated caller's complaint is recorded first time he/she describes it and the message is then played to all the others that the call is directed to?

The person listened to what I had to say and then again assured me that the delivery would be made before 9pm. 'They will call you' he repeated.

8:30pm and no delivery. I called again. This time a different person answered when the call was transferred. When I repeated my tale of woes (this was the 4th time!), he shocked me by calmly saying that the delivery was scheduled for tomorrow. 'What?' This was the only word I could get out. Then I got my voice back and completed the rest 'I was assured that it will be delivered today. We can't stay home all day tomorrow waiting for the delivery.'. 'But madam, it says here that the delivery will be made on 20th. They will come in the evening.' I hung up and then realized that today was in fact the 20th! I searched deep within me but couldn't come up with an ounce of energy or will to call again and argue.

9pm. The phone rang. It was the delivery guy asking if he could come and make the delivery. Hell yes! Though in the nick of time, they had fulfilled their promise of delivering on the 20th. I just hope I don't have to purchase anything that needs home delivery anytime soon. I need some time to recover.

What has the birth of a baby got to do with national economy? Plenty, if reports coming from the UK are anything to go by. I find the whole episode rather amusing. The kings, queens and their kingdoms were long gone in India before even my parents came into this world. I admit, I have sighed at the bygone era on visiting the lavish palaces - mostly converted to resorts or museums now - in the southern part of the country. But I also believe that they belonged to the last century. They couldn't have fit themselves in the circus that we call democracy in India.

But that's not the only thing that I find amusing about this whole episode. What is surprising is the claims that are being made about the British economy getting a much-needed boost because of this great news. Huh? Granted, a baby's birth is always cause for celebration and that the souvenirs created specifically for this royal occasion will result in a purchasing frenzy. But then eventually people will have to get back to their daily lives. They might eat and drink and make merry for a day or so - thus giving the sagging economy a leg or two to stand upon for a short while. But citizens aren't going to make big-ticket purchases or firms aren't going to invest heavily in business and go on a hiring spree just because William and Kate are blessed with a baby boy. Are they? So the question is will this boom be sustainable? If yes, how? And if not, then why is everyone going ga-ga over it?

The baby is being hailed as '3rd in the line to the British throne'. I smiled at that. After all, poor prince Charles became granddaddy before he could become king. :-)

I couldn't help but think about the late princess Diana. If she were alive today, she would have been a granny. Lady Diana, a granny. Wow!

But a baby is a baby is a baby. So here's wishing the newborn lots of good health and good luck. Going by the royal family's past record, he is going to need plenty of it for sure!

If you like to read about new fun gadgets, don't miss this 'Toying with USB'. My personal favorites are the Pen Scanner, Squirming Tentacle and USB Fish Tank :-)

While you are at it, also check out "Going Bananas" - it tells you how to use bananas to create music :-)

Time is an illusion, lunchtime doubly so
-- Douglas Adams

Surviving Aadhar Enrollment - Day 2

D-Day! I hadn't read 'The Secret' at that time or I would have surely asked the Universe to get my work done that day. I wasn't sure what time the Aadhar center opened in the morning so I played it safe and landed there at 9:30am sharp - only to find about 7-8 people already standing in what passes as 'queue' in India. All of them were standing in the stairwell as the door into the floor above was padlocked. We could see that one of the persons in the center was already there but he had chosen to bar us out for reasons best known to him. There wasn't much to do except to open the newspaper I had taken with me - and keep an eye out for those who might try to jump the 'queue'.

After about 10-15 minutes the guy took pity on us and opened the separating gate. We filed inside with the enthusiasm of prisoners who are out for their daily 1-hour stroll. Turned out that we were better off in the stairwell because all the windows outside the room that operated as the center were closed, giving us a feel of what an inside of a furnace must be like. A couple of people wrestled with the windows and managed to open one of them. A gust of wind blew in, bringing with it some relief. There was only one bench outside the room, so naturally, the senior citizens in the queue occupied it. Rest of us went back to the waiting mode.

