Entries Tagged 'Mauritius' ↓

Université Populaire de Maurice vous attend.

Les themes et sujets offerts sont :

Philosophie : Joseph Cardella

Littérature : Véronique Garrioch

Sciences et technologies : Dhanjay Jhurry

Histoire de l’art : Salim Khodabaccus

Histoire : Vijaya Teelock

Journalisme : Laurent Dubourg

Cinéma : David Constantin

Psychologie : Jean-Bernard Sadien

Sociologie : Ibrahim Koodoruth

Visiter le site pour le calendrier et votre inscription. http://upmaurice.wordpress.com/

Je suis heureux de lire que l’expertise mauricienne en matière de taille de diamant trouve place au soleil au Canada. Cette expertise trouve sa genèse dans la création de la première entreprise LSP (Lagesse Sussens Poncini) implantée à Floréal dans les années 70. La taille de diamants est ensuite reprise par Monsieur Denton avec MauriDen qui nous arrivait de l’Afrique du sud. Par aillieurs, le fils Sebatien Denton est un nomine pour l’entrepreneur de l’annee 2007. Je suis heureux d’avoir été un observateur curieux dès le départ de cette industrie à Maurice. En effet, par intérêt, et par ma fonction dans le domaine du transport aérien, je pensais à l’époque que la taille des diamants, et la fabrication des objets de valeur, convenait à l’île Maurice, où le bas coût de main-d’œuvre, couplé avec l’impact du coût de transport minimisé par le volume restreint transporté était idéale. L’occasion me fut presentée à cette époque d’évoquer avec les experts d’Air France Cargo sur le sujet pour ma thèse de fin d’étude à l’université et j’ai eu le plaisir de me rendre compte de la portée d’une telle activité en Israël. Plus tard, avec l’oncle Charlie, j’ai également suivi avec grand intérêt une aventure similaire dans la taille des pierres précieuses, importées de Tanzanie. MauriGem n’a pas malheureusement pas fait long feu pour manque d’approvisionnement régulier.
Comme les nombreux fils ou filles du sol qui pendant des années ont aidé à l’industrie sucrière en Afrique, aujourd’hui nos compatriotes aident à la transformation des pierres brutes en produits finis à l’étranger. Au Botswana, en Australie, au Congo et autres pays miniers, on pourrait bien trouver des débouchés pour nos artisans. Les pays producteurs voulant garder le plus- value dans le pays d’origine. Nos artisans d’une source d’apprentissage de Floréal se trouvent ainsi disséminer dans le monde : Inde, Thaïlande, Canada, Australie et Brésil.
Non, ce n’est pas une perte pour notre mère patrie Ile Maurice. J’ai vu et revu de nombreux mauriciens aidant financerement la partie de la famille restée au pays, et plus tard, au crépuscule de leur vie rentrent au bercail pour un climat plus clément et une retraite bien méritée.
C’est le cas de nos ‘infirmiers’ en Angleterre des années 60-70, nos artisans sucriers depuis plus de six décennies. Pourquoi pas nos immigrants de maintenant ?

L’UNIVERSITÉ POPULAIRE c’est :

• Des cours gratuits
• Ouverts à tous
• Sans condition d’âge ni de diplôme
• Des professeurs bénévoles
• Pas d’examen à passer
• Juste pour le plaisir d’apprendre et de réfléchir

L’UNIVERSITÉ POPULAIRE DONNE SES COURS
À LA SALLE DU CONSEIL DE LA MAIRIE DE PORT-LOUIS

« Ouvrir la connaissance à tout le monde, démocratiser la culture et développer l’esprit critique. »

Pourquoi pas ? Je suis émerveillé de cette initiative de créer un lieu ou la connaissance s’adresse a tous, sans condition d’age, ni de diplôme et ce gratuitement. Saurions nous d’entrevoir le paradis sur terre à travers une fissure de bonne volonté et de générosité ? Est ce une coïncidence que le sponsor du projet soit le groupe CIEL ? Enfin une bonne nouvelle et de quoi s’en réjouir. Je remercie le ciel.

Ainsi donc à partir de ce mois d’octobre, le plaisir d’apprendre et de réfléchir est à la portee de tous. Bravo pour l’idée et surtout bravo pour la mise en place. Mes plus vives félicitations a l’initiateur du projet Joseph Cardella.

«La réflexion et l’esprit critique sont donc essentiels, car ils (me) permettent d’envisager les problèmes sous différents angles, angles qui sont constitutifs de la réalité. Il n’y a pas une réalité. Mais la réalité est ce qui est perçu sous un angle particulier. C’est donc l’angle de vision qui fait la réalité, et il est donc important de savoir qu’il existe différents angles de vision, ce qui permet de ne pas s’enfermer. »

La réussite du projet ne pourra se mesurer d’abord par l’affluence au cours. Ce n’est que par la communication que nous attirerons les gens. Ainsi je me fais un devoir d’en parler sur mon blog et à toutes les personnes que ce rencontre. Cher lecteur, veuillez donc parler autour de vous.

