Oru Kathai Kanmani

[oru-kathai]

Cycle all the way!

Mr. Vasan and his wife Annapoorni lived in a peaceful locality in Chennai surrounded by canopies of trees and mild traffic plying even during busy times. The apartment was mostly occupied by senior citizens and one could hear a suprabhatam in the morning and Vishnu sahasranamam audio in the evening. The apartment was usually quiet and maintained a high level of orderliness. Occasional loud laughter of men with jokes from the 60s and some TMS songs could be heard on Sunday evenings when some of the apartment men meet at Mr. Vasan’s residence.

A loud jarring clinking of the cycle bell and a loud scream of a ten-year-old shook Mr. Vasan early one morning as he was having his hot cup of coffee and reading the newspaper. He almost dropped the newspaper. The strange sounds tintinnabulated the whole apartment. Mr. Vasan rushed to the gate to see where the noise came from. His eyes could not believe what he saw. He saw a 10 year old plonked on a cycle bigger than his size, hooting and cheering expressing excitement at his new cycle. As he saw Mr. Vasan freeze in a sense of trauma at the clangour, he raced forward almost standing and riding it.

A human touch set Mr. Vasan free from his frozen state, it was Mr. Krishnamurthy, his neighbour from the first floor. He introduced his grandson Vicky and declared that the little boy would stay with them. While Mr. Vasan was not very happy about it, he tried his best to show some excitement to Mr. Krishnamurthy to extend his camaraderie.

Vicky’s seemed thrilled about everything in the apartment, he enjoyed breaking the serene silence, as he ran down the stairs he rang the bell of the houses he passed by; he sat on the handle of the stairs holder and slided down; he cling clanged with his cycle bell even when there was no traffic. Mr. Vasan found the new normal of the apartment and the locality annoying. But he had to be nice to his neighbours, so he decided to keep quiet.

After about a month, Mr. Vasan was quite used to the hurly-burly in the morning. But suddenly one day, he waited and waited and almost longed for Vicky to disturb his routine, but there was silence and serenity reestablished. Mr. Vasan walked up to Mr. Krishnamurthy to find out what had happened. Vicky had an accident, he was thankfully safe, but the cycle was damaged. No one knew where to take the cycle to service it. Vicky turned to Mr. Vasan and asked in his squeaky voice, “thatha, can you please do something?” Mr. Vasan melted at the request.

He knew someone who could help, he called OK Boss to check if they can get the cycle services. A personal assistant was immediately deployed, he took the cycle to the nearest local service person, got the quote for repair, got it approved by the cycle owner and dropped the cycle back to Vicky in as soon as it was ready. Mr. Vasan and Vicky’s friendship began with that and has lasted for a long time now.

Have you ever imagined asking help for things like this? We at OK Boss provide you the best possible personal assistant solutions. Just ask and we shall get it done for you.

Call [phone] / 82480 33134 or download the App

[oru-kathai]

Every NRI’s team India!

Paddy aka Padmanabhan took out the tickets and passport from his vintage black pouch and checked them for the nth time, Renuka looked at him and sniggered. She had seen him do this for over 40 years and she also knew what would come next- checking for the yellow ribbons tied on all pieces of luggage as a mark of identification. They were getting ready to leave to Charlotte in North Carolina to spend time with their son, Ashwin. This was part of their routine visit to spend a few months with their NRI son. They had been doing this ever since Padmanabhan and Renuka retired from their work. They usually travelled in January and returned in July. The plan for this year was just the same. Little did they know that there was an alternate plan being made for the entire world.

Paddy and Renuka had an extended stay at Charlotte and were unable to return due to the lockdown. While their grandkids were happy about the unlimited time they would get with their story teller thatha and the all efficient paati, Paddy’s mind was clouded with mounting number of things that needed attention back home- milk delivery and newspaper that would resume automatically after 6 months, cleaning of the house, payment of government taxes and so on.

[oru-kathai]

Finding 'Jee Boomba'

High spirited laughter filled Rangarajan’s living room on the cold January night. He had his usual fortnightly family chat call on skype with his parents and siblings. Rangarajan initiated the call from Canada, it was 9.00 pm for him, his parents joined from Chennai with their morning filter ‘kaapi’, his younger brother from Texas with his dinner plate and his twin from Japan sitting by the side of her balcony watering plants in the morning. The time of the day did not matter when they were together on the call. Rangarajan and his sibling visited their parents in July and spent a good two months reliving their childhood and creating new memories for future. This trip was going to be special as the twins were ready to celebrate their 50th birthday together. While they were making plans about their trip to India, they also talked about the rising cases and how they may have a travel ban. Sabapathy (Rangarajan’s father) was sure that nothing would withstand the tropical heat of Chennai and reassured to everyone that the trip will happen. Little did they imagine that in the next two years skype, zoom, google meet, Microsoft teams will be their destinations to create new memories. With every transaction digital and no contact deliveries, they had all become mere moving images through the screen.

