Meet Mr Pai, he’s not unlike the literary Mr Pye he’s most definitely a dreamer. One of the many ways they differ however is our Mysore Mr Pai or I should rightly say Dr Pai is also very much a deliverer.

Mr Pai,now in his late 70’s, is a successful entrepreneur, who is the founder and Managing Director of VWF Industries (P) Ltd which does of things to do with wire and lighting which I don’t really understand. The point is, he is an enthusiastic initiator with a strong track record in business and follows through on his ideas.

It’s his more recent interest and enthusiasms that have grabbed me.

Manjula and I met him today during a sort of meditative session at the Himalayan Crystal Salt Cave. Ok its a room rather than a natural cave but how amazing and it’s one of his initiatives. It is 360 degrees of salt from left to right, top to bottom, under and over… The cave is the first proper one in India and we have it here in Mysore.  You book an hours session and hang out in the positive ions man!  Just breath it all in. Supporters suggest it has general health benefits and specifically for those with any problems with their lungs. It reminds me of the Himalayan salt lamp in my UK home, years ago. Well, we went to test it out and we were very impressed. More of that later.

But that’s not all he’s now got into a range of initiatives with local communities through his foundation and his latest business idea relates to what he calls structured water.

So as you can tell I was really impressed with Dr Pai’s enthusiasm and spirit. He’s one of the great people we’ve met in our life here in Mysore. He very much reminds me of another entrepreneur who I had the great fortune to meet before he died.  Ray Anderson of Interface was also an inspiration. In Ray’s case he was an astonishing leader in introducing innovations and in many ways made sustainable business make sense. I salute them both!