Food supplement consumption is the craze of today. At least in our environment and amongst the people we socialize with, the conversation some how get to health issues and food. Is it particular to us or is it a universal trend? For sure the pharmacies of the world now stock and sell more food supplement. Even supermarkets have now expanding shelves of food supplement. People are indeed more health conscious and takes more vitamins and health dietary supplementary food.

My neighbor with whom I had a lengthy and mind opening conversation last week, I learnt of her project to start off the production of Spirulina. She triggered in me the interest to learn more of this food supplement. She is planning to start off a production through a social enterprise. I find that it is a very good idea to combine the objective of alleviating poverty by giving jobs and rural development.

What are challenges of starting this enterprise? What resources are available? What technical and managerial knowledge would be necessary? What are the added difficulties in running a social enterprise?

Let us wish her success in her Spirulina enterprise.

Have you ever heard of the term ‘Hind-sight wisdom’? You have heard some guys saying wiser of the event. Truly enough, we become always wiser after any event whatever the outcome may be. It is very much the case of reflecting and analyzing the factors that affected a past event and learning from it.

How was it possible to build up the present notoriety of WAY in Mauritius in such a short span with minimum expense? Can you explain hind-sight how the name WAY has now a distinctive persona which is recognizable by a large number of persons in Mauritius?

Ask yourself what does WAY immediately brings in your mind’s eye?

The answer may be:

For some shopping at value for money prices;

For others, proximity convenience shopping;

For some others guys, a group of reliable supermarkets;

And perhaps the favorite shopping place where the owners know me.

Why do we today get these answers?

The simple answer is: because some guys wanted the public to be imprinted with these thoughts and used means necessary for it  to happen. The first lesson would be: Begin with the end in mind, and continuously work to make it happen.

This does not explain the whole story. One of the marketing image building techniques behind the campaign in the present case was the use of ‘from known to unknown’. It was no accident that overnight the already known supermarkets under the names of London, Tangs, Sik Yuen, Central all became double barreled name of London WAY, Tangs WAY, and SikYuenWAY,etc. All public communication contained the –WAY syllable. From the know name of London & others supermarkets were tagged the unknown WAY syllable which carried all the London & others supermarket experiences. After some time, once association & familiarity has set,the values associated with the older brand get transferred.

No, it was not a strike of genius. This technique was used before, and in the case of WAY it was only redeployed and re adapted to the circumstances and context. This tacit knowledge was be used over & over again.

Yet another website to visit everyday. I have to congratulate Anne Robert, a Mauritian journalist settled now in Canada who runs Global Mauritian with a clear vision. It is refreshing to read the opinion of some Mauritian at heart, who are geographically outside the medley & hopefully unbiased by the daily mind pollution that we are exposed to living in the country. Mind you, when reading their opinions one must always take into account the back ground of the author who very often tints its writing. I would also discount the content with the interests the author may be defending. I am a believer of digesting different feeds from the various sources before formulating my own opinion. I have read the comments on the hot subject of the day in Mauritius: Ilot Gabriel and all the rumbling around the subject, namely the Union Park speech of our Prime Minister as reported by the papers.

Last night I attended a dinner to bid farewell to Jean Noel Perrault who has successfully completed his contract term with the supermarket chain WAY.

The farewell dinner party allowed me to be reminded of the friendship and work association I had with this wonderful gang of hardworking entrepreneurs: the WAY group.

When I was handed over the responsibility of SPAR supermarkets way back in 1997 in my capacity of Cluster Director of Rogers & Co, with my team, we devised some scheme to grow the supermarket business that Rogers owned. Rogers, at the time, owned 3 supermarkets and had to face the competition of the hypermarket Continent, the chain of Winners stores from Ireland Blyth, and the GSR chain of supermarkets. How to grow the business without investing in it?  Operating a Franchised SPAR chain supermarket was the decision taken. The team managed mostly through external growth, in a span of 2 years to create a SPAR chain of 11 supermarkets. Later Rogers cashed in with a hefty profit by selling off the SPAR business to Bourbon group’s Jumbo hypermarkets.

In 2003, the franchised members of SPAR became uncomfortable with the new management of Jumbo. We met and thrashed out a solution. After some work, together we decided to create and build up a new chain under the name WAY. Since its opening in October 2004 WAY has been growing from strength to strength to stand today as a chain of 11 stores will a yearly turnover of 2.2 billion rupees.

WAY is now positioned to grow further with the internal 20 % annual growth experienced in the last year. Possibilities are now opened for external growth too. Should WAY seize the opportunities, further development & growth would occur to become the largest supermarket group of the country. That is the WAY.

