Customer Suckthis or Service - depends who you're dealing with

Today I was arrested for aggravated assault – or I could have been had I acted on the thoughts of mass-Customer-Service-Rep-destruction that my mind conjured up. But, the odds were against me. Too many witnesses, a mall full to be exact, and my Bull Pistle was in my other handbag. (Side bar: A Bull Pistle is a whip made from the skin of a bull's penis, and is famous for inflicting the most painful lashes ever imagined. Now you know.)

Make no mistake. The devil is alive and he owns The Phone Company – a proper noun in this case to represent the full spectrum of these service providers around the world. If you pay for land-line/mobile phone service, regardless of where your birth paper was stamped, you have been stabbed with a pitchfork at least once.

As I regarded the two imps regurgitating “blah, blah, can't help you..” and “wahh, wahh, it will cost you more money..”, I took a deep breath and remembered that I was in their position once.

I was a green 19-year-old when I got my first full-time job... at a phone company. With basic customer service experience from holiday retail jobs and a smile, I was at the mercy of the citizens of Trinidad & Tobago. The view wasn't always pretty from the other side of my desk. People get crazy when you stand between them and the thing they want. (Re-read the first paragraph if you don't believe me.) Needless to say, the security guards on duty became my closest allies.

But, I loved my job and was good at it. I listened (to the sad stories, lies, pleas) longer than I needed to; explained (head office policies, bills, payment plans) in as much detail as I could; connected (with eye contact, a kind word, or simple hello). Eventually, I was providing service and building relationships.

That was 11 short years ago, and now that I'm primarily on the receiving end, I feel like today's customer service is like the nice dinner with no foreplay before the slam-bam. Maybe I got out just in time... before I got jaded.

“It's not like I'm the only person in the building who smokes pot!”

No – those aren't my words. First to begin, I would not say “pot”. And secondly, I'm not an obnoxious cell phone user.

I had the pleasure of sitting in front of one of those people on my way home this evening; those people who make you wish you could launch razor thin tranquilizer darts into their voice box from the back of your head silently and surreptitiously.

The irony of my unwanted interaction with the offending passenger reads like poetry. I was on my way home from a forum on the importance of public space. Up for discussion was who can do what where; who pays to maintain the where; who determines the what; and the fundamental difference between the private and public realm. And up in the private space of my thoughts all I could hear was her - the bane of my streetcar ride home.

People have written about public cell phone use etiquette ad nauseam. Why do I have enough rant worthy material for a blog post?!

Voice level, subject matter, language – they all matter when your audience is stuck with you in a confined public space.

I don't care that you're soooooo tired, especially when I'm soooooo tired (and sick!) and just trying to unwind in spite of your presence. Manners maketh the wo(man).

Maybe if “the old lady” in your building did call the police to bust you for smoking pot, we would never have met.

Independence and the vacuum cleaner

You know your life passport has a valid visa to adulthood when you rush out of work to buy a vacuum cleaner on sale.

She's a tiny beauty, just like the first place I get to call my very own. But, she almost didn't make it home with me.

I arrived at the store well in advance of closing, but failed to consider the masses who also retrieved the sales flyer in their mail the day before the end of the sale as I had.

Precious minutes sailed by as I frantically fumbled around browsing shoppers for the correct aisle. I finally relented and relied on the guidance of a customer service attendant to set me on course – then panic set in. The shelf was empty. There were 26 in stock when I checked at lunch!

I gripped the crumpled flyer in my hand, as my eyes darted from the empty shelf to every other vacuum brand in stock except the one I had my sights set on. My trance was suddenly broken by the feeling I was being watched. As I met the downcast gaze of another customer, I noticed she had my vacuum in her hands. If you ever doubted whether women mark and guard their territories, enter the shopping zone during a sale. I wanted to ask her where she got the prized item but badmind took over. Why didn't she just tell me, eh?!? Clearly she is trained in the art of mind reading with her eyes all shifty-like.

When our dance in the aisle ended, I noticed two boxes resting neatly above eye level. Rejoicing on the inside, I felt comforted knowing that I too would get to leave the store a vacuum owner.

Collection of cleaning apparatus - complete; new passport stamp – check.

State of emergency

As I post, Trinidad should be a ghost town. Hours ago, people hustled to make their way home before the government-imposed curfew at 9 p.m.; or opted to take the high-road by adopting our infamous “bounce me nah!” attitude (one that causes us to test the limits in any given situation) to knock back some drinks at a favourite watering hole. After all, this wouldn't be the first time Trinidadians have faced a curfew and limed through it.

News of the “limited state of emergency” came to me the way I receive most of my up-to-the-minute information these days – Facebook and Blackberry Messenger status updates. “Spectating” from Toronto, I felt disconnected and sad. I knew my home, more specifically, my neighbourhood would appear on the list of “hot spots” under suspicion from the police.

I grew up in Belle Vue on a breezy hill. To this day, regardless of the place or time, any feeling of a warm breeze against my skin immediately transports me back to Sunday afternoons filled with the smells of sugar being burnt to prepare stewed chicken, the sight of our living room curtains billowing over me as I napped on the couch, and the sounds of rockers (reggae) being carried through the air.

I knew all of my neighbours, even sampled their pots from time to time. I was known as Ms. Esther's daughter, the woman who drove the Datsun Sunny, and felt respected and protected (of course boys will be boys and as developing girl I received my fair share of “psst.... family/darkie/glasses/slim” propositions over the years.)

