heartattack

Well, if you consume any form of media, you’ll know by now that Barack Obama is the new president of the US of A. To repeat the oft-used adjective - this is HISTORIC. He is the first Afro-American to be the president of the United States (I’m certain Indian-Americans have already started dreaming of their turn.. politics is like hemoglobin for us).

Obama has been the darling of the media and the darling of most people I have had the pleasure of interacting with. He promises to be the change that America, they say, desperately needs. Most “experts” (read morons who think they know too much) believe he’s better for the world and the United States.

Now honestly, I don’t trust pre-election promises and emphatic speeches too much. Bill Clinton was as charming and as good a speaker as America has ever had. He was supposed to be a Listerine powered breath of fresh air, like Obama is supposed to be today. But then who knew that Clinton had trouble keeping his pants on and smoked marijuana (oh, correction - he never ‘inhaled’). JFK, a person who Obama is often compared with, was again a pop celebrity like Obama is today. But then, probably under the influence of a gazillion kilos of medication he took everyday, he increased the US involvement in the Vietnam war by 20 folds.

So yes, I refuse to go by the hype, the promises. I hope Obama can walk the talk. My personal favorite was Sarah Palin. That woman is hot! And everytime I look at her I imagine Tina Fey, the woman most eligible to be my significant other. So that gives Sarah Palin extra brownie points. Before she came into picture, I was an Obama supporter just because Michelle Obama is much more attractive than Cindy McCain. But Sarah Palin made me switch.

Apart from her looks, Sarah Palin and John McCain would have been good for my health, if the old adage - “laughter is the best medicine” is anything to go by. I’ll surely miss George Bush and Dick Cheney once they leave. Not a week passed without getting a video/email forward/news report of their douch-baggery - like shooting a friend while on a hunting trip, or spitting in public when no one’s looking, or being unable to define sovereign. Bummer.. with Obama as the president, what’ll happen to the jokes?

The only saving grace is the “gaffe-machine” Joe Biden who has the knack of blurting out something stupid at regular intervals. Biden reminds me of Nibbles, the diaper wearing grey mouse in Tom and Jerry, who gets into trouble frequently and has to be monitored by Jerry (Obama in this case) all the time. I’m hopeful Biden will keep us all entertained.

So yes, McCain - Palin would have been a better choice from the entertainment point-of-view. Sad it wasn’t to be. Though I have to admit I am happy that Martin Luther King’s dream has come true and a black man as indeed reached the pinnacle of, if I may say, world leadership.

They say “no man is an island” and sometimes being in India I wish this was untrue. I wish I could do everything myself - make my own electricity, have my own oil, own satellite into space for mobile connectivity, and own bank. The reason being - any kind of external interaction in this country brings me only frustration and headache. By external interaction, I mean, for example, opening a bank account, buying insurance, getting a haircut, buying a SIM etc etc.

In the last 3-4 months, I have, unfortunately, had the need to use these services and I am astonished at the lack of respect the companies offering these services have for their customers. My experiences have been so bad and so many that I’m forced to write a series of articles on them calling them the “Shame on you” series. I start with a probably unexpected contender - Standard Chartered (Stanchart) Bank.

Here is what happened:

I opened a savings account with Stanchart about 3 months back. Like most modern bank accounts I was entitled to a debit card with my account for which the bloody bank was charging me close to Rs 250 (USD 5) per annum. A month passed and no signs of the card. I called phone banking to register my complaint. After truckloads of promises and apologies, I was assured of a card in a week’s time. I didn’t get the card.

I called once more and again the same thing - apologies and promises. Still no card. I called a third time. Same thing. It was like a TV soap - same thing again and again. As luck would have it I got a call from some random female from the Stanchart survey department asking me about the extent of awesomeness of my banking experience. My guess is my call would be her last for the day.

So after a total of 4 complaints, still no sign of the card. Without a card these days, a bank account is as good as my personal piggy bank, minus the interest which is anyway offset by bank fines and fees (like fee for counting money for cash deposits - you are a bank, you f***ing morons, what else are you expected to do). In fact, Stanchart’s customer service number is not toll free so I spent like a 100 bucks on customer service calls.

Having had enough, I headed over to the bank to close my account. The reason I opened a Stanchart account was to avoid the headaches normally associated with public banks like SBI, and to avoid the evil of blood suckers like ICICI. Bravo, Stanchart has the worst of both - the inconvenience and evil both packaged in one. If this was SBI, I would have relented. Not here.

Of course, as Murphy said it, there was an ultra pretty looking chick at the counter (ok, I have to give it to the Stanchart HR if not their customer support). She was new and she requested that I give her a chance to fix the problem (and probably a chance for her to win like a gold star or something from the manager). In a rare case of brains above balls testosterone, I declined the offer and categorically asked for an account closure.