How was it possible to  build up the present notoriety of WAY in Mauritius in such a short span with minimum expense?

‘Quand on est polyglotte, on a plus de chances d’être ouvert d’esprit’ écrit Chin Lee Choo Foo dans la presse québécoise.

Ainsi, avoir vécu dans ce bouillon de culture mauricienne, et de posséder plusieurs langues sont indéniablement des atouts qui trouvent des valeurs appréciées hors de notre île.

A lire dans la parution de La Presse du 26 aout 2007.

Wow! I had such an eventful day yesterday that I did not have the time to log in my blog. It all started in the morning when I could not log in my website in spite of several attempts. Luckily I could retrieve my mail from my .mu address. Was it something wrong with the international network as it sometimes happens? I gave up for the moment hoping to go back later.

To my surprise, I learned from the mail of the demise of Carol, my cousin’s wife and read through the eulogy written by my cousin Molly for the Requiem mass in East London, South Africa, for her life celebration. Two earthly departures in the span of three months in the same Chock family, I thought. I took a good half hour backtracking in my mind the good times I had in the company of our South African folks, both in the days I visited them in East London, and whilst they were in Mauritius. May God receive them in His eternal love.

The 23rd August is a very special day for my family, not only because it is the crossing day between the Leo to the Virgo, more importantly, it is the day to feast with long life noodles for my wife’s birthday. Damn me if I had forgotten this august day! Olivier, very late in the night from Toronto, graced her Mom with a Happy Birthday song in his hoarse voice. Stephane also conveyed her best wishes through the mail. That made her day!

She had for this special day, arranged for her friends to gather home for a mah-jong party and lunch. The banging of the mah-jong on the table and the laughter created indeed a rejoicing atmosphere which added to the sound of oldies music of the 60’s and 70’s.

Kristel called in with a lovely birthday cake and her good wishes. Her presence and irresistible smile conquered my wife’s cronies.

The day followed with few more visits from a neighbour, Sabine, who presented her with a beautiful flower arrangement in vase. Marie Helene surprised her with gifts and a lively bouquet of white roses.

In the evening we set off for dinner at Hoy foong restaurant for a typical Chinese birthday dinner with Popo, the close relatives and friends. I was very contented for my day before Mr. Sandman took me to my dreams.

My curiosity today had its fill. Whilst doing some research on the internet, I discovered the rebirth of Le Cernéen. Yes! Indeed the news paper which was created in 1832 and disappeared a decade or so is back. I could feel again the same spirit that used to glow the flame of the soul of this paper which has taken the modern digital medium for publishing. Le Cernéen in its last days as a daily newspaper was edited by Jean Pierre Lenoir who was in a way the mouthpiece of the Franco community or at least he then defended the opinions of the community. He is a very interesting outgoing person, very independently minded, creative and quick-witted and more importantly writes very well in French. I had the opportunity to have spent some of my teenage years rubbing shoulders with him. Together with Denis Piat, another critical author of Le Cernéen, we were juniors working for the same boss. Jean Pierre took from his father who was a very cultured man who used to run and owned “La Libraire le Trefle” in my younger days.

I am all for the multiplicity of opinions, of ideas and of perspectives. It is important to confront the reading of my reality to the realities of others, to enhance my vision of things. After all, is not my reality only an illusion of true reality corrupted with my blindness and my imperfect knowledge or understanding?

Living in Mauritius, in such a diverse society, we are blessed to be able to see, if we so wish, in multicolour shades through the eyes & understandings of multi-social norms. It would be wasteful not to draw benefits from “la societé Arc en Ciel”.

The story which retained my interest today was:

THE IDIOT’S GUIDE TO UNDESERVED WEALTH:

HOW TO BECOME A MILLIONAIRE IN PARADISE ISLAND.

