Passion

The first time I heard about this word was when I started reading Jack Welch’s “Straight from the Gut” in 2001. Back then I was in college and read it a bit. Jack talks about passion and how people who are passionate about their work differentiate themselves and will eventually succeed. May be, I really didn’t understand what he meant when he talked about passion towards work, but now after 6 years, I have not only understood what he meant but started looking for people who are passionate about their work.

Over the period of time, I have come across people who really love to do what they are doing and enjoy their work; here are some people who I want to introduce you to.

The first on the list is (although the order doesn’t mean much)
a) An autowala
b) A waiter at the Chinese Room
c) Couple of girls at the Tommy Hilfiger showroom in Mumbai
d) A journalist working with a media company
e) Vijay Mallya’s Kingfisher airline

The case of the Autowala (let’s call him Arjun)

There is something about Arjun and his Auto. The first time you hire this guy for a ride you will be amazed by the way he has decorated and beatified his auto. To start with it has a red carpet as the floor mat instead of the rubber ones. It has well cushioned bucket seats for the passengers. Like when you get in to the auto you will get a feeling as if you are boarding a vehicle belonging to the royal community. One side of the auto is open for passenger entrance and the other one is closed with a gold/bronze-plated chain. And the dashboard is so well decorated that the architects of Maruti 800, Santro and Indica will hang themselves in shame or can get some tips from him. The auto has a music system and to top it all it has a DVD/VCD player (all of them in working condition). This is something about interiors and coming to the exteriors the auto is well maintained and has lot of jazzy stuff like steel logos. And the driver’s seat is also sort of a bucket seat with a headrest.

Now where does passion fit in to entire scheme of things? I am looking at it this way; many of us have hired autos and traveled in them. If the guy was decent enough we might have had a good experience but we can’t say it was a memorable experience, which is worth mentioning it to friends and clicking pictures. Arjun, like any other auto driver could have kept his vehicle plain and still would have made money out of ferrying the passengers. But, I guess he thought there are 4000 other autos out there and how can I get that one customer with 4000 options to choose me for his ride? This is something not many people think about, for the rest it is the same old day, same old auto and they know there will be passengers out there who will hire them however the condition of the auto is. These people believe that customers need them, but Arjun believes that he needs customers and he decided to go out of his way to please the customers and give them a wonderful experience and may be he can expect some repeat business. Because if you are anything like me you might also want to hire the same guy when he is around rather than usual auto.

This is passion, passion towards work, towards his vehicle, passion for quality service. For all those people from Pune and want to get lucky I can help you with the registration number of the vehicle, so next time when you are hiring a rick you can check the license plate of the autos in the stand before you choose.

Here are some pics of the rick and the next post is about the waiter in the Chinese Room.


The full view(the red floor mat to give that royal look)

The bronze/gold coated chain I was talking about

The Dashboard(It is made in silver colour, with the mobile phone camera and natural light this is what I could manage)


The DVD/VCD display unit

The interiors(The bucket seats)

Driver's head rest(front angle)

Audi A6 Pics

As promised here are some pics I clicked with my O2(hand phone). I know these pics are not that clear but they are clear enough to see Audi and get a feel of how it looks like.

The Steering wheel of Audi A6

The mean machine, full shot

The front angle, the driver was kind enough to let me click as many pics I wanted to click

The display unit which gives you stats about the car and it can also be used as a DVD display unit

Finally, the key to the amazing vehicle

Amazing Audi Ride

On one of my recent trips to Bangalore I was at the Dadar station waiting to share a cab with couple of other people and get back to Pune. Waited for good 15 mins nothing happened and then it was then I decided to move on and walked out to check out other options. There I saw an Audi A6 and couldn’t believe my eyes and these guys were looking for people who want to go to Pune.

There I thought was my chance to get a ride to Pune in a car that costs a little over 2.5 crores for just Rs. 250. I wanted to see the action from close quarters so I thought of occupying the front seat. But someone is already sitting in the seat and I told the guy I can pay up to 300 instead of 250. May be, I was hell bent upon taking the front seat at any cost. I would have given him any amount he wanted for the ride in the front seat. But the guy managed to convince the other guy for me and there I am in the front seat. Started chatting with the driver and clicked some pictures of the car.

Totally amazed and excited about the ride I started talking to the driver making cpl of guesses about the owner of the vehicle. There is something you guys have to know about the driver. He speaks flawless English and for the record he smokes Wills Insignia, which is one of the premium cigarette brands. When asked the guy about the max speed the vehicle can reach he very well said that it is for me to see and experience rather than he telling me. Now, I knew there is something exciting is store.

Once we reached the outskirts he got a chance to showcase the power and performance of the vehicle. The vehicle had a choice of manual and automatic transmission and the guy chose to drive with the automatic transmission on and to accelerate from 0 to 3000 rpm the vehicle never took more than 4-5 seconds. The dashboard has a screen, which displays the info of the vehicle performance like the engine temperature and pressure in the tyres, which could as well be used to connect to system and use it as a DVD display unit. The seats are so comfortable that they had pneumatic controls to adjust rather than the mechanical controls. And a feather touch would do the trick. And at 220 – 240 Km/hr the vehicle showed no signs of wobbling as with Indian vehicles do when they touch 130 Km/hr. The guy has an excellent control over the vehicle that he touched close to 240 Km/h on the expressway. Although he did some pretty risky drifting during the ride I thought it was worth it and despite heavy traffic we reached Pune in straight 2 hours.


Was I lucky or was I destined to get a ride in Audi A6 on that day or is it something like “being at the right place at the right time and playing your cards right to grab that opportunity”. Well, who cares, I had an experience of a lifetime (will for sure cherish throughout my life or at least still I own a better car than an Audi).

Look out for some pictures of Audi in my next post.