Here is the funny irritating thing - Stanchart wasn’t too sorry about what they did. In fact the crackheads asked me why I did not come to the bank brach straight instead of calling phone banking. I had 3 things to say:

• F*** you
• Why on earth do you have phone banking then if I need to come over to the branch for stuff like this? My guess is Stanchart runs a call-girl service under the pretext of phone banking.
• I had already been to the bank a week after I opened my account to fix my personal profile. The illiterate retards handling the admin stuff got my email, telephone number, address all wrong, rendering me incapable of even using e-banking. It took them like 2 weeks to fix that. Bank lobbies are not my idea of a lounge and so I don’t like to come over every week for some bloody fault of YOURS.

Ah well, like it happens with most institutions here (and even people), they choose arrogance over dignity and simply charge me 500 bucks for premature closure of account (less than 6 months). My ballsTestosterone overpowered my brain this time and not wanting to create a scene in front of the pretty chick, I simply paid it (I regret it now, honestly, damn women!).

So there it is - my banking experience with Stanchart. 3 months of headache, waste of time, money, and energy - precisely the things a bank is supposed to preserve with its services. Seriously, if you or anyone you know plans to bank with these shitheads at Stanchart please refrain. As I said, it’s probably more convenient to buy a piggy bank and keep money at home than to leave them with these incompetent jerks.

So, except for the pretty girl at the counter (muah!!), shame on you Stanchart, shame on you. All I hope this that you have shitloads of a certain kind of investment that has been in the news recently.

Just like the Chocolate Dilemma earlier, another question has been bothering me lately. Consider this scenario:

Jack and Rose are a happily married couple. They are truly, madly, deeply in love. Adam,  Rose’s college friend, has a thing for her but Rose is simply in love with Jack. Rose loses her memory in a freaky accident. The new Rose, though still Jack’s wife, has no feelings for Jack. In fact, she now loves Adam.

My question is - what’s the right thing? By right, I mean not only for Rose, but for, let’s say, the universe. Should Rose continue to be with Jack, or should she start a new life with Adam?

A couple of months ago, I saw this film Being John Malkovich. The film is the pinnacle of fiction. It is about a guy who finds a tunnel to the conscience of a major filmstar - John Malkovich. You crawl through the tunnel and you end up inside Malkovich’s head for like 15 minutes. Quite imaginative.

After the film, I asked myself the obvious question - if I could be someone else for 15 minutes, who would it be? Among the many people that I shortlisted, one of them being Brad Pitt, especially when he’s home at night, I had in the list SACHIN TENDULKAR. 

Why Sachin Tendulkar? For his talent? Popularity? Money? Success? Nope! I want to be Sachin Tendulkar because I want to know what it feels like to be a superhero.

Why do I think Sachin Tendulkar is a superhero? Surely not because of his 12,000 test runs, a record he made just yesterday, or his 39 test centuries. I’m sure Ricky Ponting will eclipse both records some day. Superheroes cannot be judged by statistics. No one knows how many baddies Superman killed. But Superman is a superhero because we know that he’ll come to the rescue when the baddies arrive. It is for the same reason that Sachin Tendulkar is a superhero.

Every time he goes on to bat, the whole of India, if not the whole world that watches cricket, cheers, as if a gladiator has walked into an arena full of hungry tigers. The pious ones pray to God. The more pious ones put vermillion on the television screen (not kidding). The hysterical ones watch every ball he faces from behind a pillow bunker as if their eyes shot rays of misfortune that’ll go through the TV screen and bowl Sachin out. No matter what the opposition does, as long as Sachin is out there, there’s hope India can still win, even if it is mathematically impossible. Sachin is a superhero - he can even bend the rules of mathematics and take India to victory. Heck, Sachin can bend light.

The last bit my friends is what makes Sachin Tendulkar a superhero - not his money, records, or popularity - it’s the hopes that he carries - the hopes of 20% of the world’s population. My guess is all other superheroes combined don’t have the burden of so many hopes, even if I account for the population of planet Krypton.

I wonder how this man can stand straight with so much on his shoulders. I wonder how he can afford to whack a 150 kmph Shoiab Akhtar ball in the air, well knowing that if he got out, he’ll break more hearts than Aishwarya Rai did when she married that moron. Probably that makes him a superhero - faith in his powers. Spiderman doesn’t fear that his web would snap - he just keeps somersaulting. Batman doesn’t fear that his Batmobile is gonna crash while chasing baddies at 200 miles an hour. They both have faith in their abilities, much like Sachin has. 

It is easy to criticize Sachin Tendulkar by citing his less than heroic 4th innings average, or his dismal average against big oppositions when chasing big scores - often the best indicators of a player’s dependability. It is also easy to quote the performance of Ponting, Hayden, Hussey, Sangakkara, or Pietersen, and show how they are better. But it simply does not matter. This is not about proving that he is the best. He may or may not be. Remember Neo? The superhero from The Matrix? He was a superhero even before he killed a single agent. Why? Because people believed that he was their savior. With Sachin, it’s the same. He may not have rescued India as often as a player of his talent should have, but people BELIEVE that he is the savior, the superhero. It’s a question of perception. Sachin Tendulkar is a figure above logic.