Like my own, many of the families in the neighbourhoods' three areas (Belle Vue, Dundonald Hill, Debe) were kept a float by a single parent. While income levels ran low, for the most part, we had our own privileged class living among us - a common characteristic in countries of the developing world. Truthfully, there were times when even I felt privileged as I was driven to school by my mother wearing the uniform of a “prestige school” and enjoyed regular nights eating out. Around Christmas time, hard up for work, young men and women who came to our home looking for odd jobs left with some small payment and bags filled with extra goodies that mummy gave without judgement.

But....the criminal element was always there. There were gangs and gang leaders who assumed reptilian pseudonyms. Some were before my time and apparently tame in comparison to those of today. You were sure to find a piper (drug addict) in your yard at some point raiding your fruit trees or lightening up your clothes line. I knew the smell of weed from early on, had even seen my very own “homemade” gun, and never mistook the sound of a firecracker for that of a gunshot. But, I wasn't scared.

Then a shift started taking place. It started within me. I started noticing how often our garbage remained stinking at the entrance to the trace leading to my house; how many times we didn't have water but Federation Park did just a stone's throw away. I was seeing boys become men while liming on the block, instead of in their careers; girls become hardened women, scarred from too many baby fathers.

The neighbourhood changed. Soon enough, we had our first break-in – the ultimate betrayal. Even though I was already living abroad, I felt violated. But more than anything, I was livid. Things were escalating and there seemed to be an undercurrent pulling the area down.

Today, my little island with all its "hot spots" desperately needs a new shift. The challenges are not unique (the gap between the rich and poor, lack of opportunity, broken families) but, if left unattended, they will leave irreparable damage.

While it is unknown whether any real difference can be achieved in two weeks, it's better than not trying something. New Trinidad map (I stole this link from a friend's Facebook profile.They say if you don't laugh, you will cry.)

Train of thought

Subway rides, or any commute for that matter that doesn't involve taking control of the wheel, are great times for pause and reflection.

Today, my train of thought brought a memory of mummy and a private chuckle as I remembered her propensity to get vexed.

She got vexed when she was scared; vexed when she was hurt; vexed when she was sad; and vexed, of course, when she was supposed to be.

One Christmas, we were hanging curtains, a chore I was tasked to do once a year, and if I was home for a visit, that is part of the "puttin away the house" tradition that many a West Indian household toils hard at in December. I coaxed mummy into climbing onto a chair, a rocking one no less, to handle the curtain rod while I handed her the new sheers. Well boy! Almost in the same instance that her knees started to buckle and shake with fear, as she failed to balance precariously on the chair, she started to cuss. They were small words compared to some of her favourites. But two things were clear. She was too old for that "dotishness" (aka climbing) and I, the young and capable one, was not to ask her to oblige ever again.

The Long Silence

It was a grey day in Toronto today; not unlike my 30th birthday a few days ago. It was April 26 and the messages and calls started coming through early in the morning. But a specific number was never displayed on my caller id and I didn't hear the rendition of “Happy Birthday” that I most wanted to hear. This birthday was not only significant as I “crossed over” to new age territory, but it also marked the first milestone that mummy and I would not be able to celebrate in some way.

I've begun to think about mummy's death as The Long Silence. Living “in foreign” and away from all the things that would remind me of her makes me feel like I'm in a cocoon. And when I realize, in those quiet moments, that I can't simply reach out to her or dial the first phone number I ever had and hear her laughter as she admits to "beppin" in front of the T.V. that is watching her more than she is watching it, I panic. My heart races, my breath quickens and I relive that moment. The news is made fresh once again. And, depending when the moment hits, I swallow hard, force my breathing to slow down and refocus.

On my birthday I tried very hard to remember her singing. But in the end, I was not quite sure whose voice I was hearing, hers or mine. I'm still hoping for the former.

Cut Eye Meets One Bag Too Many

I hate being that passenger. You know, the one on public transit who is balancing too many bags, while trying to find a seat close enough to the door so that he/she steps on the least number of feet possible upon exit. Sigh. But today, I was that passenger and it reminded me of a great performance of subway theatre that I dubbed "Cut Eye Meets One Bag Too Many."

******

8:26 a.m. - The height of rush hour. I got on the train, remained standing and sandwiched myself between a pole and about a dozen people. As I was just about to enter my ‘zen’ place with my book in tow, the door chimed open at the next stop and in she walked... one-bag-too-many. Impeccably dressed and oblivious to those around her, she barreled through the train as if it were empty, dragging at least three bags at her feet and two hitched up on her hips. My girl then squeezed in front of me to grab the only available seat and nearly mash up ah foot with one of her over-sized treasures. The offender was a black, boxy briefcase on wheels and the unsuspecting victim, female, was pissed.

Now, let me pause at this point to mention that when I moved to Toronto and became a cog in the commuter-super machine I learned very quickly how to pass the time in lieu of reading material, sleepiness, etc. It’s simple. When yuh get tired reading the same subway/bus ad, start to maco! This is how I managed to witness the delivery of a cut-eye so sweet that it made me lose my place on the page I was reading altogether.

If you don’t know what a cut-eye is, you have never received one.

The injured, a.k.a. cut-eye, recovered quickly enough, but I would pay plenty more than a penny to hear the thoughts that ran across her mind in sync with her deadly glance. (aye aye moment: Most communication on public transit is non-verbal simply because it's safer. Always assume that you are travelling with at least one person crazier than you.)