Friday, June 6, 2008

Kind Souls at MBPJ

Dear God, thank you for reminding me that you are taking care of me and ensuring that I get to where I want to go safely. I do appreciate this and can feel the love but God, next time, can you also tell me which am the right road to take to go home fast and safe especially with the petrol price increased so drastically yesterday. Really couldn’t afford to drive one big circle and go through two tolls as I did yesterday. Thank you God. Amen.

OK! That is done! Got you all thinking what is this JenJen talking about didn’t I? Well, I got myself a parking overtime summon the other day when I had to go to the bank to pay for my visa application fee. I had no idea that over here, when you put coupon for half hour and you parked longer than that, you will get a summon. In Kch, there is no such thing. If you put a coupon for half hour and parked for more than that, when you come back, you will see a slip requesting you to go to the nearest booth to pay the extra time, in this case it will be additional RM0.53.

But in KL, it seems that even if you have a parking coupon for half hour and if you park over half hour, you get a summon immediately. And my friends, the summon is NOT cheap. The starting fine is RM30 and the longer you take to settle the summon, the higher the fine will be. Of course, if you get to their HQ, you can make a plea to reduce the fine. And to make matter worse, Majlis Bandaraya Petaling Jaya (MBPJ) does not have online payment facilities yet. So, had to go all the way to MBPJ to make payment. Me being new here and everything, had cleverly search the internet for road map to find the best way to get there.

Of course, the super clever me did not bother to check how to get OUT of the place to the RIGHT road! Can’t blame me too much on this because in Kch, they don’t build road this complicated. In Kch, it seems that the direction to and from it is very clear cut. Where you go in, is usually where you go out as well. But not in KL! Oh no. You can go in from the south side and then having to turn many turnings and then you might end up going out on the north side, or maybe it was the east side or perhaps west exit? And each of this exits leads to different highways! FAINT! I think I need to take a deep breath even as I type this.

Back to yesterday. I left the office around 4pm. Thongs has actually kindly offered to call me around 3pm to explain how to get there. But last minute, can’t take her call at all because boss ask for a meeting. So, at 4pm, I quickly pack and leave and office and praying really hard that I will be able to find the building and not get lost. Of course, I FORGOT to pray so that the road is clear with no jam and that I will be able to get out of the place using the road going to the exits that I want to go. Initially, the there were only a slight jam on the LDP highway just outside Bandar Utama. Then the jam eased off until I reach the turn off near the cable bridge to the Federal Highway.

As I never been there at that time of the day, I was disappointed but not surprised to see a crawling jam there. I thought this is normal for Fedral Highway. In fact, after crawling for about 1km, I realized that the jam was caused by 2 car accident on the right lane. I was driving like a maniac by then because it was only 20minutes to 5 and of course, I was weaving from one lane to another as I was not familiar with the road and was not sure where the turn off is. When I finally parked, it was about 10minutes to 5 and I was praying really hard that for some reasons, the MBPJ cashier in the payment counter is still open. Wishful thinking I know because by the time I got there, it was 2-3minutes before 5 and not a single cashier was in sight!

However, as I was saying, God was taking care of me. HE make sure that there are two super kind soul at the other counters that is willing to help lost innocent me (blink blink! HAHAHA! I wanted to put ‘lost innocent cute me’ but I think I better not make you puke). Not only did the young man and uncle told me in a very nice way that the payment counters here are closed but the young man even call the HQ to see if the payment counters there are still open! Using his own handphone some more! I was already impressed by this but was happily shocked when he asked me for my summons and when I said it ‘melted’ in the rain (don’t laugh lar!), he took my car plate and print out a copy. AND THEN he proceed to ask the one remaining cashier that is packing up to put a stamp that says ‘ Reduce to RM10’!

While he was running around doing this for me, I chit chat with the uncle. He too was very nice and friendly. After getting the summon stamped, the young man proceed to tell me that I don’t have to go back there to make payment. Instead, I can just post the summon together with the money order or bank draft. He even proceeded to give me the payee name and posting address! I was all wide eyes and smile by then. Hardly know how to thank them except to say thank you again and again. I think I was even smiling cheerfully when I was waiting for the lift because the guys in the lift are smiling back at me too! (I told babe that it was because they can’t resist me! LOL!)

After the high, I of course came crashing down when I realized that I do not know how to get out of the place and back to the Federal Highway to LDP via the cable bridge underpass! I don’t even know where I drove to yesterday. All I know is that I follow the road signs that say Damansara or Bandar Utama or Puchong. I was thinking either I will end up at my office area or end up near the place I stay now. Turn out I went through 2 tolls and finally turn out to LDP just before SS2. Sigh, big big big turn. When I told babe, first thing he asked, you know how to go back? And when I say yeah, on LDP already but had to make big turn and pay 2 tolls, then the next thing he said, waste petrol. AIYEH!!! SO BAD!!! Hhmppff!

So, that was my adventure yesterday. And lesson learnt? Remember to check the map for the ROAD back out too! Hahaha…

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