Wednesday, July 19, 2006

Very strange!

Yesterday morning, Richard had a phone call from DHL. They said a parcel had arrived for Daniel, from India, addressed to a PO Box address in Larnaka and a phone number in Paphos. Ringing the Paphos number didn't get anywhere, so they looked in the Larnaka directory, found that we were the only people with our surname, and tried the number. Good thing it was transferred when we moved!

Richard gave them our street address, and they said they would deliver the parcel within the next couple of days. That afternoon, the van arrived and I received the package. So, top marks to DHL for using common sense and being efficient.

It wasn't a heavy package. It felt like some papers, or a booklet. The paper attached to the front said it was from Maruti Suzuki, which sounded a bit odd, and since Dan hadn't mentioned anything arriving from India I thought I'd better open it. Inside was an envelope with a picture of a car, and the message: 'Gift a Maruki Suzuki to someone you love in India'. Hmmmm.

I opened the envelope. My instinct was correct. Dan has been sent some junk mail by a car company in India! Not even a charity, but a company who appear to be targetting wealthy ex-pat Indians, inviting them to buy discounted cars for their relatives back home.

Which leaves a few questions in our minds:

  • How did they get his name and address?
  • Whose is the Paphos phone number and how was that mixed with Dan's details?
  • Why would they send a Brit living in Cyprus, travelling the world for two years as a volunteer, junk mail intended for well-off Indians?

And the most puzzling question of all:

  • Why on earth would they send something like this by DHL?? It must have cost at least £20, and in India that's a HUGE amount of money...

1 comment:

mreddie said...

You are right, that is super strange - but then a lot of advertisers are weird. ec