It's not the heat, it's...oh wait...it is the heat.
1 Comments Published by Brian on Saturday, July 08, 2006 at 3:52 PM.
So I’ve been keeping quiet about something this past week, but it’s become an ongoing issue, so I guess I’ll spill it.
My air-conditioner went on the blink last Sunday, just a day after I wrote that other post where I talked about how I’d been humbled after complaining about the weather. I guess “someone” wanted to drive the point home, just in case I hadn’t fully gotten the message. In case He, She or It is reading this, I get it already!
The first couple of days without air-con, it felt weird, but thankfully it wasn’t too hot. I wasn’t miserable. Rather I think it was the psychological effect of feeling powerless over my environment that was most upsetting. We called the repairman on Monday, but he said he couldn’t come to my home till Wednesday evening. On that day, he came and replaced an aluminum tubular looking thing and charged me 40,000 won for it. He said, through a colleague who translated for me via cell phone, that this repair should do it, but if it didn’t the next repair would be very expensive. He didn’t elaborate. “Very expensive” was all he said. He got to work, and 20 minutes later cold air was once again pumping out of my A/C unit. When he left, I sat down and relaxed for the first time in three days, then about 45 minutes later noticed the temperature in my apartment wasn’t going down. I put my hand to the air vent. Warm air. Shit! Shit! Fuck! Shit! And so on…
I spent the rest of the evening melting into a physical and psychological puddle. I tend to overreact to life’s bumpy spots is all I’m saying.
One of my main worries was how to handle the situation with my school, because I could easily see it blowing up into a great big problem if it wasn’t dealt with correctly, and I knew there was a high probability of me not dealing with it correctly. I chose humor, as in “Can you believe it? It’s the darndest thing, but that crazy air-conditioner still doesn’t work. Hahahaha…so I guess the school’s gonna pay to get it fixed, right?" They didn't laugh.
To fast forward a little bit, I said I didn’t think I should pay. The school office administrator agreed, but felt the school shouldn’t pay either. That left the building owner. (It’s his apartment after all, right?) Well, he wasn’t having any of that. He threw it back to the school. The school then said in principle they’d like to help, but because of some anti-corruption school-policy babble (I’m not kidding) they were unable to spend the money. That part made me angry. It’s not as if I were asking them to buy me a PlayStation.
The way we left it is that the repair guy will come again next Tuesday and have a deeper look at the problem, then we’ll have to decide how much it will cost, and who should pay. My colleague’s ballpark guess is in the range of 300,000-500,000 won (300-500 USD). Thing is, that will mean delaying the repairman at least another day if not more.
So here’s the thing: Many years ago this roommate of a friend of mine had a note on his bathroom mirror. It said, “Do you want to be right, or do you want results?” Since yesterday I’ve been thinking I have a choice. Either I can be right and sweaty, or they can be right and I can be cool. What would you do?
My air-conditioner went on the blink last Sunday, just a day after I wrote that other post where I talked about how I’d been humbled after complaining about the weather. I guess “someone” wanted to drive the point home, just in case I hadn’t fully gotten the message. In case He, She or It is reading this, I get it already!
The first couple of days without air-con, it felt weird, but thankfully it wasn’t too hot. I wasn’t miserable. Rather I think it was the psychological effect of feeling powerless over my environment that was most upsetting. We called the repairman on Monday, but he said he couldn’t come to my home till Wednesday evening. On that day, he came and replaced an aluminum tubular looking thing and charged me 40,000 won for it. He said, through a colleague who translated for me via cell phone, that this repair should do it, but if it didn’t the next repair would be very expensive. He didn’t elaborate. “Very expensive” was all he said. He got to work, and 20 minutes later cold air was once again pumping out of my A/C unit. When he left, I sat down and relaxed for the first time in three days, then about 45 minutes later noticed the temperature in my apartment wasn’t going down. I put my hand to the air vent. Warm air. Shit! Shit! Fuck! Shit! And so on…
I spent the rest of the evening melting into a physical and psychological puddle. I tend to overreact to life’s bumpy spots is all I’m saying.
One of my main worries was how to handle the situation with my school, because I could easily see it blowing up into a great big problem if it wasn’t dealt with correctly, and I knew there was a high probability of me not dealing with it correctly. I chose humor, as in “Can you believe it? It’s the darndest thing, but that crazy air-conditioner still doesn’t work. Hahahaha…so I guess the school’s gonna pay to get it fixed, right?" They didn't laugh.
To fast forward a little bit, I said I didn’t think I should pay. The school office administrator agreed, but felt the school shouldn’t pay either. That left the building owner. (It’s his apartment after all, right?) Well, he wasn’t having any of that. He threw it back to the school. The school then said in principle they’d like to help, but because of some anti-corruption school-policy babble (I’m not kidding) they were unable to spend the money. That part made me angry. It’s not as if I were asking them to buy me a PlayStation.
The way we left it is that the repair guy will come again next Tuesday and have a deeper look at the problem, then we’ll have to decide how much it will cost, and who should pay. My colleague’s ballpark guess is in the range of 300,000-500,000 won (300-500 USD). Thing is, that will mean delaying the repairman at least another day if not more.
So here’s the thing: Many years ago this roommate of a friend of mine had a note on his bathroom mirror. It said, “Do you want to be right, or do you want results?” Since yesterday I’ve been thinking I have a choice. Either I can be right and sweaty, or they can be right and I can be cool. What would you do?
Yeah, those final sentences about sum it up. Good luck!