Friday, September 30, 2011

My Experience at Padini Warehouse Sale 2011, Glenmarie

Something happened that compelled me to write today's post. I feel a sense of fury as I'm writing it...


Following the crowd

Remind me next time not to come for any warehouse sales organized by companies other than book publishers. Imagine, I went there to Padini's warehouse in Glenmarie at nine-thirty, hoping to enter and complete the shopping within an hour. Boy, was I wrong!

No matter what the reason, it is just preposterous to know that they had opened just a tiny space for people to enter. Come on, man, with people squeezing from left, right and center, how does one expect the crowd to move at a faster rate when only a bunch of them is allowed in at one time? You tell me.


The huge crowd that seemed to grow and grow....

We were waiting and waiting and waiting for what seemed like an eternity and the crowd almost slipped onto the road, blocking the normal business of those offices nearby. Some of them pushed and shoved their way in, almost knocking a couple of others into the drain below!


From my angle

I had caught sight of a couple of young-looking shoppers who had taken pictures of the whole scenario. I really thought that they were bloggers who were about to blog about their experience.


Risking their lives in order to get across

By the time it was ten, I was sweating buckets and reddening with anger. It isn't fair that those coming from the sides could enter while we, middle people, had to stand under the scorching sun burning our skin. I don't know about the others, but I was reddening with anger. I was more than ready to throw in the towel if it weren't for the squashing that took place left, right and center. I almost toppled over myself!

Then, these two youngsters started arguing with each other about the shoving.

"Hey, stop the pushing! There's a big drainage here!"

"If you know that there's a drainage there, then why the hell did you stand there for? You don't have brains, is it?"

It weren't the exact sentences, but I have done my best to translate it to English.

"Shhh!" another lady insisted.

"Maybe I should have pushed you down after all."



Crazy, huh?

I called Mama Carrie on the phone and told her that I had enough of waiting under the sun. Not only my face reddened with anger, but my skin and ears looked like they were on fire! I wasn't the only one who had given up; many others had done so too, having had enough of the endless wait.


Cars missing the humans by mere meters

I didn't want to return as I had enough of the crowd, but Mama Carrie wanted to give it another shot. And so, we returned and battled a ten minute traffic congestion that had started in the morning, thinking that the crowd would have dispersed for an afternoon break, but we were so wrong. They were still there patiently waiting and being soaked in their own sweat to enter.

It rained during the return trip and we were caught in another traffic congestion, with the rising waters licking at the wheels.

I'm not willing to be in another flash flood after that episode.

To the management of Padini, you guys should have at least expected the huge crowd when advertizing the warehouse sale online instead of leaving us - the poor crowd - waiting and sweltering under the burning sun.

I may be a member, but what's the point of being a member when there is no advantage? For example, take the foreign furniture store named Ikea. They would always spare a couple of hours of the first day of their sales to valued card members before making it public for the second day onwards.

I don't see how the warehouse sale couldn't have been done the same way. I hope this doesn't mean that you don't treasure - and value - your members because if that's true, where's the advantage?

Before you even think of organizing the next one, please give a thought to humungous crowd and the traffic congestion that it'll cause. With that being said, it was lucky that the warehouse sale ended on Saturday or the Sunday Church parishioners will not be happy with you.

The whole of Hicom Glenmarie Industrial Park was congested to the brim with humans and cars alike and the 3-way intersection suffered a bottleneck while you were trying to control the amount of people who could enter at a time.

Here's a question for the management to ponder: What would you have done if someone was really injured by the pushing and shoving?

I'm so appalled by the whole experience that I vow never to step into another warehouse sale!

Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Crying




Terry Fator, winner of America's Got Talent '07, performs 'Crying' with Winston the Turtle.

Wednesday, September 14, 2011

Flash Flood


Residents who pass this area daily would know where this place is.

The water has covered the entire road of the area. Even the water pipe has almost been submerged. The long piece of steel that you see with the little blue thing is actually the top of the pipe.



You can't quite see the depth of the water as the rain marred the picture, but let me tell you, it was so high that crossing it would mean risking the car engines.

A couple of cars did just that and made it out without "murdering" their engines, but there was a sole casualty: the Mercedes driver waited in the middle of the road with his emergency lights switched on while waiting for the tow truck to arrive.

We were both frightened when it was our turn. Mama Carrie was too worried about taking the risk and all I wanted was to head home. I didn't want to be stuck in a stationary car, worrying that the water level would steadily rise. I'd have taken it a shot, but but our car was a sedan. Not a 4-wheel drive like a (Ssangyong) Rexton or a (Suzuki) Vitara.



A Malay lady came from one of the cars waiting behind to investigate on the sudden traffic congestion. Mama Carrie suggested that she could perhaps ask some of the cars in the middle to reverse and to U-turn to clear the congestion.

It worked, but the two cars behind me thought it was still safe to drive pass. With a sigh in my heart, I slid out of the car (where there was less water, obviously) and knocked on the car door to plead with them. Intense fear must have been written all over my face because the lady behind me looked so worried. Slowly but surely, the ones with less bravery turned their backs on their intended destination and drove, searching for another access.

In all my years of living in this township, I have never seen or experienced a flash flood personally. It was such a scary experience that I don't see myself on that road during a heavy rain. Never!

刘家昌 & 郑欣宜 - 连心

The tears glimmered in my eyes throughout the song as it felt emotional. Maybe it's because I know the language deep enough to understand the lyrics.

Wednesday, September 7, 2011

The Telephone Call

Weird is all I can say.



I wasn't too happy that my sleep had been interrupted by my ringing cellphone. Without looking at the caller ID, I flipped open my phone and answered, but there was no noise.

I thought that it was the work of a prankster and scrolled to the call list in the hopes that the number was familiar.

My eyebrow was raised when the recent caller happened to be Bya.

Monday, September 5, 2011

9/5/2011

How long do I have to wait for the modem to be returned to me?

When can I have a stable Internet line?

I've had enough.

Thursday, September 1, 2011

Play Hard, Work Hard, Study Hard

There were a couple of groans in the background when the teacher mentioned that we had to exchange seats with each other.



I had walked towards the person seated on my original seat and told her that I'll return during the break to collect the bottle of tea that I had left at the foot of the table. When I returned to my new seat, another classmate had caught hold of me and asked whether I'd like to join her on her table. I politely declined, saying that I had already exchanged mine with someone else.

Over the weekend, another friend of mine and I had a modeling gig at the concourse of one shopping mall.

When it was our turn, we let out a breath and graced the runway in our attire - swimwear - while we tried to be natural and swallow our nervousness.

Don't growl! Think before you speak...

Miss, let me pose a question to you.

"How would you have felt if your car has been blocked by someone who's not only taking his own sweet time to depart but had the nerve to growl instead?"

Okay, if what you said was really true, don't blame us. There wasn't a sign to inform the driver about it! Not even a painted parking space like the ones behind.

Would you've reacted the way Mama Carrie did? You tell me. In the first place, if you wanted to double park, you should've made sure that you caused no inconvenience to anyone. Simple as that.
Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...