Very very hot and mosquitoes buzzing around… Got some breeze but still can not attenuate the heat. Wish that at least at night we could have some rains and a nice temperature to ease our warrior’s sleep. Yesterday only slept 3 hours. Tried to recap the loss during the day but the bed reminds me of sauna and all i could do is to take a nap on the ground. Damnit how can the Japanese sleep on the ground. It’s so hard!!! 
Wet Wednesday! Not soaked but my office would be stinking tomorrow. This happens when there is heavy rainfalls and water would sneak into the walls and the rest is history.
Early afternoon, the meteorological station issued a torrential rain warning, which implied that schools were requested to let their students go home. Same goes for tertiary sector. Public sector employees were invited to leave before 1600 hrs so as to avoid the usual bottlenecks. At some point in time, there was a rumour in the office that buses would cease to operate at 1500 hrs but i guess this was only an excuse for early leaving.
When i was about to leave at 1630hrs, a colleague told me to take a look at GRNW river. He said that he had never witnessed the spectacle before. So when going over the bridge, i just glanced over. The sight was indeed breathtaking. The river had over flooded its bed and the millions of tons of mud water were rampaging the metallic structure of the bridge. On its pavement, people were gathering trying to take a look at the level of the river. Needless to say the couple of habitats which were built near the bed were completely devastated. Hoping that the 1930 news would diffuse this event, i went on my way and was later disillusioned. But nonetheless, there were other places where river beds had been over flooded and tons of liters of mud waters either obstructed roads or carried lives and even claimed them as had been the case of a 13 year old student whose body had been later found together with a 50 year old woman.
Ex-Lola did bring us plenty of water but paradoxically the main reservoir is still 70% full, while others are near full. There was even an article in the morning press in which a hydrological expert stated that there were signs of water leakages on the walls of the reservoir.The 1930 news interview of the minister of public utilities denied such allegations and had condemned such misleading reporting.
Weather forecast for the evening and tomorrow: rays for the north and west, but still bad news for the east, south and central plateau. But weather is expected to become fairer as ex lola continue to leave our region.
Today while reading yesterday’s paper, i came across an article on the success of a familial company. This company came into existence 40 years back when the founder tried to introduce he first locally made toothpaste. Blendax was then made known to the public. 4o years later, the brand is still going strong. When i read the article, i could not help remembering its advert. It was in the late 80s or early 90s. A woman and a man, one always on a bike. There was eye contact and then there was star coming out of the mouth of either the man or woman. The ad would end with an off-voice. Don’t remember it well. The strikingly white teeth of the protagonists impacted on me as i urged my parents to purchase the paste. I would vigorously brushed my teeth so that eventually they would turn brand white. Needless to say, nothing happened. At that age, was complete fool and gullible to everything adults would say. Like a tree would grow on the head if you happened to swallow a grain fruit. Souvenir souvenir!!! BTW, happy celebrations Mauritius!
Following the resignation of the receptionist two weeks back, they were quick to enrol another. This time, the new recruit(let’s call her “M”) boldly informed the boss and his wife about the heat and sunshine. They quickly replied that they would be fixing a film on the ceiling. Time knows when this will done. In the meantime, my assistant asked for a fortnight leave. So i am left alone. The boss wanted M to assist me but i declined this invitation as it would imply re-explaining and re-supervising which would involve much more time than if i were to be doing the job.
Much to my dismay, M is new to the world of work, freshly left academics. When the boss told me that M knows about word processing and spreadsheet(may be she told him that during the interview) my first thought was that she knew the basics. First of all, she did not know how to save, nor about cells formatting. Poor me!!! Needless to say, in the meantime the boss wanted such and such reports, which i am taking time to produce. My first thought was to give such tasks to M. It was not a complicated task. She just had to input monthly data on a spreadsheet. I overestimated her. When i sample checked some data, i simply did not understand where the figures came from. So she reworked the sheet …four times, over two days. The problem is not that she took two days to do the report, it was the number of times she had to redo the work. When i commented, she replied that it was her first time working on a workstation, and that the assignment i gave her was not simple… I refrained from bursting into anger and instead told her that it was a simple matter of checking whether the input were as the paper. This was the first and last time, i gave her to type a report for me. All assignments would be filing and dummy works. Now i really hope that she is filing correctly. I really do not have time to check her work over and over. So that was my work load over the past weeks. Still not yet over, and still not over the reports the boss is asking.
