Oh!pEnions: The Trip up North

The Trip up North

We were required to go up to the North for these two days as there were five customer sites waiting to be completed. One was in Taiping, then two were in Prai and two more were on the Penang island itself. Although the jobs were quite a lot due to our schedule, it turned out quite easy. But what was on my mind was the journey itself. I think I tend to fall asleep more when driving on long journey in the day than at night. With the Sun shining so brightly and just the straight road, I will doze off, even with some music blasting at my ears.

The Customer in Taiping
We needed to check if the customer has enough extension ports as they have a new staff. And this would also mean that they would need phone cabling too. So, after our site inspection, it was time to move on to the next customer in Prai. Since today was a Friday, most of the staff have gone for their Friday prayers.

By the time we left, the argument was still going on. This because earlier on, there was a very aggressive young lady driving a schoolbus heading on the wrong way of a one way street. She had hit a young kid and instead of stopping the bus to help, she ran off. So, the kid chased after her and made her stop. And in the ensuing argument, she denied she did anything wrong and still continued scolding the kid. By this time, a lot of witnesses came forward and trapped the bus. Then her friends came and it was a stand-off until the Police came.

This is the customer's PABX which needs a card expansion

The Customers in Prai
By the time we reached Prai, it was already mid-afternoon. So, we had to work pretty fast. The new staff had moved in and there was no phone for him. So, we engaged the main distributor to solve the task. But unfortunately, even with three cables in the room, they were not able to solve it. And by the time we arrived, it was the same, so we improvised to get the job done. In this line of work, where time is never on our side, we really need to improvise. And thankfully, the customer does not mind at all as long as they need was done. In actual fact, if we were to pull a fresh cable, it would have taken us more than a day and this would thrown our schedule out of the window.

We saw this lorry in Prai which went into the drain

It took two cranes to get it out

Luckily, I think, the driver is OK

By the time we arrived to the next customer, it was already after half-past five and most of them had left the office. Luckily, the Manager was still in, conducting a meeting with his Sales Staff. They had complained that one of their phones were out and it was not done even when the main distributor came. But after one of their Sales guy plugged it in, the phone was working fine. Still, we decided to check the system out, just in case. And it took us quite some time because the system was installed, in, of all the places, under the trophy cupboard.

Of all the places, we could only find it here, in
front of the Manager's desk

The installer did the best he can, due to the limited
in the box

And will the day's work done, it was time rest up in our Hotel before meeting up with Loctor for him to give me a very important information.

This is a very big ABC Ice Kacang and it tasted

damn sweet too. Ouch

The customers in Penang

This one needed a bit more work as we require to install eight phones and an extension card. Fortunately, it turned out we did not need to do them at all. Unfortunately, we were required to do other tasks such as relocating three extensions, a credit card line, a direct line and a fax line to the floor above. Then we activated two ports for the contractors once they have completed renovating the Ground floor for two new staff. And the main contractor was quite upset, (not or fault) because their cabling contractor has pulled insufficient (telephone) cables and also pulled all the Network cables to the wrong room which has no ventilation whatsoever. So, I decided to help him out (on the phone part) and he was quite grateful.

When it came to moving stuff, you can be guaranteed that there would be a lot of confusion because everyone would try to help but ended up giving conflicting instructions or forming wrong opinions. When it comes to this, sometimes you really have to take control of things. For example, earlier on, the staff told me that they wanted to have their credit card machines next to their table but when we were about to implement, they would say other things such as moving to a spot where there are no cabling. I have experienced this before and after complying with their wishes, they would call us back and ask us to move it to their original position (because the damn machine was too far from their tables). So, having learnt from that, I put stood my ground and told her that it is better to put it next to her table, even if its bulky. In the end, the main con compromised and put a small table next to her (since I had made a good impression to him)

There! Its in the middle of the table.
Satisfied?

Later on, before we left, there was another extension whi
ch was out since 2005. This was the extension which I had prepared quite sometime ago but mysteriously stopped working after the new tables were setup nearby. So, I used my tools (and luck) to trace the faulty cable (next blog) and rectified it. He knows that the cable has a problem for a long time but he could not afford to get the cable guy back in time to rectify it since it takes quite some time to redo the whole thing, not to mention costs.

On the way out, we saw this old PBX, which I think is an OKI

And for a machine so old, it has already used SMT. Wow

The Arena, which is Jusco's Food Court, has enough

smoke to start a haze and it makes sure your clothes
remind you that you have been there. Not only that
but they managed to keep the irritating coupon thing
running where you have to order, get the coupon, go
pay for it and come back to wait in queue for your
food where the chef makes sure its as delicious as
wallpaper