Redevelopment - 4 Re-locating

This was the last picture I took before I moved out from the house I had lived for many years. It was not easy. Although it looks a mess, it was not always like this, sometimes it was even worse. Nevertheless, My house was comfortable, cozy and had positive vibrations and every visitor felt the same the moment they entered my house. Its strange how we spread our tentacles and claim every corner of the house as our own possession. It is difficult to let go. But then, everything is perishable.

I had begun to clear up my house one month ahead.  But clearing is a slow process. I didn’t know that I had collected so much junk. I was not aware of the dirt that had accumulated in dark corners. So what was my helper doing, regularly charging me for cleaning my house? She could never tolerate late payments. The minute I would change the page of the calendar, her eye-brows would arch in askance of her salary. I have learnt now not to depend too much on helpers and a personal touch is required from time to time. Maybe I had got too lazy or maybe I was too involved in other activities and trusted my helper too much. Or maybe my eyes were shut to the dirt that I saw sometimes. I should have shifted furniture from time to time more regularly, I should carried a broom too.

Most of the things I have thrown away. But the most difficult part was organizing books. I was able to discard many but there are some books that you cannot just give it away. How does one dispose away the cookbooks, fiction, art, religion, philosophy, memoirs?, There is unlimited variety of interests. I have found some room in the iron cupboards (lower shelf) and have stored it away in the new rented house. All the magazines I gave them away to anybody who wanted it, and there were many takers. Who would refuse travel, style and food magazines? Another challenge was disposing kitchen articles: steel utensils, crockery, gadgets, spices and food, what can I possibly discard? I have disposed off clothes, utensils, furniture and many other things. Didn’t sell anything. Moving from a bigger house to a smaller one means I had to reduce my possessions.

The last day of leaving the house was one big confusion; my furniture was transported out to the rented out, so I sat in the empty house, picking up the last remnants and disposing off the things that I didn’t need. House was filled with rag pickers picking up everything, they found of value. Building compound was filled with truckloads of packers and movers. All the packed furniture spread in the building compound, everybody conversation was on exchanging the new address and promises to come back after two years to a newly re-developed house with better amenities.

The building was in bad shape, we were asked not to remove the doors and grills of our house. I saw people removing taps, doorknobs, locks, lights, fans and some even electric wires and switches. Neighbor said he made Rs2500 only on sale of finer things of the house. Some neighbors secretly sold doors and grills too. I had no patience for bargaining on petty things and I gave away everything free. The rag pickers told me I am very generous. They didn't know I was lazy. Bargaining and selling used stuff is lots of effort.

But relocating to a rented house is tedious too. I rented out an empty house and brought my used furniture, but shifting the furniture has resulted in many scratches to my furniture. So here I am with painters, electrician, plumber, tailors, styling up my house to a better shape and trying to create a comfort zone of my own in my new place.

But I still miss my own house......

Redevelopment - 3 Packers and Movers

It was time to move out of our homes to make place for redevelopment. We are promised swanky apartments in a high-rise building with all the modern amenities, a swimming pool, a gym and an impressive lobby. But that is in the future, right now it meant that we had to move out to a rented apartment.

Relocating means that we have to sort out our possessions, and decide what can be taken with us. There are many things I have been hanging on for years, hoping that it will come into use someday, now, that have to be disposed immediately. I realized that I had lots of junk coated with dust. I didn’t actually need them. Many of my possessions had occupied the cabinets, nestled in dark corners, hidden, ignored.

Now I needed help, somebody to help me sort, pack and then help me unpack. I needed packers and movers.

Research is important before taking any task, although recommendation helps. Friend suggested ‘Agrawal Packers and Movers’. I went to their site and discovered that they claimed to be the best having won number of awards, they could be trusted.. or so I thought.

I called them up to give me the quotation. I was actually moving just few block away, so I didn’t think it would be a problem. Moreover, I was not moving all my furniture since it was just from my bigger house to a smaller one. I had already disposed off the excess furniture.

A representative from ‘Agrawal Packers and Movers’ quoted a lump sum price of Rs32k. I found the price too steep, therefore hired a private person who agreed on 10K.

Most of my neighbors decided to move during the weekend. The building compound was filled with trucks of all sizes and shapes. Packed furniture lay scattered in the compound awaiting loading and transporting.

I was not able to track all of my neighbors, but the few that I met, I was quite impressed with their packing. The furniture was bubble wrapped, covered with brown paper and then plastic. Since I had employed an unprofessional person, he just moved my furniture uncovered, manually lifted most of the boxes and delicate articles were transported on foot.

But the packers and movers that mushroomed in my building looked quite impressive.

So what was the verdict?

Two of my neighbors had hired ‘Agrawal Packers and Movers’ and both were highly disappointed.

“They claim to be number one but they are not.” Said my neighbors who used their service.

