No one answered.
I turned on my computer. Nah, they hadn't switched me on. I was unable to access the Internet.
I dialled their number again. This time, a young male voice replied.
It took him some time to go over my details. Did he understand that I was waiting for their man to come here and perform whatever he must perform so my computer can go online again? I had terminated my contract half a year ago, because I had moved house and was visiting my home only for a couple of days a week. Why pay RMB 150 for unlimited Internet access when you get it for free at your place of work?
But now are holidays, and I spend most of them at home. However, I cannot visit the Internet without a little help from the boys at Telecoms...
I repeat my request: send that blasted person around to fix my split-line.
He promises me to talk it over with his supervisor...
I am still hanging in there, hearing him talk to someone else on a separate telephone... After a while, I decide to replace the receiver.
He called me back ten minutes later.
"We can send someone, but we don't know when that someone will come... can you give me your mobile phone number?"
That's it then! I suppress my anger at this moment. They had promised me to send someone on this Tuesday, at 9 a.m.; now it was 10:55 a.m., and they are telling me I had to wait indefinitely...
"But you promised me yesterday..." - "Bu hao yise!"
"I can't eat your 'bu hao yi'se, man, I am going to go away shortly, and not return for days..."
So, I am left with no option: I wasted yesterday's morning going to the local Telecoms office, a trip that took 2 hours (one hour discussing with the staff there, repeatedly interrupted by other clients' queries), and now they are not willing, or able, to deliver. I must wait.
And no, they don't work during lunchtime, nor after 5 p.m., and not before 9 a.m. again...
Tell me: haven't you ever lost it with such unfeeling, uncomprehending and uncaring fat cats of white-collar staff who are more interested in their breaks than in your wellbeing?
Service industries cannot thrive if their personnel are so annoyingly lethargic!