My experience of queues so far has been that in every queue there usually is someone who assumes that he/she knows everything that is there to know about the work that people in the queue desire to get done. I was proved right in a matter of minutes. There were 2 girls standing behind me. One of them tapped me on the shoulder and asked me if I have an appointment. I said I don't. They appeared relieved. Just then a senior citizen, who till then had been instructing his wife, turned to them and proclaimed, loudly and vehemently, that an appointment was necessary - he and his wife was given one the previous day. One of the girls gave me a panicked look. I proclaimed, in matching loud tone, that I was given the form and asked to come today by the person manning the center. The senior citizen glared at me but decided against arguing. I went back to my newspaper.

By 10am another person working at the center arrived and then things started to move, albeit slowly. This gentleman came to check forms and supporting documents of everyone in the queue. Fortunately, for all of us, our documents were in order. Just then, the first person in the queue was called to get his data fed into the system. All of us craned our necks to check out the process. There were 4 steps - first, the person's data was being transcribed from the form into the system and verification of his supporting documents was done. The person could see the details on the screen in front of him so he/she could verify them. I hoped and prayed that everyone had a good legible handwriting because the time taken by this step seemed to be directly proportional to it. In the second stage the applicant's photo was taken. Fingerprints and iris scan completed the third and fourth stages. These stages seemed to get completed quickly.

The senior citizen, who had earlier given completely unsolicited advice, had been, for some time, getting on the nerves of a kid, about 9-10 years of age, who was standing immediately before me in the queue. Apparently, his mom had left him with the documents there in the morning and was now nowhere to be seen. The gentlemen kept asking the kid to call his mom to make sure that she gets her enrolment done. I had seen the kid make calls a few times but he seemed hassled and somewhat embarrassed by the unwanted attention. More than once I felt like telling the gentleman to leave the kid alone but refrained from doing so. I had no desire to get into argument with the person, who, no doubt, would have relished the opportunity.

As the time passed the queue got shorter. Two people who had been given appointments the day before were processed ahead of the others in the queue but still it looked like all of us who were in the queue would be done before lunchtime, 1pm. A few people who came late were asked to return in the afternoon.

Finally it was my turn to get the enrollment done. I handed over my form but as the person started transcribing it, I started dictating the information myself, including the spellings. It was considerably faster that way. That done, I was asked to sit back for the photo. I have this stupid habit of blinking just as the photo is taken so I widened my eyes to guard against that possibility. The end result was that the photo on my Aadhar card will now look as if I have seen a ghost or an extra-terrestrial! If the process of giving finger prints was creepy, the iris scan was decidedly hilarious because at first I ended up holding the device's wrong side in front of my eyes. It felt all the more weird because the remaining 5 members of the queue had by now filed inside the room and were observing the process keenly.

'You are done' said the guy as he handed over the receipt to me. Music to my ears!

P.S. This was less than a month ago. Just 2 days back, I got an SMS that my Aadhar number has been generated and the card is being dispatched to me by post. Mission Accomplished! :-)

It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it

-- Upton Sinclair

Sometimes it seems that most of these quotes were written about the inept lot called Indian politicians! Just substitute 'Swiss bank account' for 'Salary'.

This one came in an SMS. Needless to say, it sounds so right when our politicians are busy attacking each other while China is causing trouble at the border.

कभी नोटोकें लिये मर गये, कभी व्होटोकें लिये मर गये
कभी जातपात कें नामपे मर गये, कभी आपसमे दो गज जमीनकें लिये मर गये
होते आज वीर भगत सिंग तो कहते
'यार सुखदेव, हम भी किन कमिनोके लिये मर गये'

There was precious little to be done except to curse myself for taking such an early morning appointment at the dentist's. It was around 9:20 and except for the 2 attendants who were busily cleaning the place, I was the only human being to occupy the waiting room. Even the receptionist hadn't yet made her appearance. Since I hadn't expected waiting there for long, I hadn't brought any reading material with me. And I am not one of those who can find endless things to do with their mobile phones.