So back to where I started - I really want to know what it feels like to be Sachin Tendulkar - walking into a stadium with chants of “Sachin, Sachin.” What it feels like to hit a six or score a century in front of such a crowd. Also, I want to know how it feels like getting out cheaply in that stadium? Does it feel worse than watching Serena Williams in skimpy outfits? Worse than spending 5 minutes with an iPhone fanboy? Worse than Mayawati’s face?

All I want is my tunnel. Sachin, I’m sure, can make this tunnel too.

In a small village near Bogra in Bangladesh, a woman walks in with an umbrella and an insulated blue colored bag. In a scene reminiscent of the Pied Piper story, about a dozen children follow her. No, the bag does not have 3G iPhones in it! Instead, the bag contains 20 cups of Shokti Doi (Bengali for “Power Yogurt”), a cup of 80 grams of fortified yogurt that might just be a new social movement.

The foundations of this movement were laid in October 2005, when the Bangladesh based Grameen Group of Companies, lead by Nobel laureate Dr Muhammad Yunus, and Group Danone of France, a food and beverage powerhouse, decided to come together to improve the diet of rural Bangladeshi children. Shokti Doi was born in early 2007 out of this joint venture, conveniently called Grameen Danone.

Shokti Doi is no ordinary yogurt. From its ingredients, to pricing, to packaging, it is a remarkably well-designed product that offers something new to its target consumers – children.

First, the yogurt contains exactly the nutrients deficient in the daily diet of the Bangladeshi children. Danone conducted an extensive study of their eating habits from which it determined the nutrients they lack most. Shokti Doi was then fortified with these nutrients, which include vitamin A, iron, calcium, zinc, protein, and iodine.

Furthermore, the taste of the yogurt is in line with the tastes of the generally sweet-toothed Bangladeshis. To offset the “off” taste acquired from the fortifying ingredients, sugar from dates was added to the yogurt, a violation of the sugar-free policy of Danone yogurts worldwide. A number of permutations were worked on to get the taste right. This move ensured that the children would want to eat the yogurt.

Next, the product is affordable. Priced at 5 taka (approx 7 cents), Shokti Doi is much cheaper than normal yogurts in the market, let alone fortified ones.

So now, children in Bangladesh have access to an affordable health food that not only satisfies their nutritional needs but is tasty as well. This is unprecedented.

The wonder of this venture does not end there. Besides malnutrition, the Shokti Doi project aims to fight poverty by creating opportunities for local manpower.

The business follows a proximity model. This means that factories are small and service only a small area. The idea is to scatter many such factories across the country. This allows for distribution of the yogurt by local ladies instead of trucks. The automation in these factories is limited to increase the scope for employment. Furthermore, the ingredients of the yogurt like milk and dates are procured from farms run by the locals with the initial financing coming from the Grameen Bank itself.

The venture is also environmentally aware. The yogurt factories are solar powered and the yogurt cups are made of biodegradable cornstarch as opposed to plastic.

The fact that it is able to address such a multitude of issues makes Grameen Danone’s Shokti Doi initiative a form of social revolution. In fact, there is potential to do even more. Grameen Danone, for example, could use the Shokti Doi packaging to educate children. Simple thoughts like “Be Honest” and “Girls and Boys are equal” printed on the yogurt cup can be very effective pedagogical tools.

This is just a start. Malnutrition is a global problem. So far Grameen Danone has set up one factory in Bangladesh that serves just the district of Bogra. The road ahead for the venture will be to build more factories in Bangladesh and create a system that allows this venture to be scaled to other third world countries effectively.

One can also expect additions to the Shokti Doi family to fight typical forms of malnutrition in women and infants.

From the economics point of view, Grameen Danone is run as what Dr Yunus calls a “Social Business,” i.e., a “No Loss No Dividends” company with a social objective. Such a company works like a profit making company, but the margins are minimal and all the profits are channeled back to the business.

Social businesses, as exemplified by Grameen Danone, allow corporations to integrate social objectives with their core competences. Companies, instead of simply donating money to charity, can contribute to the society much more by using their know-how to build products for the poor.

Grameen Danone has opened up a market for food and beverage products aimed at the rural population, a segment of the market often ignored by the topmost players owing to the segment’s low purchasing power. One can now expect other players like Nestle and Unilever to introduce competing products, either as their own social businesses to fulfill their social responsibilities, or as traditional profit-making businesses if Grameen Danone does turn out to be a profitable venture.

This competition will allow for an expedited introduction of such products globally, more rural employment at better wages, more products, and more competitive prices. Poverty can be wrestled with and knocked out faster.

But until that happens, Grameen Danone is fighting it “one cup of yogurt at a time.”