Paris - A business trip

In june I had to go to Velizy, France for a business trip. But there was only one problem... no two... nah three... or may be more. The first one - my passport was about to expire. I applied for it's renewal at the regional passport office. In first instance itself I managed to submit all the necessary documents. And then started the long wait for the passport to arrive. After 30 odd days I still had not received it. I checked the status on the website of passport office and for next couple of days I observed that the status was same. And next day early morning of I went to the passport office only to be sent back with a status that my application is at police station. The police station of course has not received my application and thus started my running from police station to the passport office and then back. The least that I can say about the passport officials is that they were least helpful and illogical in their approach. The system could be hi-tech, the office could be computerized, but in the end it is the mindset of the officials that can improve the efficiency of the office. There could be 100 reasons to say NO to improvement but only one strong boss to turn around an organization.

Finally after n number of round to police stations and passport office, I received my passport. But then the appointment to the France consulate for getting visa was not available! Now this is the 'office' where the applications are moved in very efficient manner. However I must say that my travel office really tried their best and got an appointment for me... just a day before my flight. And thus I got my passport stammped with the France visa!

I was packing my bags on saturday, the same night on which I was to fly to Paris, I got a call from office. Some data which I had to take along with me had some problem. Once again I was shaken. I rushed to office and in another 3 hours or so got everything under control. In the mean time called up my wife to pack whatever she thinks is appropriate and I dd not regretted that... :-) Then I rushed back in time to say good bye to my family and of I went to the Mumbai airport.

The flight was good and landed on time in the fashion capital of world - Paris! The weather however was quite bad... it was cold and raining. Very unexpected in June. Visited the Musee the Louvre, Trocadero and Eiffle tower on sunday. Could not go up the Eiffel due to the chilling wind and the rains. Interestingly there was a big screen put up at the Trocadero for the football world cup. The football fever was in the air.

Monday - first day of office at Velizy was good. Met all my colleagues after a long time. The conference for which I went there was on the next day. Everyone was putting in all there efforts to make it a success. The conference was excellent and very knowledgeable. I also got opportunity to meet experts of various fields. Meeting and hearing the views of customers from all over the world, getting to know their perspectives was altogether a different experience. Most importantly I conducted a session in this conference and it was very well received and appreciated... Making it worth all the troubles!

Vedi Farms

From last few weeks I was having difficult time to find suitable place to visit during summers. The summer is a bit harsh this year and it is not helping to make this decision any easier. So while idly reading the local newspaper I spotted a news about agro-tourism. This is where I spotted the name of Vedi farms... Vedi Ve as is Way and di as in Dinar, is about 90km from Pune on Pune-Satara NH4 highway, approximately 45km before Satara. As soon as you cross the Khambatki Ghat, keep an eye on your left for a village road and a hoarding pointing towards Vedi farms. This stretch of road is quite rough and lasts for about 10km. On reaching the destination I was told that the road is under construction and would be tarred within a year or so. And what I found was that the Vedi farms itself is under construction. This fact was hidden very cleaverly by the marketting person from me. Most of the staff was on leave, the caretaker was not informed about our arrival. We were left to ourselves and after lunch we asked the caretaker about the activities and farm visit. They agreed to show us the farms as and when we were ready. So we started in the evening at around 5 pm after a siesta. Saw some crops like tomato and capsicum and then headed to see the Emu farming. Also saw the green house of Gerbera. I was curious as I had never seen the bird before. It bears similarity to ostrich, is about 5-6 ft tall and has a stronf smell. In the evening we had dinner and roamed around the Machan, this is a wonderful construction at this farms. It is quite windy at machan and one can see for long distances at a stretch. At night one can see the lights of the vehicles driving down the highway far away.

The next day we left after lunch. On the way we saw the windmills and on whim decided to check them out. Just about in 10-15 minutes drive we were at the base of the first windmill. I was awed by the size of the structure. I was surprised that the windmill was spinning even when there was not much wind. My idea was that it would need a huge thrust of wind to move those huge blades... its a must see.

In about an hour and half we were back in Pune. All in all the visit was not all that interesting. Probably I had some expectations set after seeing the website of Vedi farms, and they were not met there. As a matter of fact there were no vistors there and it was so very empty. I hope that the owner of this wonderful site would make the most of this location and most importantly handlle the marketting properly. Afterall a satisfied customer is the best advertisement.

Checklist for outing

Outings in general consists of happy moments, either with friends or family members or both. Sometimes it so happens that in the excitement of making these happy memories, one misses out to put the camera in their bag pack or to forgets to pack that special outfit bought specially for the trip. Of course the trip goes on but somewhere we know that it is little less than perfect, right?

So to reduce this problem to significant extent I thought of preparing a checklist of some sort. So whenever you are planning your next excursion, make sure to keep this check list handy!

I think I have included most of the essentials in this list. And I suggest that you keep a copy of this with you while planning your next trip. Do you think something is missing from this list, say it.