A bad tummy has kept me home for 2 days and living on electral and tablets. I live at Hastings which is considered an upmarket area in Kolkata so I headed out to the local doctor. The local doctor has this small dispensary next to a medical store here. I was waiting in line with about 10 - 12 women and a couple of army guys. The dispensary was dark and small with a doctor who seemed to know what he was talking about.
This is the situation in Kolkata, one of the metros of India so you can imagine the situation in smaller towns. The last time I had fallen ill in Kalka, on the way to Shimla I was attended to by a doctor who was not an MBBS. Even then I felt that the medical care facilities in India really need to improve. I don't think it's a lack of Doctors. It's just that they are not available at the right place.
One more problem I noticed was the chemists not selling tablets as per requirements especially for the expensive tablets and tablets I must tell you are very expensive. My tablets cost me all of 250 bucks for 3 days. that would be a large chunk of salary for a lot of people.
As a kid I had a dream of an India complete in every aspect. Haven't done much to change it yet. But if me living in a city doesn't have access to medical facilities, a lot of India would be at the mercy of quacks who are taking advantage of poor hapless people.
One thing we guys can do is probably contribute unused unexpired medicines to medicine banks available at many chemists. I know local chemists in Mumbai had it. What would anyway have been thrown out can help somebody.
Let's do our bit. Remember every drop can catalyse a wave.
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Saturday, May 16, 2009
The last few pages
Another chapter ends in my life. This one's on branding and what better way to end it than winning the Brand equity Quiz at Kolkata traditionally one of the best quizzing cities. Unfortunately couldn't make much of an impression at the finals.
I'm now moving on to Bangalore which means I'm getting closer home to Mumbai. I'm moing to Sales - Grocery 1, Karnataka. Which means handling sales of the food brands.
Definitely interesting stuff this.
Clicked this picture at Princep Ghat today. The kid was busy washing his face in the water oblivious of me clicking him with my phone camera - the LG Viewty.
BTW got loads of gifts at Kolkata - 1 Lakh worth gifts + another 20K worth at the finals including a handsfree, a coffe machine, loads of gift vouchers and a 5 star cruise.
Now to find some1 to join me there :).
Luv,
P.R.
Sunday, May 03, 2009
'Give us today our daily bread' or what happened at brand equity 09 and my visit to Mother house
That's a line from the Lord's prayer and also what resulted in one of the most amazing stories of my life. But let's start at the beginning.
Wednesday morning. Two teams from ITC were to go for the brand equity. The two teams wereto be created from a pool of 4 people GK Suresh (my super boss), Satish, Sreerang and me. Sreerang and me have participated in 2 quizes earlier and missed qualification by a point both times. Satish and me had qualified for a super tough quiz where we messed up. Anubhav (who had to go to Mumbai for some work) and Satish had earlier come fourth in one of the Kolkata circuit quizzes.
Anyway Satish and I decided on 2 teams (rotation for luck) - Satish and Sreerang and GK Sir and me. Come 5:30 Sreerang lands up at our office where Satish and I were furiously wrapping up our work. Sreerang and I decided to go ahead and fill the qualification forms as GK Sir and Satish were busy. So we left at 5:45 for a quiz thatwas to start at 6. Kolkata quizzes are famous for starting super late so we strolled into kala mandir at 6:00 to be told by the sponsors that the quiz is starting.
Sreerang and I were then suddenly the only team from ITC. We ran in and sat for the prelims of 30 questions out of which we got around 19 which seemed to be decent. However Godbole and I have this knack of missing finals by a point, so we waited with bated breath for Derek O Brien. The Derek O Brien we had seen on numerous BQCs, Brand Equities announced the bottom 12. Then the top 3 before announcing that the fourth team was a small and upcoming Kolkata company (which had us shaking our head) before announcing ITC. He also commented that we had qualified many times but ITC had never won (at least at Kolkata).
Then started a wonderful quiz (in hindsight). We were the underdogs as the Kol quizzing circuit is full of stalwart teams. On the Dias were StanC, IBM, TCS(who were the defending national champions 2008), Cognizant and M junction.
We started off well (to every1s surprise). Leading the first and 2nd rounds before TCS caught up at the third round and passed us by the fifth round. TCS and us were on the top 2 for the last round where teams are given 8 questions. The rule is that teams can be in the buzzer round (10 for right, - 10 for wrong) as long as they have a chance to catch up with the top 2 teams. The first question saw m junction exit. TCS were at 60 and we were at 55. Cognizant, StanC and IBM were tied 3rd on 40. TCS beat us to the buzzer for the next question which was Agra's favourite sweet. Ans: Petha after which IBM gave a wrong answer which was a -10 and they exited. Then came 2 questions which no one answered (we obviously wanted to stay in the top 2) and Cognizant and StanC exited which left TCS and us at the top 2 with 3 questions to go.
Question 6: Which is the first word of SWOT if arranged alphabetically. TCS hit the buzzer before us and were ready to kill ourselves when they said Strength and we couldn't believe our ears.
Score TCS 60 ITC 55.
Next question: Which product is named in the Lord's prayer. The answer 'Bread' in the line 'Give us today our daily bread'. We hit the buzzer and suddenly the quiz changed.
Score ITC 65 TCS 60
The last question. Who is known as the originator of management? TCS hit the buzzer and answered 'Booze A Hamilton'. We believed the answer was McKinsey.
