Remember the Sesame Street song?
Sweet Hannah brought her photo to our driver, Raju, and asked if he could find her...
Monday, February 28, 2011
Which one of these things....
Remember the Sesame Street song?
Sweet Hannah brought her photo to our driver, Raju, and asked if he could find her...
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Friday, February 4, 2011
Things we won't miss... (rant to follow)
1. Our phone has a dial tone. I can hear there are messages in our mailbox but I cannot access them. As soon as I dial any number the phone is dead. Friends, family, kind readers of our blog, I WILL NOT MISS THIS PART OF INDIA.
2. Bureaucracy. Below is an email from a colleague of Shae's who just returned from his expat assignment in India. He should have received his air shipment in about 2-3 weeks, shipped by SantaFe movers. Instead it took over 3 months.
"Specifically, I encountered a supposed “air embargo” that prevented my air shipment from leaving BLR due to “a raised terrorist threat level”. After patiently waiting almost 90 days (and checking in weekly with SantaFe, who assured me everything possible was being done but that the US Government was preventing ALL air shipments), I finally called DHL and FedEx myself. Sparing you the gory details, both said, “Air embargo!? What air embargo? We can get your things to you in 7 days, including customs clearance time.” I then insisted that we stop waiting for SantaFe’s usual method to open up and that we book my shipment on either FedEx or DHL immediately. Total cost increase: about $1,000USD (pittance relative to the total cost of an international move). When I pushed the SantaFe guy on why they hadn’t explored these option further, he said, “I was getting you the best price.”
It was like a bad acid flashback (and I’ve never even done LSD!).
In addition there were some other packing-related things that hadn’t been properly estimated, so there was a bit of a scramble as the movers had to get “approval” from someone (it’s India after all). This was handled pretty quickly, but the move foreman made sure to freak out and let me know how concerned he was that this could be a “major problem”. Nice. I have a feeling this was something like, “OMG!!! This is going to cost Rs.1,000, so we’re going to have to go straight to the top for approval. When I asked what kind of costs were involved, I was told they weren’t permitted to share any pricing with me. That was only for the “authorized contact.”
"
2. Bureaucracy. Below is an email from a colleague of Shae's who just returned from his expat assignment in India. He should have received his air shipment in about 2-3 weeks, shipped by SantaFe movers. Instead it took over 3 months.
"Specifically, I encountered a supposed “air embargo” that prevented my air shipment from leaving BLR due to “a raised terrorist threat level”. After patiently waiting almost 90 days (and checking in weekly with SantaFe, who assured me everything possible was being done but that the US Government was preventing ALL air shipments), I finally called DHL and FedEx myself. Sparing you the gory details, both said, “Air embargo!? What air embargo? We can get your things to you in 7 days, including customs clearance time.” I then insisted that we stop waiting for SantaFe’s usual method to open up and that we book my shipment on either FedEx or DHL immediately. Total cost increase: about $1,000USD (pittance relative to the total cost of an international move). When I pushed the SantaFe guy on why they hadn’t explored these option further, he said, “I was getting you the best price.”
It was like a bad acid flashback (and I’ve never even done LSD!).
In addition there were some other packing-related things that hadn’t been properly estimated, so there was a bit of a scramble as the movers had to get “approval” from someone (it’s India after all). This was handled pretty quickly, but the move foreman made sure to freak out and let me know how concerned he was that this could be a “major problem”. Nice. I have a feeling this was something like, “OMG!!! This is going to cost Rs.1,000, so we’re going to have to go straight to the top for approval. When I asked what kind of costs were involved, I was told they weren’t permitted to share any pricing with me. That was only for the “authorized contact.”
"
Thursday, February 3, 2011
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