Agrawal Packers sent only few people to do the packing and when they complained, they send more people from outside the company who didn’t know to pack. Moreover the truck came in late at night instead of morning, and the family were shifting till 2am. This is very tiresome for the family with health problems and insensitivity shown was very disappointing. In addition to that, they had to hire their own carpenters to dismantle the furniture because such service was not provided by the packers.

Another neighbor used the service of ‘Metro Packers and Movers’ whose motto is " WE Have A Job To Do - And It Must Be Done Well” Metro movers promise exclusive customer support with their personalized moving service.

“Most of them promise a lot and then try to cut corners once you opt for them” said my neighbor who used their service. “The steel cupboards were not bubble wrapped therefore they got scratched”.

Excel Packers & Movers has emerged as a prominent packers and movers in Goa

Two of my neighbors used Excel service and they were very happy. They were impressed with their packing and they found the people quite courteous and professional and did good job. “Tough job well executed” they said.

‘Gurukripa Packers and Movers’ have their main office in Indore and they are in service since last 12 years. Two of my neighbors who used their services were very happy with their services. With just Rs16k their work was very efficient. “They finished packing and moving in one day and everything was packed and transported properly, they even unpacked for us and sorted it out as per room, making it easier to unpack in new house.” they said

One of my neighbors moved to the next building and I was amused to see him transport his furniture across the fence.

Getting a right type of help relieves the person of the burden of relocation but if wrongly selected, it leaves us exhausted and drained.

Social Media Week In Mumbai

Social Media Week was held in Mumbai on 22nd-26th September. I was invited by Blogadda to attend the events on day two. With almost 1000 events taking place in 11 cities and 9 countries and with around 3000 speakers confirmed, Social Media 2014 was the world’s most culturally diverse and geographically distributed conference of its kind.

I was able to attend only three sessions on the day two of the social Media week and the most interesting of them all were the sessions on Food blogging and Pinterest.

Pinterest is the photo-sharing medium widely used to create engagement with the reader by the impressions you make. Pinterest does not link boards to other social platforms unless it is mentioned with targeted key words, phrases. To improve the traffic to the business, a great variety of boards can be created using tags/titles. Linking the business account with the impression makes a huge difference.

Pinterest is most popular social networking website because it is used more by women.

A small film was shown during this session in which women were shown pursuing their interest in painting and handicraft. The hobby projects are very inspiring to women and it helps connect people with the retailers through attractive images. Women get inspired to share their activity on social media, interact and improve their performance.

Everybody wants to know the stories behind the trends, Pinterest allows you to show your interest in images, you could benefit better if the proper research is done to understand the market and use it to your best advantage. Use hash tags that make sense. It could work best by promoting photo contest and maintaining interaction. You could solve problems for people by offering consultation.

It is better to use your own images to present your own idea instead of picking others images. You can pin the images you like to broaden your theme of interest.

Personally speaking, Social media has played a very important role in helping me sell my book. I created a board on Pinterest with the hash tag and it has reached a wider audience.

The other day, I met a face Book friend at Durgamata pandal, and she congratulated me on my recent published cookbook on Sindhi Cuisine.

My #SindhiCuisine was published two months ago. Neither did I have a formal book launch with popular food chefs as chief guest, nor any live cooking demonstration in front of audience. I just used social media to promote my book and it was an instant success.

U-tube is the personal visual channel and this plays an important role in spreading your idea. One must learn to use it productively.

Not just images, the content is also important to convey your idea. The session on food blogging was focused on how to be a good blogger. “Food blogging gives a thrill of instant connect with readers when you get feedback” said Rushina Munshaw, who conducted the session on food blogging.

Bloggers are becoming powerful because they are the media who promote brand with honesty and sincerity. The key to writing a blog is to create interaction. Blogging can also lead to some issues in negative manner. Handling of sensitive issues is important because people forget and move on to trending issues. Lots of things will change in future, people will pay for performance and if you are not able to be sincere and honest, you could lose your audience.

Rushina Munshaw’s session was more focused on how to be a successful blogger. Food blogging should be original and true to the heart, she said. People come to your blog to read your story and your thoughts. Your blog should reflect your originality and personality. It does not serve the purpose if you plagiarize other people’s content. Blogging is the conversation you have with your readers; you can add anecdotes, summary and surprising statements to keep the readers interested.

Another session on ’14 Social Trends’ discussed the rich informative journalism. It falls under 3T: Tools, Talent and Context. Content is the king and context is definitively the queen. TV and print media is still going strong in spite of twitter, Face Book and other social media but there will be revenue generation on line too. It is important to stay connected with social hanger that is based on real time insight driven by cognitive computing which is basically talking to web. All social media are interconnected through social data and sensors from roads, cars and other transport that give real time graphic data. 

Social trends are all about delivering right content at right time.

 We are the media. We have a voice. We can learn to use it to our best advantage.