Thursday 25 May 2017

Worst Day Ever | Towed Car & Costly Mistakes

'You'll do great', I whispered. ' Just don't screw up', I told myself and for every time I did, I would do the complete opposite of what I remind myself. In some rare occasions, good things still happen unexpectedly and that would be the day you'll see my bright face with the purest smile in the entire world.

"Focus on the bright side," they said. "Be positive!"

YES THAT'S TRUE. Be positive and never talk about the bad things in your life. Pretend it never happened and never learn anything from it? OKAY!

But then where will the truth in life occur? Is it okay to showcase only the rainbow and sunshine and skittles parts of life and tell people that there's no bad things in life that you should be aware of? What if I tell you that bad days are the days you'll learn the most?

I'm not good at storytelling but this will be my first entry of the worst day ever. Bear with me while you read my story and think about how petty the issues I'm facing and how unnecessarily depressed I am over it. I don't care. You can simply browse through other interesting blogs. Come on, do it now.

Still here? What are you expecting?

Oh my God. Still here?

Okay, fine.

This Monday after my classes end, I offered some of friends a lift to the hostel (Varsity lodge) and as usual, every driver will drop passengers in front of a fence that has a small entrance at the end of it. I didn't park my car right away because I was planning to refuel my car so there I was, side-parking my car in front of the fence. After dropping them except this one friend of mine, Keba, who was nice enough to accompany me to the Petronas, I changed the gear to 1 and started pressing the accelerator.

'SCREECHHH!!!'

The sound was loud enough to make my chinese girl friend, Tati, whom I just dropped off to look back at me, with a shocked face.

As if her reaction was not enough, I continued pressing the accelerator and 'SCREEEEECHH!!!', that sound was heard once again before the car got back on the road. 'It was perhaps a scratch', I thought so I continued driving before stopping my car by the junction right before getting into the main road. I got off my car and quickly went checking the 'scratched' part.

A scratch, my ass.


The dent was quite big and inwards, causing the passenger's door not being able to open wide. It was blocked.

And here's the thing scratching my car.

I was my fault for parking very near to the yellow thing tho. It was also my kegelabahan for continuing my drive upon hearing the first screech. 

That night, I searched for all the bengkel ketuk kereta I could find in Puchong, Serdang or Cyberjaya and finally resorted to the one in Puchong. One more thing, I decided not to tell my parents and I was so bloody sure that I could handle everything on my own. My decision inflicted with my guilt towards my dad because he repainted, vacuum cleaned and washed the car so it looked brand new for me to use. As for my mother, a protective one, she was very paranoid to let me drive especially in KL. She said she can't face the consequences if I ever got into a serious accident and get injured and couldn't be able to live up my dream as a surgeon. You see, if I tell her about this, I'll never regain her trust and most probably never driving again!

Today, my biology teacher had a meeting during the afternoon so the class was rescheduled to the morning session and it ended at 12 pm. Having no friend to accompany me, I was determined to drive to Puchong guided by the mobile navigation following the location that the repair guy sent to me. Waze or Google Map would be my main options but the shop's location didn't feature in any of the system so I had no choice. My phone battery was at 35%. 

After 20 minutes, I reached the location that the repair guy sent to me and it was a furniture shop. I knew that the whatsapp location accuracy was not that good so I was able to remain calm and called the guy. I described my location and his instruction was clear, "Tunggu di Shell kat depan tu. Nanti saya datang" so off I went to the Shell, fueled up my car and waited for awhile. While waiting, I checked on my whatsapp and noticed that the guy had resent a new location. 'Probably the actual location to the workshop', I thought so i started driving, passed a toll and that's when he called.

"Dik, kat mana?" 
I replied, "kat tol, bang. Saya ikut location abang hantar ni"
"Oh ok adik u-turn, lepas jambatan dan sungai, adik tunggu kat tepi jalan"

Again, the instruction was clear but again, my brain was not functioning the way it should have so I drove straight, looked for a bridge and the river he was talking about. At that time, I was going too far from the actual place. I called him again and described my location. He told me to stay there as he would come and show me the way. 

I was at the side of the road, under the scorching sun, sweating hard and haven't realized my mistake. While waiting, I scrolled through my phone and my friend, Syah started texting me and asked about the car's progress. I turned off the engine and as I was about to reply his message, a big hot cloud of smoke came out from my car's bonnet. The smell was strong and I could not see anything from inside. I was freaking out so bad. 

I started driving again despite my car's condition and stopped at a parking space in front of 'Pusat Perdagangan IOI' building, waited for a few more minutes and a new problem went up. My phone battery was at 5%. The repair guy was having a hard time finding my car and I couldn't drive to him and not being able to call him would be such a big problem. Luckily enough, there were 2 young Indian guys were passing by and were kind enough to ask me if I needed any help. They didn't have a power bank but they told me that they can stay there until the repair guy came and I can use his phone in the meantime. A few minutes after that, my repair guy arrived. 

That was a small act of kindness but I was sooo touched by it. 10% elevated mood, but 10% of that quickly went downhill when the repair guy told me that a part of my engine coolant pecah. I was definitely scared as I looked at him with a pale face. " Berapa ringgit agak-agak kena ni, bang?"



My car was then towed to the workshop. An uncle whose name was later discovered as Pak Di was in charge to fix the coolant and he told me that my coolant cannot be fixed by part but it had to be replaced entirely as it was a 'made in China' product. He offered to use a better coolant with the same price but might cost a little bit more because he had to change to the 'tapak' for installation. We made a little more negotiation and he stated clear that he could finish the work by today so I waited there while reading my biology notes. I was tired and the place was noisy. There wasn't much thing that I could absorb at that time.

To cut things short, my car was fixed with new coolant and fan and the dented part has been 'ketuk' back to its shape but I refused to repaint the car because it might takes another day. Pak Di, Pak Cik Qahar, the young guy who had to find me and my car, and 3 other Pak Ciks have been such a great help. They were really soothing and the fact that they understood my financial status as a student was relieving. Pak Di told me that he felt moved to help me because I looked like one of his nieces (the perk of having a common face)




By the way, the towing cost me RM 100, new coolant and fan cost RM 220 and the dented part costs RM 50. Overall, it costs me RM370 when initially, I was just planning to repair the dented part and repaint it. 
(Ya Allah, if there is one reason on why this whole thing happened, please make it something that's best for me :')))

Check this place out! It's cheap and the guys are nice.


Btw here are the things I learnt as of today,
1. Park accordingly and do it slowly. Don't protude too much to the right or the left. 
2. Check the car's temperature regularly. Any slight increase might require us to stop by the road to let it cool.
3. Make sure your phone battery is full whenever you're out alone and at a new place.
4. Don't hesitate to call and ask for clearer explanation. Don't focus too much on not wanting to annoy someone. 
5. Plan an organized journey. Make sure the car is fully fueled and T&G card should have enough money especially for long journey.
6. Don't try to be a smartass. Tell your parents about your mistakes. They don't bite.
7. Listen to instructions carefully. 



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