Following my previous post, a development occurred. The receptionist resigned. Surprised?? Well, yes and no. She did mention that she will be “mange zot la vie” if she did not get another job. Matter of fact, if she resigned this means that she got another better paid job. Good for her…
The day before she resigned, she was absent. On D-day, when she submitted her resignation, she told the boss that she is giving her 14 days notice as prescribed by the law. Surprisingly (no surprise to me, though), the boss told her that she can leave immediately if she wants and that he would be paying her the full month. The receptionist decided to stay for a full day and at the end, (another surprise!!) the boss gave her a hand shake… Unbelievable!!!! He does not usually give handshake. I guess that he badly wanted her to leave that he expressed his gratitude in this way.
Well, do not know how long the next one will hang. I am not naughty but just expressing the facts. To be continued…
Not deviating from the usual posts, I have decided to write about my place of work. This time, instead of relating things that happened to me, i will be writing about the series of unfortunate events befalling a colleague.
Everything was going fine, until the day the boss’ son in law found a diskette containing the receptionist’s CV. Needless to say, the sister took knowledge of the fact, and thereafter thought that the receptionist is going to leave. The fission process started. There was a series of remarks made on the receptionist. The funniest things about those remarks is that they were not directly made to her but through x, y, z. When the receptionist knew of those remarks, she did not pay any slightest attention.
Yesterday was the drop which overflowed the vase. The boss’ wife barged into my office and told me that the receptionist is not doing her job properly. She was working on payroll and found out while checking the attendance book that some workers did not fill in their time slots. The receptionist was supposed to check the attendance book to make sure that all workers filled in the slot, according to her.
The grapevine starts now. The wife phoned me later in the morning to tell me to inform the receptionist that his husband is not happy with the way things are going. Since she told me to inform the receptionist, i reported that to her. The receptionist in turn told me to inform the wife that ’she was only helping out and if she were to do the attendance thing, her salary will have to be raised’. I communicated the reply to the wife. Upon hearing, she was shocked and dazzled. She then stormed into her husband’s office and later on, the receptionist was called into the boss’s office. We could hear loud shouts and talks. Each was replying to each other.
In the end, it was decided between the two parties that the receptionist would be tendering phone calls and checking on attendance. Later on when i queried about what was said in the boss’s office, the receptionist said that she vomited every qualms and problems she encountered during work including the heat and sunshine. For the heat, the boss bought a stand fan (a poor palliative when considering the structure of the office), and as for the sunshine, he told her to move away from the hub. Again not a solution since between the two hubs there is a pole. Needless to say, after this fortuitous meeting relationship between wife and worker was gashed. And the intermediary is none other than me. I think that for me too it is high time to become “regardant”.
As things stand, i sincerely think that the boss intend to do everything to make the receptionist resign on her own. A pleasure that the receptionist does not intend to offer… To be continued! Stay tuned for next time.
For how long Mauritians will bear the ever increasing cost of living.? After the nth increase in various commodities, flour and bread henceforth weigh heavy in the the household’s basket. The traditional pain maison which was sold at rs 2.15 is now available at rs 2.65. The baguette is now priced at rs 5.50, a rise of rs 1.0. Flour per pound is selling at rs 6.90 It is to be expected that following the price increase in flour, derivatives such as dholl puri, ‘roti’, cakes will cost higher. I remember getting 10 pairs of dholl puri with rs 30., but now with this same amount, i can get only 3 pairs, with less dholl. The association of bread manufacturers shows some relief with the decision taken by the government but nonetheless expected a higher increase.
