Recipient of Shanghai 2018 Magnolia Award
IA’s story of resilience and strength
“Tough times are inevitable in life, but how you compose yourself during those times define your spirit and will define your future” -Richard Branson. It’s amazing what people can do when they come together to face the most difficult times. There are many inspiring stories in the Indian community in Shanghai, supported by their own Indian Association (IA) and lifelong friend of the Indian Association – The Shanghai People’s Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries (SPAFFC).
As the community assessed that lockdown might take longer than anticipated, there was a concern that families will run out of basic Indian cooking ingredients. IA got a whiff of this from concerned community members and we reached out to our friends in SPAFFC. They managed to get us a permit for 2 days. This permit enabled two people from abundance store in Pudong to visit the warehouse to arrange groceries for delivery to some families in Pudong who were already in lockdown for more than 2 weeks.
We approached SPAFFC to arrange a 2nd Green Pass for Abundance. We then started planning for a set of packages along with Abundance to ensure all families get something. The demand was much more than the supply available at Abundance. The transport was even more difficult as we needed to send orders to 13 different districts in Shanghai. The IA team helped Abundance to form different WeChat groups so Jimmy can focus on packing and the IA team can address any queries from the Indian Community. It took 3 days for packages to be prepared, they were packed and picked up on Sunday 10th April and delivered over the next 3-4 days.
We hail our heroes Mr. Jimmy Chow from abundance and Eve Samyuktha who helped us with providing and packing groceries and estimating families by district and planning the distribution respectively. A big thank you to both of them from the Indian Community in Shanghai.
IA reached out to its friends in the logistics industry to arrange for the Green-pass transport to Pudong households without any cost to the community. Hearing this news IA started receiving plenty of requests from the Indian community on the Puxi side.
We approached SPAFFC to arrange a 2nd Green Pass for Abundance. We then started planning for a set of packages along with Abundance to ensure all families get something. The demand was much more than the supply available at Abundance. The transport was even more difficult as we needed to send orders to 13 different districts in Shanghai. The IA team helped Abundance to form different WeChat groups so Jimmy can focus on packing and the IA team can address any queries from the Indian Community. It took 3 days for packages to be prepared, they were packed and picked up on Sunday 10th April and delivered over the next 3-4 days.
Despite these efforts, there were many families that did not receive the delivery in the 2nd round. IA team took note and started working on the 3rd round of deliveries. During the 3rd round of indian grocery distribution, the supplies in Shanghai were insufficient. Mrs. Pooja Ahuja (Wechat: ursmile08 / Mobile 15958555161), the owner of the JASHNN restaurant in Shaoxing, came to our rescue. Once again Pooja has risen to the occasion to serve the community. She delivered and fulfilled the needs of the Indian Community in Shanghai. For Pooja’s selfless and timely help, the India community in Shanghai would like to say a heartfelt thank you.. We received orders from the community over 2 days and arranged cross-provincial transport from Shaoxing to Shanghai, once again at no cost to the community. These are being delivered to about 121 households. As there were no indications of the lockdown in Shanghai coming to an end. IA team started planning for Round 4 of grocery delivery.
This is a great example of Indian Community’s resilience in the most difficult times in Shanghai. It reflected in the 100+ testimonials shared by the community.
