Recently there is an ad campaign, titled Me and Meri Maggi, going on for Maggi Noodles. This has inspired this post. I wanted to write some of my encounters with multi-way, (I sometime call them m-way), people.
Circa-2003, Place: My residence at RT Nagar, Bangalore
I was a bachelor at that time and shared the house with my brother and another friend of mine. I enjoyed sleeping till late into the morning on weekends. At around 6:30AM, someone knocked at my door. I was obviously annoyed at this unwelcome intrusion and wanted to shout at whoever was on the door. I opened the door and there was one of my friends standing at my door with one more person. I welcomed them to my small living room.
Let me tell you some background. My friend who has just come has been calling me for last couple of weeks to discuss some business plan. He called me on many weekends to attend a meeting to discuss their business plans which will be attended my many like-minded people. I asked him what is the business; he won't reveal me the type of the business...
Now I come from the wash-room and give them two glasses of water. The other person accompanying my friend asked me what is my future plan. He warned me that there were going to be much expenses in life and income from my job was not sufficient enough. So I should do some business. I was actually forewarned by a few other friends about this multi-way business. I could strongly and politely refuse them.
Circa-2004, somewhere in Sadashiva Nagar, Bangalore
Whenever I spoke to this friend of mine, he told me he had some business plan. I respected him (and still respect him). He was a brilliant guy who passed out from my college and was my senior. He earned a lot and possibly the highest paid guy amongst our contemporaries at that time. I thought he wanted to do some start-up. So I was interested. I asked him what was his business plan; but he won't tell me directly his business plan. After many conversations, I started getting a doubt that the style of discussion was going in the same way as my first story. I wondered how much money does one need. Here's the possibly best paid guy from my college and he is into this multi-way thing..
Circa 2003, Manipal Hospital, Bangalore
My younger brother was admitted into the hospital. While settling the bills, I had some interaction with a guy who handled medical insurance. We exchanged our business cards. This guy later really pissed me off. He kept calling me for almost every alternate day for multiple weeks to attend some meeting to discuss some business plan. I had to be really rude with this guy.
May 2006, The Great Mall, Milpitas, California
I went to the Great Mall with my bhabhi. While shopping there, I came across an Indian family - husband, wife and a kid. They asked me what did I do and if I were shopping for my wife. The guy told me that he ran his own business. On hearing that, my bhabhi suddenly pulled me away from them. I was a bit surprised as to what happened. Bhabhi tod me that these friendly-looking families are those multi-way people. Two of my friends who were also there in the mall kept talking to them. The family took the hotel phone numbers of my friend and reached our hotel in the evening with a box. Yes, their business plan start with a box. :-)
Feb-March 2008, Castro Street, Mountain View, California
My friend was enjoying a walk in Castro street with his newly married wife. They met a very friendly Indian family and exchanged pleasantries. The next day this friendly-family reached my friends' apartment with the business inside a box. I kinda warned them the scenario. They politely avoided them.
October 2008, on a vacation in Assam
I got a call from Bangalore at my cell phone. The caller introduced himself as a friend of one of my friends, who I knew were already doing the multi-way business. The caller told me that he has some business plan and wanted to discuss with me. I asked him straightforward if he was a multi-way guy. He said he was. I politely refused. Told him that my work demanded long hours. Whatever little time is left after work, that is exclusively for my family. That's all..
2009, the Bay, RMZ Infinity, Bangalore
A stranger started talking to my friend (the same guy in Castro) saying that my friend's shoes were very good. He kept on the conversation that led to a business plan. But my friend was already experienced by now. He quickly found that this stranger was none other than multi-way guy..
Today (15th July 2010), Bangalore
My wife got a call. The voice was very familiar to my wife. The same lady called my wife last week also to sell some product. The lady on the phone introduced herself by some other name. Today my wife actually identified who was the caller. She wanted to sell some international standards multi-way facial product. My wife knew the caller was actually a friend of her, but pretending to be some business-woman. My wife refused her strongly.
Do you have any multi-way (m-way) moments. Wanna share these with me here?
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2 comments:
jms,
it seems there are more m-way people in bengalure compared to hyderabad.
One of my colleagues at Sun (2001 time) is m-way member. He invited me for a meeting with his m-way mentor. As a custom - m-way newbie member wont give business gyan to a prospective member; only his mentor will do the talking/convincing part, the newbie member will be just shadowing his mentor.
Pestering them with lot of questions is the only way out.
Here is brief summary of our interaction with m-way mentor:
Mentor: m-way doesnt spend money on ads and it passes the benefit to consumers.
I: Then the prices should be less than what we get in market?
Mentor: We provide high quality product. Our protein powder has 99.9% protein, where as you wont get protein powder with >90% protein.
I: Instead of one spoon, I'll take two spoons; market ones are much cheaper to compared your product.
...
As part of this discussion, he gave demo of how to use their tooth brush; tooth paste to get maximum benefit out of it. I asked him = if we use the same extra optimization technique on regular tooth paste then that paste lasts much longer than this mini paste ...
Final blow:
Asked him to give me their 'starter kit'; but, I'll pay the money only after consuming all the products and if I am completely satisfied with the products :P
My colleague never disturbed me after that.
ROFL, Jyotirmoy Da, you seemed to have loads of encounter with the am-way in n number of ways ;-) I too have a few to share. I had my brain eaten by a co-passenger on a train to Bangalore from Vellore. That was my first encounter and I had no idea about what amway is at that time. Luckily there was another passenger who was overhearing our conversation and he warned me of Amway and told his side of the story and that saved my day. And after that many other encounters I had with amway agents till date. But I've a simple rule, if I want something I'll buy it on my own and no one can force me to buy anything of their choice. I simply don't believe the way Amway operates and I don't give a damn to their so called high-end products(which I feel nothing but a hogwash to fool ignorant people).
Nowadays I get very careful and defensive whenever I see that some stranger is trying to be friendly with me at any shopping mall. 99% of the time that person will be an amway agent.
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