I think it’s high time that i bake my own bread. Some flour. yeast and water and hop everything in the oven. But with the hectic life Mauritians are, it is in silence that they will be bearing the ever increasing cost of living. What will be the next target, water?? Will there be a declic, if any?
It’s been very very hot lately. Yesterday, i woke up at 1.00 am because it was too hot. I simply can’t sleep. I went downstairs and switched on the television. There was a french film aired and without conviction i watched it till three. Needless to say, when i woke up at seven, my eyes were very sleepy and sored. But i had to go to work. I did not do much at work, except some filing. And after 3 hours of ‘hard work’, off home. After lunch, i dashed back to my bedroom where i dozed for one hour, feeling somehow energised by that somewhat one hour rest.
Heat waves in the mean time continue to radiate through the walls and the intense light reflected from panes and white walls. Wind, please blow!! Rain please fall!! Please hear a sinner’s prayers!! Damnit i have a headache now. What’s next?
It’s been 4 weeks since my boss and family left for holidays, and left some follow-ups for me to do. One of those included liasing with a freight forwarder company for delivery of a container to our premises. Piece of cake i said to myself.
I was completely wrong!!! There were some problems inherent to it. Firstly when i phoned the company, i was told there were some outstanding demurrage charges with we did not pay, and in this context they could not deliver unless these charges are cleared. Surprises kept on coming when i further learned that the container had been in Mauritius since 36 days!!!! I was dazzled!! Why did he keep matter pending for so long? God knows. To avoid the sword from cutting my head, i smsed the boss, having in mind also that now i will ruining his holidays! Eye for an eye!!!
He replied to me two days later, urging me to contact Mrs ‘X’ telling her that we badly need the parts etc. Failing to get a positive response, the boss decided to bypass the forwarder company and use another one instead. i transmitted the message to Mrs ‘X’. The latter replied that bill has already been processed and they were waiting payment for clearing. Needless to say, i forwarded the msg to my boss. He phoned me later on and pressed me to reply to the company verbatim, that he did not ask them to pass the bill and it is up to them to ‘demerder’ because we wanted the documents back. There was no further correspondence until my boss called me and informed me that he managed to talk to Mrs ‘X’ and that they will do needful for clearing of goods. Two weeks had already elapsed since the bill and the outstanding charges. When i phoned to enquire abt status i was told that original bill of lading was missing and that it was still with supplier. I phoned the latter and he told me that he will check. Two days after christmas and still not reply. I decided to ‘harass’ the supplier until i get a reply. He said he had sent the docs on Friday. When he faxed the AWB to me, i noticed that he sent the docs on Saturday. Needless to say, the docs reached Mauritius on Monday 31st December and we got the docs on the 3rd January 2008. The container reached our premises three days ago.
Boss reached Mauritius two days ago and asked for a feedback. I told him that container was delivered day before. He said he is very unhappy with the service provided by the company and would be meeting them as soon as he gets an updated statement. To him, demurrage was incurred because the company failed to handle an order. I was barely listening to him. Am glad he came back because the file was handled by him and returned to him. One burden less on my shoulders.
As you are all aware, according to the CWA, Mauritius is facing acute water shortages. The same organism predicts that the actual water levels in our reservoirs will last for two months at most, should no rain falls. There was an incident lately concerning water supply in the region of Roche Bois whereby inhabitants did not receive water supply for four consecutive days. They expressed their discontent by blocking the trunk road. The CWA reached a compromise that during the festive period, they would receive full supply and thereafter, the cut programme would be in place.
Heat and plenty of sunshine are predictions for the new year,and hopefully plenty of rain. Cockroaches are messing around lately. Does that pre-sign heavy rainfalls? Since morning there have been spells of showers but insufficient to fill the reservoirs. They are very shy lately. El Nino?