Few weeks back I was at one of the many mega-sized consumer electronic stores in Beijing. As I was walking by the various shop-in-shops, I was amazed by a ingenuity of a simple but very effective tool that I saw being used.
Look at the picture below - this is the City Map of Beijing and has been mounted on a hard board. The map has been marked with a coloured pen and these marking represent the routes of various delivery vans that are in operation. As shoppers finished haggling for the best price on their TV or whatever that they had bought - the sales girl would bring out the map and ask them point out on the map the location of the delivery destination. She already knew the route-load for the next 48 hrs. and she could quickly tell you by when could you expect your article to be delivered. Simple.
But this post is not just about the ingenious use of maps to get customer addresses and expedite product delivery. I also want to use this example to point at the pragmatic way in which most of the Beijingers tell you directions and locations. Finding a place is not about "close to the big water tank" or "near the traffic signal" or "under the flyover". Finding a place is about clear directions. "Is your house north of the street or south?" "Is the address east of the bridge or west?"
Not just on the street, but even within the office - we have meeting rooms designated as "Campaign Room - North/South etc.The directions are really very clearly etched in people's minds. The use of map is only and extension of this pragmatic approach to get to a place. Contrast this with India for example - how many of us would readily know our location on the map of Delhi for example. You get the point.
I am yet to understand what is behind the Beijinger's relative ease with directions - but whatever it might be - it sure makes the city special.