Sabapathy and Annapoorni had been confined to the four walls and considering they were aged, Rangarajan and siblings decided to give them the comfort of all services rendered at home. Annapoorni was more tech savvy of the two, she learnt to juggle between multiple apps her children and other relatives suggested. She had almost 10 apps each one for every service she availed. Sabapathy was more of the ‘in-person’ kind, he was meticulous and maintained bills and all other documents carefully. He had the habit of writing everything in his diary- order milk packet, pay phone bill, collect curtains from dry clean, call AC service. All of this would then be translated into the digital apps by Annapoorni. When Sabapathy was out in the field he would plan his route in such a manner that he would complete all tasks on his list and return home proud about himself. He could manage all of his work by himself and take care of assistance that his sons and daughter needed, especially things like property maintenance, tax payment etc. He wished there was someone who planned everything the way he did or atleast translated his plans into actions. He was sure that he would find his ‘Jee-boomba’ someday. He mentioned his wish on the family calls so many times that every call would begin with the ‘finding Jee-boomba’ factor.

A few days later, it was their routine fortnightly family call, Rangarajan asked his mother Annapoorni to look for OK BOSS, he mentioned that that personal assistant app was an all-in-one service. The all enthusiastic Annapoorni began scrolling on her phone and then suddenly disappeared from the call for a while. Sabapathy was enjoying the gibberish story narration of his grandchildren when Annapoorni returned to the call, beaming. Looking at her expression everyone wanted to know the reason. She announced that Sabapathy’s ‘Jee boomba’ was discovered! She told the family how with one call to OK Boss, she had assigned them 5 different tasks at one go. This was impossible on any other app, she had used. While the family call was in progress, an OK BOSS tasker arrived at their residence and collected instructions. By the end of the day, Annapoorni sent the family a complete update on tasks that were completed. She told them that OK Boss was not just an errand service for people in Chennai, it also provided a whole band of services to the NRI. OK Boss is truly the ‘Jee-Boomba’ Sabapathy was looking for!

[oru-kathai]

Ticked off the list

The milk cooker howled its shrieking whistle announcing that the milk was ready, the calling bell tweeted along with the morning vegetable vendor’s squall, Ramya’s hands were busy typing out a mail. Vicki, the enthusiastic 10-year-old ran to the door. Shankar silenced the milk cooker. The pandemic had extended work hours to 24/7 but had built a team at home to work together.

Ramya was an entrepreneur doing business online, she was enterprising and was always there when anyone needed help. Her family, their friends and their friends treated her number as their first emergency, SOS, all purpose numbers. She had an answer, a contact and reference for just about anything. Sharadha mami, her brother’s neighbour, called to ask where she could drop off some unopened pack of cutlery she may never use- she had a reference for that. Shankar’s colleague called her to ask for the best place to but fabric for making western fashion dresses, she had an answer for that.

Shankar ran an Event management business, he was creative and always enthralled his clients with new ideas. He even organised online events with a lot of creativity. He was excellent at networking, every person he met, every client he worked for, he could remember names and the events. He maintained a diary in which he noted down things for the day and ticked off items that did not need his attention any more. Ticking off items from the list gave Shankar a great sense of fulfilment. His latest assignment was an online birthday party with ‘Spiderman’ theme. He was working on it like a super hero himself.

Vicki was in 5th Std studying at a CBSE school, he was a cheerful kid with a lot of creativity and talent. He was skilled at painting, drums and coding. His parents felt he did not fit into the rigourous CBSE regime. They wanted to look for an alternate school that would help him blossom naturally.

Ramya and Shankar eagerly looked for announcements from schools for applications from time to time, especially the ones they had shortlisted. After about two months, the websites finally announced applications open. They were both thrilled but that excitement had hardly lasted a minute. All applications had to be collected in person on a date they were both busy. They had never before had clash of events. Their professional commitment was important for both and could not be sidelined, that was their bread and butter. At the same time, they didn’t want to give up on the months of patience for the applications. Both of them called their contacts who may be able to help, but unfortunately, they could not find anyone in their circle who could help.