From my past visits, I knew that the only reading material available would be the issues of Filmfare and Femina. I generally don't bother reading any articles that are meant 'only-for-women'. I am one of those who wonder why any woman would need multiple sets of purses or footwear and my choice of attire is dictated more by what is comfortable rather than what is in vogue. But Femina does have a section on recipes so I prefer it over Filmfare.

As I was flipping through the magazine, I came across a section which featured blogs, on various subjects, written by women. On further reading, I found them pretty interesting. Here is the list:

http://IndianMemoryProject.com/
http://purplefoodie.com/
http://lifesacomicstrip.blogspot.in/
http://backpakker.blogspot.in/

McDonald's is not a place I prefer to eat at but we were headed out of town and it was located right on that road (as they say 'location, location, location'!). To be fair to the fast food joint, I think their breakfast is better than the lunch/dinner. I make it a point to have a heavy breakfast when I am going out of town because most of the expressway food courts are packed with commuters on weekends. If you want to grab something to eat, you need to possess either of the 2 essential traits. One, infinite patience to stand in serpentine queues, if there are any, when the person standing behind you is occupying almost 75% of your personal space. Or two, an almost superhuman ability to push through a mass of people standing haphazardly in front of a counter, a voice loud enough to put a public address system to shame and a shameless attitude to bark out your order and walk away with it amidst angry cursing glares. I possess none of these things. Hence the heavy breakfast.

So I was sure I was going for pancakes (smothered in a divine mix of honey and butter!) and a hash brown but hadn't yet made up my mind about the egg sandwich. That was probably why I was lagging behind the rest of the group, making it easy for the girl to single me out. From the looks of it, she and others in her group were college students, standing there to corner hungry souls into answering a question or two about yet another survey. I was bang on the target. 'Excuse me Mam' she said as I passed her, making me stop in my tracks. 'Yes' I put on my best smile - it was still too early in the morning to put on the grumpy 'don't mess with me' face. 'I was wondering if you would be able to answer a few questions for me' I am not very sure but I suspect that I could have crammed in a lot many more words in the time that she took to get this sentence out. 'Sure, why not?' I said as my mind pondered over my breakfast order in the background. She paused as if stumped. Was I the first one to agree to being questioned? 'You see, we are conducting this survey....' she started rambling on. God! I knew this was a bad idea the moment I said 'Sure, why not?'. Judging by the rate she was speaking at, even if the survey had just 5 questions with a simple yes/no, I would be here for a good 10 minutes at least. By then, others would have ordered their food and perhaps would be devouring it.

'Okay, you are gonna have to ask me these questions pretty quickly. I am really pressed for time here' there was no way to put it more politely. Or if there was, it didn't come to my mind at that time. She looked stumped again. After a significant pause, she said 'Oh ok then, please carry on.' 'Thanks!' I said and really meant it as I hurried away.

I don't know whether the girl in question normally spoke that way or was using the style just for the survey purpose. However, I believe that the people doing these surveys have to keep it in mind that those who choose to participate are investing a bit of their time, even if it is just 5 minutes, to do so and time is the luxury all of us can ill-afford. It will help them and their responders if the surveying process is structured efficiently.

e.g. the person taking survey can ask the person he/she spots 'Excuse me Sir/Madam, would you be interested in taking this survey about so-and-so?'
If the person responds in the negative, simply thank him/her and move on to the next person.
If the person chooses to take the survey, clearly (and quickly!) state the purpose of the survey, number of questions and approximate time that would be needed e.g. we are conducting the survey on consumer habits for our class assignment in college xyz. There will be n questions in all and will take approximately m minutes.

I am sure more people will be willing to participate in these surveys - only if that doesn't make them stand right in the middle of a food joint or a mall answering a barrage of questions - with no end in sight - as the rest of the humanity continues to flow past them.

Perhaps a survey is needed to gauge how the surveys are carried out ;-)