Times of Trouble
Sat Mar 14 2020 00:06:00 GMT+0800 (Malaysia Time)
Greetings from somewhere in the sky over India.
Happy Friday the 13th. Since last week the coronavirus situation has changed a lot both in Europe and here in India.
Tomas and I are on an almost empty flight from Bangalore to Kuala Lumpur. Gosh.. It's almost a ghost flight. Most of the two dozen or so people and the crew are wearing face masks. This is like something in a movie.
Last week I was telling you about taking an ancient boat across the river Ganges and visiting the children's home we support, you can read about it here.
Since then we took a flight to Delhi and spent a few days doing deals. We have been trying to secure a particularly nice range of incense, a beautifully designed incense, for sometime now.
I'd almost given up hope of achieving a workable deal but Chatterjee our man in India managed to organise a meeting with the big boss actually at the incense factory, about an hour's drive from Delhi. Turns out the boss a stylish gentle guy is married to a French lady..who is the inhouse designer. When two cultures mingle and new products emerge something special happens.
We pitched that AW was the best company in Europe to market their lovely products.. and that our company ethos and values matched.
We were pleased to see the best working conditions in a modern factory you could imagine. Clean and tidy, ventilated and super organised. Just the sort of family company we like to work with.
After a while and some bonding, the boss admitted that his current distributor in the UK had some internal issues and hadn't managed to deliver on promised volumes so he would work with us.. Plus the prices magically came into line with what we had expected.
We got up to so many adventures in old Delhi, discovering a whole new area full of artisans and traders down tidy little back lanes with huge go-downs and mazes of showrooms. Not only amazing products but some amazing characters, we quickly made some new friends and hope to do more business here.
Even though riots and rumours of riots in Delhi were rife we managed to stay out of trouble.
It's a time of trouble for sure but life goes on.
After Delhi, we flew down to Goa to catch up with old friends and also meet up with one of our gemstone guys who came to meet us there. Very few tourists in Goa.. And it was a bit of a shock when the Indian government announced all tourist visas were suspended.
Next stop was supposed to be China.. But a change of plan we are going to Bali, virus free Bali (they claim). Where at least we can focus on more artisan products and work with our man Ringo.
With Italy in lock down, Slovakia in semi lock down and governments across Europe announcing increasingly strict measures.. Who knows what this week will bring. A time of trouble.
Stay safe. More news next week.
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