Currently Playing: Trading Yesterday - One Day.
Nothing but gripes for today.
Run along now - I have some steam to blow.
The session begins now:
#1
I’ve just about had it with bad customer service.
A smile doesn’t take much, you know? The last thing you want to see on the face of the person who’s attending to you is a long, sulky, annoyed expression. Believe me, I have met my fair share of rude waiters/waitresses. All of them are the same. They’re the ones who look like they’ve been reincarnated into the wrong life, constantly sighing and impatiently shifting their weight from one foot to the other. I marvel at their determination to keep their faces set into perpetually bored looks; it’s nothing short of admirable.
The best part of the service has got to be when they bring the food in. Not only do they clamour for your attention by slamming down the plate on your table, you will find them very thoughtful of your feelings by disappearing abruptly from the table without so much as a glance back, hence sparing you from more disgust. If you’re lucky, you might be able to see just what is it that’s got them running away so quickly. Is it the steady stream of customers that need to be served? No, that’s not it. It’s most probably a text message that needs replying immediately, or the boyfriend who’s waiting outside on his motorcycle for his girl to finish her shift.
I’ve always believed that whatever your line of work may be, a job is an amanah. A trust. A duty. A responsibility. No matter how low and down the rung one is on the Career Ladder, if you’ve got a job, do it right, for God’s sake. All this "life is unfair, I’m better than this" BS vibe that I get from these people I’ve encountered always makes me think twice about forking out hard-earned money to their establishment, simply because I believe that bad customer service will always mar quality food, no matter how good.
If this is the normal standard of PR today, it’s no wonder we can’t seem to compete in the bigger market.
They should have that saying by Mahatma Gandhi spattered across their walls.
A customer is doing us a favour by letting us serve him. We are not doing him any favour.
#2
A long while back, I had ranted about a certain Astro ad that I saw as sexist because it depicted only the men as true blue football fans, forgetting to include women in the process. It’s a good thing they don’t show that ad anymore.
Recently though, I caught a SenQ ad which was just pure disturbing. It features a family of 3. The ad begins with a woman at home whose wondering where her husband and son are. The two of them call to inform her that they’ll be arriving home late. Husband says he needs to work late, Son says he’s got tuition. The next scene however reveals both of them out with some friends, catching a football match on TV. The ad proceeds to show the woman at home alone, looking forlorn, before setting out to SenQ to look for a TV. She buys one, and voila! All her problems are solved in the end when both Husband and Son both are seen spending some quality time with the poor attention-deprived woman at home. In front of the TV. And so now they’re one happy family, thanks to the SenQ’s brilliance.
I can’t even tell you how utterly incredulous I was the first time I watched it. I thought that there must have been some kind of mistake. How could something so outrageous like this make the cut to be aired? By the second time though, incredulity got replaced with righteous anger.
What message exactly are we sending out to the masses by airing such a morally-wrong and ethically-twisted ad? What does it imply? That its excusable to lie to your wife/mother? That TV is the answer to family unity? That underlying problems within the family do not need to be addressed when there’s an idiot box to keep all the folks under one roof? What madness is this?!
Please, those responsible for this garbage had better get themselves educated. And quick.
# 3
**Spoiler alert for those who haven’t read Louisa M. Alcott’s Little Women series/watched the movie, and are planning to.**
Laurie : I have loved you since the moment I clamped eyes on you.
What could be more reasonable than to marry you?
Jo : We’d kill each other.
Laurie : Nonsense!
Jo : Neither of us can keep our temper-…
Laurie : I can, unless provoked.
Jo : We’re both stupidly stubborn, especially you.
We’d only quarrel!
Laurie : I wouldn’t!
Jo : You can’t even propose without quarreling.Little Women (Movie dialogue)
I don’t think I will ever get over the fact that Jo refuses Laurie. It’s preposterous! Mostly because, growing up with Jo, I’ve always related to her best out of all English period books I’ve read. Yes, even more than Lizzie Bennet of Pride and Prejudice fame. I read myself in every of Jo’s thoughts and actions, and the fact that both Jo and Laurie share the best friendship and such a good chemistry should have set the stage for a wedding in the end! I know I’ve read Little Women to the point of wearing the pages down, but I always hope for that part to end differently, no matter how illogical.
Oh Louisa, how could you?
The session ends now.
Enough said here.
