Customer service?

On the 4th of May, I received a letter from one of my Internet Service Providers, that a deposit of € 500 that they had taken from me a couple of years was to be returned to me. They gave several alternatives for me to get my money back.

The first was to fill up a form and post it back to them. The second was to visit a web page and fill in the details. (I tried this but the page was so complicated that I did not get past filling in my name and address!) The third, and simplest, was to ring a Customer Care phone number provided in the letter.

I obviously chose the third alternative.

On Friday the 7th of May, in the afternoon, I rang the number. The girl who answered did not know the existence of such a service at this number. Then she said her computer was down. She took down the required details and then told me that she would send me a text message.

I waited, and I waited.

On Monday the 24th of May, I rang again. The immediate response of the lady who answered the phone was that he computer was down. I told her that it did not matter that the computer was down but I wanted to get an answer as to why something the Customer Care person had promised was not acted upon. With great reluctance, when I told her that it was me to get some money back, she took down all the details and said she would ring me back.

Guess whether I got a call back?

On Wednesday the 26th of May, I rang again. I spoke to a gentleman who spoke excellent English. I posed my problem and when he looked at the computer, which was obviously working, he did note that my call and notes of the 7th of May were in front of him, but he could provide me with no answer as to why nothing had happened in the intervening 20 days.

I asked him some basic questions as, if I did not pay a due to their company, what would be the action? I asked him whether his company would pay the penal interest for not paying my dues on time. I also told him that the letter I had received was most interesting that there was not even a name or signature attached to the letter. I told him if anyone received such a letter purporting to be from my company without a name and signature, it would probably be thrown in the dustbin!

He was most apologetic. As a gesture, within his powers, for the trouble I had been put too, cancelled my last bill, gave me an ad hoc credit of € 50 and then said he would follow the matter through his supervisor.

I also told him that his Customer Care Division of his company had recently gone on strike to get substantial service benefits. I asked what should the Customers who they harassed by the inefficiency of their Customer Care Division should do? He told me that he was not one who had gone on strike, but acknowledged that the handling of my situation was certainly not correct.

Let us wait and see what happens before I reveal the name of this service provider! Stay tuned!

Vegetarian Halal Beef?

I noticed that of one of our tenants in our Guest House had bought himself a cup noodle packet, Beef and Tomato. I had never seen this brand before.

From Vegetarian Beef

When I looked at it carefully, I noted clearly that it was a Beef and Vegetable preparation.

From Vegetarian Beef

When I looked still a little closer, I noted a small emblem showing that this product was suitable for VEGETARIANS.

I looked even closer at the next symbol to note that it was suitable for MOSLEMS who only eat HALAL MEAT.

From Vegetarian Beef

I looked at the list of Ingredients. It read as follows (Emphasis is mine):

"INGREDIENTS: Noodle Cake: Wheat flour soft, palm oil, water, salt. Seasoning: Beef flavouring, wheat flour soft, sugar, maltodextrin, tomato powder, salt, monosodium glutamate (E621),citric acid (E330), caramel (E150c), I+G (E627, E631),silicon dioxide, (E551), onion extract, dried (chives, carrots, peas)."

'What a combination I thought -. Vegetarian Halal Beef Noodles!

You never know where technology takes us these days. :-)

The birch sap flow ends

Someone commented that the title of Lady Annikki was not just good enough - I agree! How can I make my Queen a mere "Lady"? :-)

Annikki's dramatic discovery of how to draw on the birch liquid (sap) brought her over 30 litres in a few days.

All good things must come to an end.

From New Album 16/05/2010 06:40

An overnight haul of precious birch sap from one small branch.

The sap, which was crystal clear for the first few days, slowly became cloudy and finally, as the first signs of leaves appeared on the branches, nature acted in its best interests and shut off the tap.

Strangely, the taste of this sap has a faint tinge of coconut water? I wonder what is the relationship between a coconut palm and a birch tree.

Annikki is ooking forward to the next year of tapping. I am sure she will devise some simple gadget to get the maximum flow from the broken twigs and branches! :-)

What was this?

A few weeks ago I wrote about my experience of ordering a biriyani in one of the three Indian restaurants in Oulu. I regretted that day.

Last week I was tempted to have a biriyani in another of Oulu's Indian restaurants. This was what was served up:

From New Album 16/05/2010 06:40

What does it look like? (I won't answer that question as I dislike public use of foul language!) Where else in the world does one get a biriyani served up in this fashion? Where was the rush of colours from white to golden red? Where was the red tinge of Kashmiri saffron?

The only thing to be said about this biriyani was it had plenty of cashewnuts and well-cooked large mutton chunks, but with no smell or taste anywhere near what I consider "a biriyani"!

Look at what a typical serving, of what I think is a biriyani, should appear on a table (as I had posted on my last entry on this subject):

From Jacob's Blog

The fragrant smell of saffron, the beautiful colour layering of the rice, the burnt onions, are all a must in a biriyani - not a mish mash of a curry sauce and rice, in which are thrown large chunks of cashewnuts and meat.

Yes, I do yearn for a good biriyani in Oulu! Maybe I will have to cook it myself!

Cricket in Oulu takes a new turn

Yesterday we had a cricket tournament for local Oulu cricket lovers. For the first time we used the matting so kindly provided by Asheesh Kumar of Medipolis GMP.

There was a small problem of carting this large matting roll around and also fixing it to the ground. The use of the hammer was necessary on several occasions to keep the bowlers end firmly fixed down. Also some small adjustments will also be required to have the sides not curl up.

Three teams took part in the 10 over format. The teams were married, bachelors and University student players. The games were thrilling.

From New Album 16/05/2010 06:40

Venkat Reddy bowls while Rajesh backs up.