Then Derek called the chief guest onto stage and there was the whole 10 minutes of drama when he asked us our answers and revealed the right answer:
Mckinsey.
Score: ITC 65 TCS 50.
Suddenly we had won the Brand equity Kolkata round and all thanks to the Lord's prayer.
Thank you god.
BTW this would be my last few weeks in Kolkata so I finally decided to visit Mother Teresa's grave. I asked someone at my church where was Mother Teresa's grave and he personally took me outside and pointed in the direction of AJC bose road. I asked him for a landmark and he smiled and said 'Everyone knows mother house'.
I took his advice and flagged down a cab and told him mother house and the cabbie knew. He parked the car besides this little lane. I got down and one slightly disformed young lady just pointed towards an alley where a man in a lungi and banian pointed to a small gate. The time was 11:50 and the visiting hours were till 12. I was directed towards Mother's small little room, sparse and simple. There is something about the place that feels different. You have to go there to experience it. I then walked to this little museum which speaks about this great ladies life which is amazing. Read Navin Chawla's biography of her. We (a couple of foreign tourists) and I went to her grave where all the sisters came in to pray. Trully a wondeful feeling. Do go there if you are in Kolkata. It's humbling.
Luv,
Pranay
Wednesday morning. Two teams from ITC were to go for the brand equity. The two teams wereto be created from a pool of 4 people GK Suresh (my super boss), Satish, Sreerang and me. Sreerang and me have participated in 2 quizes earlier and missed qualification by a point both times. Satish and me had qualified for a super tough quiz where we messed up. Anubhav (who had to go to Mumbai for some work) and Satish had earlier come fourth in one of the Kolkata circuit quizzes.
Anyway Satish and I decided on 2 teams (rotation for luck) - Satish and Sreerang and GK Sir and me. Come 5:30 Sreerang lands up at our office where Satish and I were furiously wrapping up our work. Sreerang and I decided to go ahead and fill the qualification forms as GK Sir and Satish were busy. So we left at 5:45 for a quiz thatwas to start at 6. Kolkata quizzes are famous for starting super late so we strolled into kala mandir at 6:00 to be told by the sponsors that the quiz is starting.
Sreerang and I were then suddenly the only team from ITC. We ran in and sat for the prelims of 30 questions out of which we got around 19 which seemed to be decent. However Godbole and I have this knack of missing finals by a point, so we waited with bated breath for Derek O Brien. The Derek O Brien we had seen on numerous BQCs, Brand Equities announced the bottom 12. Then the top 3 before announcing that the fourth team was a small and upcoming Kolkata company (which had us shaking our head) before announcing ITC. He also commented that we had qualified many times but ITC had never won (at least at Kolkata).
Then started a wonderful quiz (in hindsight). We were the underdogs as the Kol quizzing circuit is full of stalwart teams. On the Dias were StanC, IBM, TCS(who were the defending national champions 2008), Cognizant and M junction.
We started off well (to every1s surprise). Leading the first and 2nd rounds before TCS caught up at the third round and passed us by the fifth round. TCS and us were on the top 2 for the last round where teams are given 8 questions. The rule is that teams can be in the buzzer round (10 for right, - 10 for wrong) as long as they have a chance to catch up with the top 2 teams. The first question saw m junction exit. TCS were at 60 and we were at 55. Cognizant, StanC and IBM were tied 3rd on 40. TCS beat us to the buzzer for the next question which was Agra's favourite sweet. Ans: Petha after which IBM gave a wrong answer which was a -10 and they exited. Then came 2 questions which no one answered (we obviously wanted to stay in the top 2) and Cognizant and StanC exited which left TCS and us at the top 2 with 3 questions to go.
Question 6: Which is the first word of SWOT if arranged alphabetically. TCS hit the buzzer before us and were ready to kill ourselves when they said Strength and we couldn't believe our ears.
Score TCS 60 ITC 55.
Next question: Which product is named in the Lord's prayer. The answer 'Bread' in the line 'Give us today our daily bread'. We hit the buzzer and suddenly the quiz changed.
Score ITC 65 TCS 60
The last question. Who is known as the originator of management? TCS hit the buzzer and answered 'Booze A Hamilton'. We believed the answer was McKinsey.
Then Derek called the chief guest onto stage and there was the whole 10 minutes of drama when he asked us our answers and revealed the right answer:
Mckinsey.
Score: ITC 65 TCS 50.
Suddenly we had won the Brand equity Kolkata round and all thanks to the Lord's prayer.
Thank you god.
BTW this would be my last few weeks in Kolkata so I finally decided to visit Mother Teresa's grave. I asked someone at my church where was Mother Teresa's grave and he personally took me outside and pointed in the direction of AJC bose road. I asked him for a landmark and he smiled and said 'Everyone knows mother house'.
I took his advice and flagged down a cab and told him mother house and the cabbie knew. He parked the car besides this little lane. I got down and one slightly disformed young lady just pointed towards an alley where a man in a lungi and banian pointed to a small gate. The time was 11:50 and the visiting hours were till 12. I was directed towards Mother's small little room, sparse and simple. There is something about the place that feels different. You have to go there to experience it. I then walked to this little museum which speaks about this great ladies life which is amazing. Read Navin Chawla's biography of her. We (a couple of foreign tourists) and I went to her grave where all the sisters came in to pray. Trully a wondeful feeling. Do go there if you are in Kolkata. It's humbling.
Luv,
Pranay
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