@SamsungSA and @StandardBankZA Partner To Offer 0% Interest On #Samsung Products

Hi Friends, 

These days we all are in search of devices and products that make life better, whether at work, home or play. Samsung’s range of products are designed to achieve this and so much more. There is therefore great news for those wanting to purchase a must-have device or home appliance. Samsung and Standard Bank have partnered to offer customers 0% interest on all Samsung products bought using a Standard Bank credit card, from the Samsung Online Store at https://shop.samsung.com/za/financing.

“We are committed to offering the best of Samsung innovation and an ecosystem of incredible experiences to more people. Now through Standard Bank and this exciting collaboration, we can bring even more added value and convenience to those who choose the power of cutting-edge technology to enhance the quality of their daily lives, “said Kagiso Khaole, Head of e-commerce and Services at Samsung South Africa

You can now purchase from the Samsung online store starting from R5000.00 or more using your Standard Bank credit card until 30 June 2021*, and select the six, twelve or twenty-four-month budget plan on your card in order to pay. You will receive a 0% interest rate for the duration of your selected budget plan payment term, for that specific purchase from Samsung.

Israel Skosana, Head of Card Issuing says, “As a leading provider of digital banking and financial services, Standard Bank has partnered with Samsung to provide our customers with access to the latest cutting-edge mobile technology at an affordable zero per cent interest rate. This last year has shown us that we are increasingly more reliant on mobile technology to communicate, work and play. Our latest partnership with Samsung will hopefully encourage customers to adopt and utilise multiple digital platforms and payment options like Samsung Pay, the Standard Bank Banking App, and virtual cards.”

From special offers on newly launched devices, such as the Galaxy S21 5G and the latest Galaxy A Series, to Samsung’s innovative range of popular home appliances, it is now effortless and even more affordable to shop on Samsung.com with your Standard Bank credit card.

*Offer period ends on 30 June 2021. Terms and conditions apply

Cheers!!!

Support me if you like reading this blog post by buying me a cup of tea or coffee - https://www.buymeacoffee.com/TheLifesWay Contact at thelifesway@gmail.com to collaborate and promote your services and products. Subscribe to my YOUTUBE Channel for giveaways, product reviews and mystery unboxings. #TheLifesWay #9YearsofTheLifesWay. Namaste!

5 Years of Life in #Johannesburg #SouthAfrica #6YearsofTheLifesWay

Hi Friends, 

It's been 5 Years in South Africa since I first landed at O.R.Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg from Gurugram, India. I was so much anxious and excited about coming to this country and the city after hearing a lot of news items on the Internet. But as I remember, one of my friend I asked before I traveled, told me that it's good to try out the new city rather than going back to London, UK. I made my decision to come to Johannesburg and here I was on 2nd November 2013. The day was Deepawali, the festival of lights and I had no SIM card, no way to contact my parents and family until I reached the place I was assigned to stay by my employer. The roommate allowed me to call my family back home and then cooked food for me. I was busy getting my stuff in the almirahs as I celebrated Diwali alone as he went out with friends.

My first day at Standard Bank office in CBD was meeting some of the important people and getting the access card and laptop sorted. I continued to be amazed by the cleanliness and the infrastructure of the city. During my initial days only I came across Fordsburg - H.K. Superstore which continues to be my supplier of Indian groceries ever since. Dosa Hut was one of the places I would visit to get my South Indian food in the evenings. I continued to eat at a Pakistani eatery daily during my lunch time for some months till Sai Amrit restaurant which was a better one started its business in CBD. It's still one of the best tiffin/snacks kind of restaurant on Marshall Street.

By the end of the first week, my company moved me out of Roodepoort to Morningside, Rivonia Road and I had to start my life afresh. I got a friend as one other associate directly came to those apartments and we hired a car and started exploring the office and the city together. Soon it was December and I went back to India to meet my brother and family who came from the USA after a while. It was too fast of a trip but I could do some of the blog posts as my Indiblogger rating fell in November as I didn't have any Wifi or Internet connection in South Africa. I also won some of the contests and wanted to bring the prizes back to South Africa for my entertainment.

Over the next few months, I took the internet connection and started watching all the TV series which I had never seen earlier like 24, Game of Thrones, How I Met Your mother?, House of Cards, Homeland amongst others. It was constant watching starting on Friday evening till Sunday night. Sometimes I won't even go anywhere outside the home to eat food or meet people. I used to continuously watch episodes after episodes of 24 (All Seasons) and was able to finish them in a month or so. In between, I used to do some blog posts and tweets which will earn me some of the great invites and prizes. I used to ask various brands for their PR companies contacts and slowly and steadily, I became a part of their lives. There are still many brands which I am not part of and still trying to reach there.