In the end the Bachelors walked away with a victory over the married players.

The official training session and season will start shortly. This was a good forerunner to what we can expect in the coming summer months. Some discipline as bowling less wides and no balls, etc. will have to be the outcome of the training sessions if the Oulu XI is going to make it big in Finnish National Cricket tournaments.

After the matches, we all adjourned to India House where we broke up into smaller groups, some playing carroms (on the only carrom board in Finland), others enjoying their new experience of cycling in Finland, some playing cricket, some playing shuttle, and a lot of people just gettng to know each other.

India House was in its element as we had over 40 Findians, men, women and children having a wonderful time. We ordered pizzas, kebabs and salads from Oulu's best and largest pizzeria, Goreme (owned by keen sportsmen Hasim and Kasim from Turkey) and everyone enjoyed sitting in the sunshine of 8 pm and just being friends. A few newcomers arrived to take part and generally the whole day was a rip roaring success.

Kudos to the organisers and hope we have several more just fun days this summer.

Speaking with Bill

Yesterday evening I rang to Toronto, Canada, to wish my Physics teacher of 50 years ago a very happy 85th birthday. I also spoke to Pushpa, his wife, who had also been a teacher in our Mumbai school. My classmate, 59er Hasnain Chinwala (Chinnie), who also lives in Toronto was with Bill (prearranged) when I called as we, 59ers, paid our respects to a man who firmly shaped our lives.

That Bill and Pushpa attended our 50th year reunion in Mumbai last year was itself such a joy for all us 59ers. They lent their solidarity with a class of boys who have traversed the world and sought success based on the fundamentals of life that were instilled in us by our teachers. Not just our classroom performance, but our moral values were instilled in us by these wonderful Gurus!


(Photo thanks to the 64er Rajiv Ved when we took time off for a fee minutes to attend their reunion in Mumbai.)

In the olden days, as per the Indian Civilisation, the Guru was a man to be revered. All of us 59ers have revered all our teachers during the ensuing years. But Bill and John (who was our class teacher and our English teacher in 1959) are very special as they took the time to travel a long distance at great expense, many thousands of kilometres, to be with us as we reveled in our past last November.

In our conversation we talked about many things - including the greetings from other 59ers (which Hasnain had forwarded to Bill,) the loss of another wonderful teacher, Alberto Zavala from peru, our geography teacher, the exploits of Greg, our Chemistry teacher, and the whereabouts of many past Canadian Cathedralites, as Torontian 59er Narsys, but not just our classmates, as 63er Monty Wilson and 49er Peter and 51er Sheila (née Contractor) Vaney, and Peter's brother, 57er Herbert.

Now that Pushpa and Bill live right in the centre of Toronto, a stone's throw from Lake Ontario, I will make it a point to visit them soon as my grandson, Samu, an Ice Hockey fan, wants to visit that great city, with his Grandpa, to see one of his favourite teams play.

Happy birthday Bill - we love you!

Gravity and Annikki

Sorry to have been of blogging for a time. I was recovering from my non-stop 4500 round trip drive to Amsterdam to drop Joanna and the grandkids at amsterdam so that they could catch the Eurostar train to London!

I have recovered, but am overworked as I am handling my Furnished Accommodation Service I run in Finland, without too much outside assistance.

I hope to be back at blogging regularly again, soon.

Today's question is what AWARD we should give to my better half?

Sir Isaac Newton got recognised because an apple dropped on his head.

How should we recognise this wonder "girl" because "birch syrup" dropped on her toe?

A look on the internet will find literally hundreds of entries on the best way to tap a birch tree to get the syrup, which is considered very healthy. Most of the methods require the tree is tapped by drilling a hole in the bark and then plugging the hole so that the flow is stopped.

There is possibility of considerable damage to the tree if this is not done properly.

The other day, Annikki was tidying up the garden. It was getting late. So she thought she would have a lie down as it was hot and the sun was still streaming through the branches of the birch trees at the end of the garden.

There were a few irritating birch twigs hanging around, so she snapped off one and lay down on her easy chair. A few minutes later, she felt a drop of something fall on her toe.

It was a sunny day, and no sign of any raindrops around.

This was followed by another drop.

Being a very curious cat,  she saw that the liquid was dropping from where she had broken the twig on the birch tree.

She tasted the liquid and found it to be water like but slightly sweet.

She rushed inside, and using her creative genius, she got a plastic bag and tied it to the end of the twig.

From Blogger Pictures

As she lay down, she saw the plastic bag gradually fill up with a water-like liquid. She observed that flies were greatly tempted to this liquid.

From Blogger Pictures

Soon she was up and about breaking twigs on birch trees that annoyed her, and promptly attaching a plastic bag at that point.

She had a steady flow of birch syrup collecting in the plastic bags.

The important point of this method of collection is that no damage is done to the tree. Secondly, as the collection is at the end of a branch, this is the excess liquid, as the tree has already used its requirements. This liquid would probably be lost by evaporation.

The process of collection could be increased substantially with some scientific experiments as to which were the best twigs to break off.

From Blogger Pictures

That the value of the liquid was no worse than that collected by traditional means of tapping into the bark is proven by the great attraction flies had to the plastic bags containing the liquid, although there was no unusual or strong smell coming from the bags.

And this collection was being made in the first week of May!!!

Sir Isaac Newton discovered gravity because of an apple.

Tan Sri Dr. B. C. Sekhar became called the Father of the natural rubber industry when he discovered that application of ammonia to the bark of of a rubber tree allowed continuous flow of latex, making life of the tapper so much more easier.

Should Annikki be Lady Annikki or the Mother of Birch Syrup Industry?

The debate has commenced! I bask in reflected glory! :-)