Psst! Wanna make a fast buck whilst doing next to nothing? Read these instructions carefully and if you follow them to the letter, you too can become a millionaire many times over and simultaneously add a thin veneer of intelligence to what is essentially a dull and insipid personality. The instructions are very easy to follow, so easy in fact that government advisers who, as we all know are not blessed with the greatest intelligence or wit, have no problems at all to implement them fully whenever the need for personal advancement that is not based on merit or qualifications becomes necessary.
First of all, physical looks do not seem to matter at all as it is generally assumed that even the ugliest person will somehow compensate for his shortcomings in the appearance department by projecting the aura of authority and commanding physical presence that he believes automatically follows any job provided by his political master. Some people will venture the rather cruel opinion that personal advancement based entirely on political patronage is inversely proportional to physical looks and intelligence, and the uglier and dimmer you are, the higher the chances of finding yourself parachuted into a position that provides no great benefits to the country but which is guaranteed to enrich you immensely. I do not subscribe to this uncharitable view as I am sure there must be some rare exceptions (oh, all right then, some very, very rare exceptions)that somehow struggle to be the exception to the rule…
So, armed with a face that only a mother could love and an intelligence level that consistently fails to register anything of note on numerous I.Q. tests, the next step on the road to riches and faux grandeur is to embark on a symbiotic relationship with a politician who seems destined for high office after a general election. Here again you must choose a politician who matches you in the looks and intelligence department, i.e. as ugly and as stupid as you are. One note of caution though : never, ever allow your monstrously huge ego to overshadow that of your political partner in crime. This is an absolute no no, as apparently no Mauritian politician will ever tolerate the possibility that there may be numerous people out there who are far more intelligent than the specimens we regularly send out to servi nou pei. The cardinal principle that you must never deviate from is simply this: the politician is never wrong and any pronouncement by your master, irrespective of the new depths of inanity that are reached with every successive statement, must always be met with an innocent look of astonishment at the sheer genius of the man; if, for example, he tells you that he has a son who is a medecin and a daughter who is a medicine, you must suspend disbelief and marvel at the surprisingly procreative abilities of such a stupid man.
Now that the basic qualifications of intelligence and good looks (or lack of) have been met, you must learn to match bullshit with bullshit. That is not as difficult as it seems. You must always assume that the politician will voice rubbish of the bovine variety every time he opens his mouth, and therefore all you have to do is have a small number of made to measure replies to anything that he says; as long as you remember to say ‘Yes, minister, that is such an intelligent move on your part’ to any crackpot ideas that emanate from a febrile head soaked in last night’s booze at the almost daily manz boir event that is a must for anyone proclaiming to serve the nation, you will be ok, and that may even add another 10% to the mandatory 25% annual salary gratuity that is given to any lick spittle irrespective of actual performance.
The only other qualification that is most prized apart from arse licking is the ability to stab friend and foe in the back; this usually manifests itself in telling blatant lies to your ministerial godfather about the political affiliations of friends, rivals, and enemies. The minister is, of course, too stupid to differentiate between a bare faced lie told solely to deal with deep, personal, psychological problems and genuine information that will help the minister to do his job with a modicum of efficiency. The robin has a natural ability to flaunt its red breast of jealousy and innate inferiority complex and will do anything to worm its way into any position that it believes will serve its purposes exclusively, and will therefore forego any of the notions of loyalty, friendship, and faithfulness that binds most ordinary mortals into a common bond of shared purpose and sincerity.
Of course, you must make the potential minister believe that you ‘carry’ a large number of votes, and this is best achieved by appealing to the nasty, casteeist,communalist instincts that unfortunately still afflicts so many of our citizens in this apparently civilised democracy. If, for example, you happen to be a Rajput, you convince the minister that you can guarantee him the votes of all the Rajputs at election time; it does not matter that everyone apart from the putative minister know that this Rajput represents only himself and nobody else. If you happen to be a Moslem, then claim complete allegiance to the Holy Quran and vociferously condemn any proposed legislation on anything to do with the private sex lives of our citizens whilst spending every Friday and Saturday evening getting blind drunk in the distinctly ungodly atmosphere of our nightclubs. The crucial tactic to maintain here is to feed the ministerial delusion that his political future lies in your hands which contains the votes of all those who happen to share the identity conferred on them entirely by the accident of birth.
Finally, when the votes are counted, make sure you are there when your man is hoisted on the shoulders of his supporters to welcome his victory; it will help if you have one or two nephews shouting your name within his earshot so that he is now convinced that his good fortune is entirely due to your hard work and your influence within his constituency. When he hugs you in public to show his gratitude for your so called hard work, whisper gently the magic names of any of the numerous parastatal organisations that litter Paradise Island and look forward to an astronomical salary and expenses package that has no bearing whatsoever to your qualifications, experience, or aptitude for the job; and you will also get a 25% gratuity of annual salary irrespective of your performance, and which is paid whether you work well or to the abysmally low standards that have characterised your work record so far. This should guarantee you a salary of around Rs1 million for the month of December alone and a total annual salary package of between Rs 3 and Rs 4 millions a year. Not bad for someone who could barely write his name before polling day…
But if you want to be really clever, you should capitalise on an atmosphere of friction between yourself and the Board of directors; if you are really lucky, you will be invited to resign and you will be able to go home with a cheque for around Rs2 millions which astonishingly contains a gratuity payment for a future performance that cannot be evaluated as you no longer work for that organisation! If your name is Dan Maraye, you must look at yourself in the mirror every day and thank your lucky stars that you live in Paradise Island where your political masters are experts at creating paradise for the chosen few.
Of course, if you had a conscience, or if you really loved your country, you would not follow the route planned above and will instead do whatever you can to create the wealth that this country desperately needs. But how many of us are willing to take that road?