In the last 5 years, my biggest achievements will be getting 2 promotions at work, winning Samsung Bloggers Challenge which I always wanted to win since the day it was announced, winning Canon Instagram Engagement Award, winning Huawei Best Photographer (Jan 2019) and Huawei Mate 20 Lite, became debt free and start earning for the future, broken many relationships and making new ones. I have learned a lot and worked hard to achieve where I am now but this year I will take a break and relax a lot. I am not going to do any press releases as it takes time and benefits are not there at all. I will create my own content and blow my own trumpet to relearn what has been lost in translation during the last 5 years. I got so many gifts, tickets, show invites, launch events to attend and literally traveled around the city in my little Fiat 500. I love going to Montecasino, Silverstar Casino and many such places for their entertainment value.

Social media wise, when I came and contacted one Smartwatch company for their product review, they said I only have 50 followers on @TheLifesWay and now the same has crossed 8000 followers and increasing daily. The Instagram handle @araijain also was having around less than 1000 followers and now it has crossed 10k followers. The blog also crossed 2.16Million pageviews on 18th Feb 2019 and daily increasing along with the blog posts. I started my profiles on social media channels on Tumblr, snap chat, Pinterest and many others. This year I started focussing on Youtube channel too and soon there will be a lot of videos on the same.

Family wise, my wife started working as a permanent resource with a local company and my daughter loves her school and friends. We were blessed with a new baby boy who has just turned 1 last month. It's great to watch him grow as I missed the same with my daughter as I had to go to London, UK and they could not accompany me there. It's not easy to be constantly checking on the kids and sometimes I get irritated too but overall a smile from the boy gives me the courage to carry on.

It's still a struggle to earn some income from my blog or any of the social media channels but I will reach there soon where I can ask for my price. I am working towards the same and the changes due to my decisions will be visible to everyone. I am enthusiastic about all the time I am able to get as I could focus on important stuff rather than putting effort to post Press Releases on my channels and promoting it later for free.

Last 5 Years in Johannesburg, I have seen a lot of places in and around the city and still, I fall in love with the city as and when I travel in my car every morning or evening. I fall in love with the city when it's raining or when the rainbow comes after the rains. I still love going to Sandton City and visiting all the Indian Restaurants in the city. I love going to Fordsburg and going to Lion and Rhino Park too. I love my travel to Suncity and Hartbeespoort. I have made so many friends and so many people became my friends for life. I might have not seen South Africa completely too but I intend to do so in my next year of existence in the City of Gold.

That's my journey in the city and I continue to enjoy the rainbow nation! Not only my hairs have turned grey but my heart has turned more Red as I fall in love again and again with this beautiful city!

Cheers!!!
Contact me at thelifesway@gmail.com to collaborate on your products, events, and services. #TheLifesWay #PhotoYatra!

New Image Capture features on #Lumia #Denim @MicrosoftSA

Hi Guys,

One of the amazing things about modern technology is that improving it doesn’t always mean having to invest in new hardware. Sometimes a software update is all it takes to turn a piece of hardware’s performance from good into great, or from great into unbelievable. That’s the case with the Lumia Denim update, which brings a range of new imaging features to the Lumia 830, Lumia 930 and Lumia 1520 – in addition to new features like live folders and smoother and faster internet browsing.

Chief among these new imaging features is the Lumia Camera app, which complements the existing default camera app by making it even faster and easier to capture crystal clear, properly exposed images, even in low light or high contrast conditions.

If you’re more interested in what you’re shooting than what your camera’s settings are you’ll love Rich Capture, a feature that automatically decides whether or not to apply exposure compensation, whether or not to use the flash and if HDR (high dynamic range) is needed to accurately capture a particular scene. Meanwhile, if you’re the sort of person who wants full control over your handset’s camera the Lumia Camera app is ready to oblige. Swiping up on the shutter release button brings up a range of onscreen controls, allowing you full control of focus, shutter speed, white balance, exposure compensation and ISO.

Switch to video mode, and those setting options change to controls for white balance, focus and exposure compensation. And what would an imaging update be without improved selfie capture? A new setting called “auto selfie” lets you use the rear camera to take a selfie and trigger it by blinking to set off a three-second self-timer.

The Lumia Selfie app then lets you apply a range of filters and corrections to your selfies, from brightening the eyes and softening the skin tones to giving your self-portraits a vintage feel or even putting your face on a fake magazine cover.

Lumia devices aren’t just great at capturing stills, they’re masters of video capture, too. A new feature called Moment Capture combines the best of both worlds by letting you shoot high-definition video by simply holding down the camera button. Video is captured at 24 frames per second, and each frame can be saved as a high-quality still image.

Another welcome addition is the ability to capture images as RAW files. RAW files are bigger than conventional images because they contain all of the data captured by the camera sensor. They’re the negatives of the digital photography world because they can always be reprocessed to produce different effects.

Most mobile phone cameras only capture and store images as JPG files, which means the phone has to make processing decisions and throw out some of the original data when saving the image. This limits how much you can do to a photo because it’s already been compressed by the time you come to edit it. With RAW files you have full control over the final image, and you can reprocess images down the line if you want to achieve a different effect.

If, however, you don’t want to fiddle with processing your pics and are quite happy with JPGs alone, you’ll be pleased to know the algorithms your Lumia device uses to process JPGs has been updated, too, to ensure the best possible results, regardless of shooting conditions.

