Monday, September 26, 2011

India Day 3 (Thursday the 8th, 2011)

India Day 3 (Thursday, Sept 8, 2011)

Back at PTM in the morning at Pragati Maidan...at 10:30...There was a bombing 2k (just over 1 mile away) away at the Delhi High Court at 10:14 am local time...killed 12 people and injured over 70 others...



At 11:30 pm (same day) there was an earth quake...talk about an exciting day! I was on the phone with my wife when the quake happened and the hotel began to sway for about 30-40 seconds...I told Yumi, the hotel is swaying back and forth and she said, "are you drunk?" hehehe, nope just in the middle of a 4.2 on the Richter scale my dear!

First meeting was at the China booth and one of the ladies there asked me to pose with her for a photo..she said I looked like Justin Timberlake...then another lady from the next booth also said she thought I looked like JT...my wife will laugh at that... There I am below...or is that JT...I can not tell the difference...;)


 There is the KTO booth...I had 4 meetings there with two DMC's (Destination Management Company), Incheon Int'l Airport and the KTO. Was kind of funny to have meetings with KTO since the Deputy Director I spoke with was at the KTO HQ the same time I worked there in Seoul.






ICN Int'l Airport wanted another photo with me when I walked past to model their new ICN airport manual, they must have also thought I looked like JT...;)


 After 14 scheduled meetings and 6 unscheduled meetings it was time to unwind for an hour at the PTM Social Hour in the Network Lounge.

There were 15 different Australian wines from Western Australia by one of the vendors and was great to sample some very nice wine from Western Australia. I had only tried wines from SE Australia... A bit about the area they were from

Margaret River
Area under vines 4250 ha (10,625 acres). Cabernet Sauvignon wines from Margaret River have established a fine international reputation with Merlot and Shiraz also producing outstanding styles. Benchmark whites established from the region have resulted in some excellent full-bodied styles from the Chardonnay variety, which remain an important feature of the white wine production in this region. Semillon, Sauvignon Blanc and smaller plantings of Chenin Blanc have also been responsible for very successful dry styles of significant regional character. Although plantings are small, other white varieties in production also include Marsanne, Rousanne, Viognier and some fine Riesling.



PTM Social Hour in the Network Lounge.












PTM Social Hour in the Network Lounge-wine reps plying us with their wares...After an hour I was picked up by my driver Pankaj and I was wisked away to Bukhara (restaurant name), Delhi.










Located at the ITC Maurya Sheraton Hotel in New Delhi, Bukhara serves dishes from the north-western region of India. This type of cuisine is typically in the form of very richly flavored kebabs served without rice, which is unusual for Indian cuisine. The restaurant has received many notable mentions and became famous when it was visited by Bill Clinton, and for this reason some say it is somewhat over-hyped. However, if you brought your expectations down to a reasonable level, you would enjoy a very savory meal, possibly one of the most delicious in New Delhi. It was for me.
Bukhara: Superb Northwest Indian Cuisine...The best meal I had in India and I had AMAZING food every day... I ate Indian food for every lunch and dinner and LOVED it!

I was the guest of Tony M. the VP of ITPL our owned DMC in India. I was joined by an agency owner who used to work for Pacific Delight Tours.

We started off with Poppadoms, Chutneys and red onions that have loads of fresh lime and a powder put on it and is served with most meals....Lovely!

Then came the main dishes of goat Kebabs, Goat chunks (stewed) goat skewers and chicken Kebabs and pieces...also we had their most famous vegetable dish Black Dahl (wow-loved the stuff-we ordered more of it) and of course assorted Indian breads.

Of course we went native and shunned the silverware and ate using our fingers picking up meat and dahl with pieces of Nan bread...



Up close view of our delicious food with the black dahl in the back right (looks brown). Can you smell the garlic nan??? I still can, now I need to go out for lunch today and get me some more Indian food!!!




I was sure to not drink the bowl of warm lemon water that they brought to us after remembering we ate with our hands, so was to wash our fingers, how funny would that have been if I had drank it...;)

After dinner Tony and I had a quick chat about ITPL(tours side of our company) and OR Global (OR Global is our call center, technical center and backbone of our company-located in the suburbs of Delhi with over 100 employees)...I went to OR Global with my driver and took a cat nap on the way there since it was after 10 pm ET and I had to be fresh for a conference call back to our HQ in Encino CA with my boss, Laudie Hanou VP SITA World Tours, plus a few other staff (Hardeep-India product manager and Canada BDM and Charlie-South BDM).

I was greeted by Justin (far left) Ruby (second to left) two shift managers (3rd & 4th from left) when I arrived at OR Global. Justin and Ruby game me a tour of the 4 story OR Global and introduced me to every employee.

This is the 2nd floor and the main call center with about 8 rows of desks and workers...
This was the main floor with the conference room to far left.
This was the 3rd floor with one of the teams.
Same floor but panning to the right.
Top floor with an enclosed area for accounting and other workers.

The basement had an all purpose gym that they have TKD 3 times per week and Yoga 3 times per week (they work Mon-Sat) and since they are catering to USA time they start work around 11 at night local time and finish around 8 am ET. It gives you a lot better appreciation of what they are doing to support us here in the USA.

They can do Yoga and or TKD (with instructor) during their shifts to stay awake and to feel motivated while at work.

After this I had the conference call with my HQ in Encino, CA from around 11 PM to 11:40 pm ET then went back to my hotel and crashed...

No comments:

Post a Comment