Down Under

Sorry, might not be blogging for quite sometime as am in need to calm down for a bit after rows of dissapointment with my university that has not paid me for all my lecturing works for the past two months now.

Arrrrghhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!

Born on the Same Day

God! At last I'd managed to get round to blogging about this! sorry, Geoff that it took me ages to settle down and right about this!

So, here we go:

One of my very active explorative mate has opened a new project called Born on the Same Day. You might already knew him long before as being one of the "crazy guy" (Neil is the other half) that got into Guinness Book of Record in September 2004 for visiting 275 tube stations in 18hours 35minutes and 43 seconds. I am not going to blab more about it as you can see what it is about on Geoff's web and the Tube Challenge charity gesture written officially by Annie Mole and here.

So, anyway, back to the point! Geoff and Pete is having a project called Born on the Same Day and both whom "appear to have a strange bet on who can be the first to find fifty people" that share their birthday.

By the way, if you are wondering, I am on Geoff's side of betting :) So please, if you have some time, click on their website and happy entering your birthday, your cousins', your parents', your sisters', your brothers', your enemies', your neighbours', ..... etc! and see whether it matched to Geoff's or Pete's!

Have fun!

PS: the Official Logo will be up soon!

Politics...politics...politics

I hate politics! and apparently no matter where I am, it always comes up and surrounds me!

I had just experienced one in my own University of Brighton. Not a surprise as it never as liberal as I thought it should be, but to experience it in my own School Division, that's ashame!

Eventhough am not badly affected by it (yet), at the end of the day, the students will be the one that suffer the most.

*deep sigh*

Lewes Bonfire night 2005

Despite everyone warning us that it will be packed with people (the police we were talking to said it's about 80,000 people expected on that day), me and Jon (with him grumbling the entire queue) decided to give it a go and braced ourselves by joining the queue of the pack crowds waiting for train from Brighton Station to Lewes at 6pm (Jon should have the pix up soon). Don't ask me why, but we manage to stand patiently for another half an hour to 45 minutes (with two evil glances I'd made to two very thick face people who leaped across the queue barrier and jumping the queue)! Not because of the trains that were running late, but basically because the train(s) trying to cope in huge number of people trying to get to Lewes. We need to wait for the third train to arrive before we were being able to be "transported" up to Lewes.

The parades were already on when we reached there but I can't say I enjoy it much since we arrived quite late and we were basically at the back of the crowds on the pavement. All I can see was this huge man's derriere! Despite me hopping up and down praying to catch a glimpse of the parade, I believed no one even actually noticed I was there! I literally need to get a "repeat" coverage by Jon who conveniently taking pictures using my cameras and show me the parade pictures through the viewing screen! How sad!! *grumble grumble*




























































The fireworks was amazing! Despite Jon saying that although he enjoyed it, it's still not the best he saw so far! *Yeah right*! However, for a person like me who never seen any fireworks in my life until 7 years ago, am quite amased by it!

We finished at about 12ish and the queue to get back to Brighton was even worse than when we were up to Lewes. Apparently, we managed to get back at about 1.30am the following day.

Dancing with SBE Repair Centre and Imate

If you fancy testing how patient you are - yourself, you better have the same experience like I did for this past two months!

Having an Imate Jam is a good thing if you fancy a pocket pc phone and when it's up and running. But, when it's time you need to send it for repair, that's when the moment of hell started.

About two months ago now, I had sent my own imate jam for repair to SBE Repair Centre (the only so-called official repair centre in the UK). After calling them beforehand (never knowing that that will be the last ever call that they will ever answer), I got back a quote of maximum around £120-130 to repair it (which is already bad enough). To my surprise, three weeks later, I received a letter from them quoting £350+ to repair it! The same price as buying a new unit!

The reason: housing bezel (scratched). Part to be repaired: *blank*.

Fuming furious, I tried to contact them by email, fax and phone call, requesting them to explain to me the reason for the quote, to no avail. Having reached a dead end, I had then raised the matter further to Expansys (where I bought it from), Imate (the maker) and Kent Trading Standards. Expansys and Kent Trading Standards replied back but heard nothing at all from Imate, the only party that not saying anything for the whole duration of the problem! One of Expansys manager has dealt with the matter directly for me and contacting SBE herself and to my surprise, it seems that it work perfectly fine! Unless they have another different number or something! So, apparently a motherboard need to be replaced and they assumed it is not under warranty. Only when I verified more, Imate agreed that the changes of the motherboard is considered under warranty. Good news. All happy! Well, not quite so..

SBE also contacted me back saying that if I would like to carry on further with the repair of the cosmetic parts, I will still need to pay £30.00 for it. However, SBE stated that it's not a fix price yet as they need to look into it more carefully to see whether there is the only thing that needed to be repair. Having said that, after two emails with no reply (starting from ground zero again) I need to AGAIN raised the problem to Expansys two weeks after that. Surprise surprise! This time SBE get back to me (deja vu moment). This time SBE stated that it's been repaired and ready to be sent back to me with special delivery. Three working days later, after me in need to miss two working days wasting my time waiting for the unit that never arrived, this time I was really in a "duck- goes-into- barbeque pot- feeling". I had then need to email SBE and Expansys again! Being totally understanding, the very same Expansys manager had greeted her teeth again and brace herself calling SBE again. This time, apparently the SBE manager that dealing with me is on holiday! how "sweet"! She proceed further by talking to the MD but to my surprise I had discovered how lack of management they have in SBE. They now said that the item is still on waiting for spare parts! Totally not what we obviously being informed for six days ago!

Almost two months on now since the first time I sent the item to them for repair (one month three weeks, to be exact), this afternoon, I had received a GOOD news from Expansys saying that after talking to the MD of SBE, apparently now the item is ready to be shipped to me by today. I won't bloody hold my breath, for sure. And it better be truly in excellent condition when I received it back.

After deep thought, maybe I should change my area of research to "The art of chasing people quickly!"

So, why is it "Dancing with SBE Repair Centre and Imate"? well, the whole experience does feels like dancing: one step forward but two or three steps backwards!