My colleague

Here is a photo with my colleagues. Ladies are the manager of other departments e.g. I.T., marketing, secretary, office. We are having farewell party for some of Indians.
Generally, they are nice.

New friend in Bangalore

On Sat, we met a Hong Kong lady, Teresa in a hotel where we had lunch. She married an American who works in Microsoft. She has two little girls, one is 7 months, one is 3 years old who looks like foreigner but can speak Cantonese . It is rare to find HK ppl in Bangalore, but you can easily find Japaneses and Koreans.

We have lunch of Chinese Dim Sum including Hao Gao, Pork Bun, Glutinous Rice in Lotus leaf together on Sunday.

Today is 26/6, salary is given today. I am going to check my bank account!!

Sat evening, I went to visit a juice outlet. We would like to get it into our store. I was impressed by the good hygiene and taste. May be I can bring it to HK. Here, we need to persuade concessionaire to join our business, not like in HK where concessionaire approaches Wellcome. But I believe in the future, we will be more attractive to them.

Hyderabad

On Thu and Fri, I took domestic flight to Hyderabad, another city in India where have 20 foodworld supermarkets there. I did the store visits with the regional manager, Keith. In addition to business, he can tell me a lot of interesting things. For example, why there are so many cows and goats on the road unattended; why Indians always swing their heads when express yes or agree. He also introduced some places for leisure time. So if anyone visit me, I can bring you there too.
Comparing with the stores in Bangalore, the stores sales are lower, store standard is poor. Root reason would be lack of good manpower.
On Friday morning, I went to the vegetable and fruit market. It was raining. My shoes and feet got totally wet with damp, so terrible…..I need to use antiseptic cleaning agent to help washing afterwards.
Apartment searching is still in progress. Induction program nearly finished. The issues start to come to in front of me and pressure is coming.

Appartment searching

Yesterday, I had my appartment searching. Previously, there are 4-6 choices for me, and finally change to 3 only as more and more people are moving into Banaglore for business. This is the first time to have home searching. It is interesting.
The appartments available for me is big. But one is old, seems like 30 years ago China. One is well furnished, but will be out of budget. My boss reminds me about the leaking of water in raining season. I am looking for other choices.

Feeling of the store

Today is the last day to stay in the store for training. Tmr, I will have review with my boss and searching for appartment in the afternoon. Sunday, I have no special plan yet. May be I need to plan my time table. Otherwise, I will only spend the time to work and on-line. I would like to do more reading of books and newspaper or exercise, singing exercise practice . I need to make use of my time, a lot of personal time now!!!
With the chance to work with India in the store, I think Indian are nice, intelegent. Most of the full time workers including the staff, supervisors and store managers are educated. However, the hygiene is a concern here. Everyone uses right hand to eat. The back up and office is not so clean. I must use the antiseptic tissue before eating. Only the area manager have the same practice in HK, he focus on the grocery and less focus on sales. Speak is perfect but do another thing!!!
I need to have dinner soon! Tell you more later!

Food in India

umm... I am afraid that I cannot keep fit here. As the food here is not very bad.
The sashimi and Tenpura are out of my expectation. I cannot imagine before I can still enjoy the Japanese food here. The Udon is in good texture as well!!

The bowl of noodles and the pizza are my lunch example. They are spicy! Luckily, no adominal pain after eating!!!

My new life in India

Today, I continued to have induction program with different department heads.
There are two expatriates. One of them is called Shadhaa who is from Singapore. His breed is Indian and have Indian appearance, but he was born in Singapore. He is in charge of logistic. The other one is called Robert who is also from Singapore. He is the merchandising advisor. In conclusion from their advice, Indian is very clever, but they are reluctant to change. If a task takes 1 day to complete, in India, it may take 1 week. If you want to fulfill 100%, Indian will offer 30 % for you. So their advice is to keep checking, keep patient, to be a part of them, in order to help them to improve step by step, and finally finish the task.
Next week, I will have on job training in store for 5 days, so as to familiar with the operation of fresh food, Dairy, Frozen, Grocery, Check out (cashier) and store administration. Actually, my boss has given me assignment. I need to check their stock & order book and need to design the Planogram (position plan of each items on shelves) for the fresh food and submit to him on Wed.
So this weekend, I need to get enough rest for coping with coming job.
About my living here: In the first 3 weeks, I stay in the Chancery hotel. At hotel, I can enjoy the songs and internet with my computer notebook. I have used the skype to see and talked with my family yesterday night. Next weekend, the agent will bring me to have apartment searching. My boss takes care of me very well. He and his wife bring me to different hotels for dinner after work. I can have Chinese food and Western food such as Chinese vegetable, cheese cake, pasta… They even ask me to play golf tmr. I don't need to take public transportation. Car and driver are arranged when I need it, e.g. from hotel to office.
Of course, there is a lot poverty and dirty areas around. I will avoid to go there.
Moreover, the electricity supply is not very constant. It has just stopped for few seconds when I was typing it… I have not yet saved this long long message, luckily, the computer has back up for me. I drink bottled water and use it for teeth brushing as well.
This morning, there was bright sunshine. But it is raining heavily and getting cool now.
How are you guys? Miss you all so much!!! Please take care!!!!