Here's an interesting excerpt I read on a website about one of the very few to compete as a skier in the Olympics for India:
I vividly remember the 1968 Winter Olympics in Grenoble, France. (Ok I am showing my age ) My mom woke my younger brothers and me up at 4:00 in the morning (No Tivo then) to watch Jerry Bujakowski, the one-man ski team from India. (I am not making this up) Jerry was a waiter with my older brothers at the Chart House in San Diego and a fantastic skier. He was born in India and therefore qualified to be on the Indian Olympic ski team. Any way, there we were all cuddled on the couch waiting to see Jerry in his downhill run. We watched Jean Claude Killy, a couple of Americans and then when Jerry was to race, ABC cut to a commercial! The network thought an Indian skier was of no interest to the American viewers.
Well, my mother gets up and goes to the phone in the kitchen (no cordless phones).
She calls the local ABC station and wants to know who is responsible for scheduling that commercial break. After several more calls, my mother finally gets a hold of some one in New York City. By the time she gets back to the living room and the commercials are over, the sportscasters on that mountainside in France are announcing that they will now replay the run of Indian skier, Jerry Bujakowski for his fans in San Diego, California.
From that day forward, I never doubted the power of a properly placed phone call.
Courtesy: http://www.oceanchampions.org/blog/?m=200808