Shankar suddenly remembered one of his clients, Leena, talk about some personal assistant, he immediately checked his diary for her contact. He called Leena, he was a bit wary about making what he thought of as a ‘weird request’. Leena assured he could ask them anything. Shankar anxiously waited, the phone beeped and when he opened he saw a Vcard on Whatsapp that read OK BOSS and a message that said OK BOSS ROCKS! With a new lease of energy he dialed the number, at the end of the conversation with them, he was happy about finding help, at the end of the day he ticked the item ‘get application’ off his list with the application in his hand.

OK Boss was naturally added to Ramya’s set of SOS numbers and Shankar’s networking list.

[oru-kathai]

Ask and thou shall get it!

Subhajit Mondal and Paramita, a young millennial couple moved to Chennai with big dreams, they were adventurous so they decided to start their life with their one-year-old daughter in a city that was completely new. They wanted to live in a city where they had no relatives or friends, they wanted to start every relationship from the scratch. Subhajit was an IT professionals and Paramita a sales and marketing professional, though their job prospects weren’t all that great, they had been attracted to the old coastal city because it had the reputation of being the educational capital of India.

A month after they arrived in the city, they had to face the worst-case-scenario of their life, lock down and the extended shut down. Their life almost came to a standstill. No friends, no relatives, can’t meet neighbours, don’t know the local language. Both of them worked from home, so they took turns to do chores, take care of Diya and also manage their jobs from home, this word was a taboo word just a few weeks ago in their offices. For the first time they doubted their gut feeling.

Fortunately, they were both extremely optimistic about life, they always believed in hop on the other side of the dark tunnel. They began taking help from ‘google guru’ to pick up local language. Life was starting to become a brighter.

Then, they slowly unearthed a lot of app-based services which came to their rescue. Well, this needed no interaction, so it worked all the more to their advantage. They decided to try all of them, ones from any references, web suggestions, paper inserts, random searches.

One day, Paramita picked up a blue and grey infographic which said, “we are your personal assistants- OK Boss”, she liked the concept of the personal assistant. She placed a call. She the asked them for all kinds of things, routine stuff like get vegetables, groceries, medicines etc. She even asked them for the strangest of things one could think of - get new curtains for my room, baby sit my daughter- while I am at a meeting, get a list of organic milk suppliers, get the mixer repaired, want a deep clean for the house, source art items from a nearby store, get my door fixed. For every request asked, there was an answer, a solution and a personal assistant- OK Boss.

The couple never felt so cared for, it was like the universe conspired to be by their side to serve them each minute, each second. They found a friend an extended family in the new city they had moved into. OK Boss! simply Rocks!

[oru-kathai]

The "see-off" bye

Leena lives in Dubai, she visits her parents in Chennai every year. She looks forward to the time she spends with her parents. It had been three years since she visited her parents, thanks to the pandemic! The excitement of ‘home-coming’ when the plane lands on the native soil is something she experiences even after 20 years of living in another country. Every time she visited Chennai, her father would come to “receive” her at the airport, a long-lost tradition of welcoming people from the journey. He would wait in the hustle and bustle of the airport arrival, looking for his daughter and grand kids- his eyes scanning every passenger that came out of the airport. This a ritual he never missed in all these years. But this time, it was all very different, Leena scanned the arrival and found an empty alley, she took a cab and reached home. Her father was at the door to receive her. Home-coming was definitely not the same as before, this time.

After her three-week vacation, it was time to go back to her “home at Dubai”, well the vacation had not been the same fun time. Besides, her father missed his ritual of the “receive” and the “see-off”. Life had changed a lot with the pandemic. Leena called her friends to say bye, she would have met them in the ‘old’-normal’ days. She told her friend Radha about her father’s “receive” and “see-off” rituals every time she visited. The “see-off” was as special as the receiving, because her father would keep waving to her until her face disappeared in the far end of the airport. She would keep turning back to look at him, she could see his eyes welled up but a bright smile that sent out his love and affection.

Leena’s parents were older and they needed someone to accompany them, this was another reason why her father could not come with her to the airport. While Leena’s mind was in sync with the times but her heart accepted no exceptions. Radha had the perfect solution for her. She shared the contact details of OK Boss, a personal assistant service. Leena had never heard about a service like that before. Radha told her about the way this team had helped her during the rains, passing on food to her parents, bring a document she had left back in office and also helping her dad buy a valentine bouquet for her mother. Leena was surely impressed with the range of things she heard. She called OK Boss the next moment.

A personal escort was assigned to stay with her parents through the day, to take him to the airport and drop him back safely at home. Leena’s departure from Chennai, was all over again the same experience with her father waving to her till she disappeared into the security zone, but this time Leena’s eyes welled up and she sent out that bright smile to her father and the personal assistant holding her father’s hand.