René Seifert – Entrepreneur & Global Citizen

Weekends in Banglore are always good to consider an outbreak. So today it went 40 km north of the city to Angsana Spa, a chain with various properties in Asia. The impression was overall a bit mixed. Let’s start with the positives:

- Very well maintained; an enjoyable oasis to evade the chaos of the big city
- Excellent cuisine for the lunch on a buffet
- Very professional and relaxing Ayurveda massage

On the flipside of life:
- The property is certainly no architectural pearl. WIth its grey concrete construction it reminded me occasionally to my vacations as a little boy in socialist Yougoslavia. But anyway, that’s really the least to complain.

And then we have the “usual suspects” in terms of negatives in India:

- Idiotic booking: In order to book a daystay and a massage, you need to call two different numbers and it takes them ages to actually get it done. Why don’t they have a single point of contact?
- The staff tends to be friendly, but pretty useless: E.g. When you check in, 2 different people would jump at you with high attention to be a second later be distracted by three phone calls and then forget about you and your intention to just pay and move on to the pool.
- No systematic service at the pool: Why does noone roam around and ask guests if they wanted something to drink? Instead you have to scream across the pool for your order: 2 lassies. It took them 1 hour (!), no exaggeration, to come up with them. At that time we were about to depart and refused to take and to pay them. For that you get the well known stupid stares in return.

I hope not to appear overly critical or decadent as an overly demanding customer. I just try to put myself into the shoes that this was my spa, my entrepreneurial venture, and I would have to observe such shortcomings. I would surely kick asses in a big way.

On the funny side, to conclude, before going to the Ayurveda massage, we were admitted to the doctor. A lady, in a conservative blue-white Sawar Kameez and a straight parting in her tighly knotted hair, who enquired about some possible medical complications. And towards my girl-friend, in particular, if she was on her “menstrual cycle” or if she was “spotting”. My girl-friend did not understand “spotting” (=deer spotting in the forest?? – LOL ), asked back “do you mean bleeding”, which extended the discussion on the topic more than planned and which made the lady increasingly embarrassed, nervious and red beneath her dark skin. (After all, anything around “sex” in the broadest sense in India is not treated at all verbally or shortened to the necessary minimum.)

And when I finally added that I was not on my “menstrual cycle” and neither “spotting”, we believed she would immediately faint into unconsciousiousness … T.I.I. = This is India! :-)