Respondents I Remember
While doing consumer research as part of my summer internship, I got to visit Coimbatore and New Delhi. I met a lot of people to interview them with my lengthy questionnaire. Much against my wishes, I interrupted couples holding hands, parents cajoling their kids, teenagers chilling out, students filling admission forms, and lots of people in the middle of something or the other.

“I don’t have the heart to disturb people when they’re having a good time.” I groused to somebody from advertising. Then, he told me, I was in the wrong business as advertising and marketing are all about interrupting people. I could disagree with support from Craig Davis' quotes.

Anyways, from the hundreds of people ‘interrupted’ by me, some are stuck in my memory – either with reason or without. I enjoyed two of the best perks a marketing job can give: traveling and meeting people. Here’s an attempt to recall…

Mumbai is where I started my research and met people at various places.

Rajeev Mehra was with a couple of friends at Nariman Point and was probably having a post-lunch chat. As I approached them and asked for some time, they begged for forgiveness but Rajeev obliged. “Apun ne bhi bahut kiya hai, la.” he said. Don’t be impressed by his show of sympathy. He only screwed up the questionnaire. Writing occupation as ‘Market Research’ is an indicator of his sadist tendency. He selected options that were most different, just to skew the data. I guess his favourite was the Likert Scale. He ticked diagonally, zig-zag and straight. I wonder if he read anything. His answer to “What’s the coolest thing you’ve done in the last week?” was – sex. Collective advice they gave me? “Kya itna kaam kar raha hai. Fill them on your own, yaar!”

It was a Saturday noon when my haversack of questionnaires and me headed for Jai Hind College. Thought we’d get some students to talk to. Just as I entered the gate, a girl came rushing to me, asking for a favour. No, she only wanted me to get interviewed by her camera-laden team. We’d scratch each others’ backs. Sindhu Satish turned out to be a BMM student doing her internship in an ad agency and had come with her team to interview people. She was so soft-spoken that I had trouble listening to what she was saying from two feet away. I later discovered that she usually does that save her voice. A trained singer, Sindhu had reached one of the final rounds of Indian Idol 2. She intends to make singing a profession.

I met Jasmine Eunice in the canteen of a medical college on my first day in Coimbatore. A fair, chubby female in salwar-kameez with a lovely and warm smile. I interviewed her and later regretted not taking her number or e-mail. Maybe I didn’t need to. The next I was at Nilgiri’s (a famous supermarket) and walking along Aravanshi Road along my way to Racecourse Road. Surprise surprise! Who do I see! We say hi to each other as if we’ve been old buddies and give brief intro’s. I took her e-mail and she gives me her palm to jot my contact down. I didn’t want her to be seen taking numbers on her hand in the middle of the road, in front of her friend. Like a good boy, I take out a post-it and hand her the details. “I’ll wait for your mail.” she says. Very eagerly that evening, I went to a cyber café to write her a mail asking her to show me around. The mail still bounces back.

(to be continued…)