Lumia cameras have always produced impressive results because of their combination of top-notch optics (the physical lenses that make up the camera), high-quality sensors (that capture and record the light the lenses help to focus), speedy autofocus and the best in image processing software. I am still in love with the #Lumia1020 which is not part of this update though but considering the improved camera capabilities with Denim updates, you can do wonders with mobile photography.

The Lumia Denim update maintains this tradition of excellence and makes the existing, already outstanding camera hardware found on the Lumia 830, Lumia 930 and Lumia 1520 even better and more flexible, helping you capture images as you really see them. If you have any of these three devices, go ahead and become a better, improved and motivated photographer to capture the whole world in your pockets.

Cheers!!!

Follow me on twitter @araijain or @thelifesway
Email - thelifesway@gmail.com for invites to launch events / sponsored posts and product reviews!
Checkout my Instagram (araijain) page
Checkout my photo blog - www.photoyatra.blogspot.in
Like The Life's Way Page on Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/TheLifesWay

Top #Lumia apps for Smartphones @MicrosoftSA

Hi Guys, 

With the countless apps in the ever growing Windows Phone Store, here are some of the Top apps for May:

Standard Bank Masterpass
We are all looking for simplicity when it comes to the way we shop whether at home, in store or on the go. This app offers the perfect combination of security and convenience, safely storing payment and shipping information so that consumers can spend less time checking out and more time enjoying things they love.

DStv
The DStv app will ensure you don’t miss your favourite shows. It is an ultimate guide to DStv which features all the latest highlights, news and a full 10 day schedule and allows you to elect your favourite channels, set reminders for shows and share what you watch on social networks.

FNB
Going to the bank to do banking should be a thing of the past. The FNB Banking App provides you with the freedom to bank when and where you choose. The app performs all your traditional banking transactions eg. Making payments and adding recipients, doing transfers between your accounts and viewing account balances and transaction history. All at the palm of your hand!

One Drop of Life
Water is a scarce resource and everyday people are encouraged to consciously save water. With One Drop of Life, learn while having fun about the importance of water in our world. Navigate your drop to water the crops, but be careful not to have it contaminated! Interesting facts are provided throughout the game to help you learn more about water issues worldwide. Share with friends this great game and help ONE DROP raise awareness about water issues that affect the daily lives of so many.

WFS
Want to keep track of your account payments and have access to your account information? WFS is an app that allows Woolworths Cardholders to do just that using a mobile phone. 

miCoach train & run
If you are working towards that fitness goal and need some assistance and encouragement to get there, miCoach train and run app is the best companion to help you do that. miCoach works with adidas top athletes and coaches to offer the best in training - building speed, endurance, and strength. This version now supports the adidas miCoach Fit Smart device! The app gives you access to hundreds of strength & flex exercises to achieve your fitness goal. 

Threes

Now here is a game that will grow on you. Explore this little game’s deep challenge and grow your mind beyond imagination with endless challenge from one simple game mode, an endearing cast of characters, a heart-warming soundtrack.

VCpay
VCpay is the only app you’ll ever need to pay online! Instantly create anywhere, anytime Mobile Virtual MasterCards® using your phone.

Mango Airlines Booking and viewing your flight can be a simple process with the Mango App. The Mango app is your gateway to South Africa’s most innovative airline. Mango offers on-board Wi-Fi, consistent on-time performance, affordable airfares and app functionality that allows you to book and view bookings in an offline mode and receive specials and promotions. Download it today.

Simfy Africa
Music is a universal language that has a special power to move us and stir our emotions. Get yourself unlimited access to 27 million tracks - anywhere, anytime. Simfy Africa gives you access to all the top International artists as well as the biggest range of South African and Africa music.

Some of these apps I have also talked about earlier also but these continue to grow as they are downloaded the most in the smartphones that are taking the market slowly and steadily amongst all the competition. I still want to own the Lumia 1020 for it's awesome camera capabilities. Check more info on Microsoft twitter and facebook pages.

Cheers!!!

Follow me on twitter @araijain or @thelifesway
Email - thelifesway@gmail.com for invites to launch events / sponsored posts and product reviews!
Checkout my Instagram (araijain) page
Checkout my photo blog - www.photoyatra.blogspot.in  

Like The Life's Way Page on Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/TheLifesWay

Promotional Goodies - Caltex South Africa

Hi Guys,

Caltex is one of the major petroleum retailers here in South Africa. They have tied up with Standard Bank to offer their customers rewards points based on the petrol/diesel purchased from their garages.

To promote their collaboration and to gain more customers for Standard Bank, Caltex offered these goodies for all.

I really liked the color of these goodies. If you are a Standard Bank customer, do enable uCount Rewards system and get points back every time you fill petrol in your cars and other vehicles.Follow them on twitter at Caltex & Standard Bank

Cheers!!!

Clicked using Panasonic FZ5 Camera
Contact me for your product's review on twitter @araijain or @thelifesway or email - thelifesway@gmail.com