It’s another sleepy afternoon. My brain’s all scattered with the MSSQL codes I’m still trying to figure out. My thoughts turn towards the conversation I had with my best friend, Terai last night. It’s been a long time since I heard her voice and the call was certainly very amusing.

Our conversation ranged from how she has finally discovered just how useful a blog is. She says she has enjoyed posting entries on her blog. She mentioned that she had to stop herself from posting more entries because it looked ridiculous that all her entries were from the same date. *laugh* She is such a sweetheart. (Note to self : Must find time to design a better layout for her site) We also talked a bit about how Julius found himself blogging as well. Here’s a guy who’s probably very busy with Med School yet finds the time to blog about Donuts and post scary pictures of some of their medical activities (i.e. dissecting this poor dead baby). Terai said she was grossed out when she saw the pics. I, myself was shocked, but was not grossed out.

In the middle of our conversation, Terai suddenly interrupts me and told me to hold on. She had a client to attend to on the other phone. So, I wait patiently for her to come back. I could hear her on the background talking to the client. The first one was trying to ask how much balance she had on her account. Terai tells me there’s a law that prohibits them to tell the actual contents of a person’s bank account to whoever was inquiring even if they successfully verified their identity. What does she do? The caller mentions an estimate of the account balance and Terai confirms whether it is higher or lower than the actual amount. It’s like that tv game, The Price is Right, where you guess if the value of an item is higher or lower.

Another call came in a little later only this time I could actually hear Terai swearing from time to time. I was of course laughing my a** off on my end of the line. It was hilarious. Apparently, the caller was Korean who couldn’t speak or understand English that well. Terai was trying hard to let him/her know that whatever she wanted, she had to go to a specific bank branch which opens only on Mondays, Thursdays and Fridays. Listening to her side of the conversation, I couldn’t help but thinking, “Exactly, what part of ‘the bank is closed’ doesn’t ring a bell in that client’s head?” Terai found herself saying “The bank opens on Thursday, because it’s closed on Tuesdays and Wednesdays”, at least four times, and “It opens at 11 o’clock in the morning”, at least three times. Occasionally, I could her hear swear. She must have been getting frustrated. Of course the person on the other line couldn’t hear her swear. I remember her telling me that they press this mute button when they want to block out what they say to the caller. This button has gotten them in occasional trouble too. There are times that it won’t work, so they end up swearing at the clients and they hear it.

I’m sure that if I were at her job, I’d probably lose my cool and start screaming at clients. I’m not a people person. They’ll just get on my nerves I think. Thank god I don’t have to deal with the people Terai deals with. To you Ters, may you have more patience and learn more languages to swear in!