2 mins 35 seconds – call is picked up
Conversation completely in Cantonese:
(After my cellphone number and home address are verified)
Me: Can we have the Hawaiian… The Hawaiian – which one has only ham and pineapple?
Pizza Guy: Something in Cantonese.
Me: I didn’t understand that. Can you say that bit in English?
Pizza Guy: Is-it- (speaks more slowly but repeats what I suppose is the name of the pizza in Cantonese)
Me: I can’t understand, what is that in English?
Pizza Guy: (Rattles off a bunch of ingredients completely in Cantonese for each pizza. For a minute I’m irritated – he can’t even say “ham” or “pineapple” in English so I can understand some of it?? Come to think of it, I thought I knew the Cantonese words for “ham” and “pineapple” – how come none of what he just said sounds like “ham” or “pineapple” in Cantonese??) Why don’t I get our English-speaking colleague to take your order?
Me: (plaintively – I’m starving, home alone with Rockstar and want to get him bathed and dressed quickly) I always have to wait on hold longer for your English guy. Can’t you just confirm the name of that pizza of yours in English? Just the name, I know it’s Hawaiian-something, you guys have two Hawaiian-somethings. Then I’ll remember if that was what we ordered last time.
Pizza Guy: I…. Really don’t know what that is in English.
Me: You can’t say some of the ingredients in English either?? Not even “only pine-apple and ham” which is the one I want???
Pizza Guy: Wh-y don’t I get our English-speaking colleague to take your order?
3 minutes 42 seconds – placed on hold <dance* dance* in frustration>
4:30 – feel like hanging up. Has it really been less than a minute on hold??
5.25 – start reading Jeffrey Archer’s Cat O’ Nine Tales – it’s the only reason I haven’t given up and just tried calling the main line again.
6:02 – <thinking> maybe they’ve forgotten to transfer my call and I’m just on hold indefinitely.
6:15 – <thinking> maybe Pizza Guy had a seizure. Or passed out from not eating dinner. I could understand That. Now there’s no one left to tell the other pizza people I’m on hold for an English speaking pizza person. Keep reading.
6:25 – <thinking> maybe one of the pizzas caught fire. The whole place has burned down. I should try Pizza Hut.
6:37 – call picked up by someone in Cantonese who can understand a few words in English. (Yes she still speaks to me in Cantonese. From experience, they are usually still much faster in Cantonese even when they can speak English.)
Pizza Girl: What’s your name and n – why don’t I re-read your number and address quickly? Swiftly runs thru in Cantonese. (NB: You will shave even more seconds off all your waiting times at local places is you memorize your name, address, telephone number in Cantonese. I am still working on the pizza names. They sound nothing like “Hawaiian Pizza” in English.)
7:46 – I confirm my pizza choices, add 4 extra toppings and one stuffed crust. Rockstar and I are boning up on calcium, but Kings is on his perpetual diet. Then I decline a few specials. Half English, half Cantonese.
8:11 – Pizza Girl: Your order will arrive in under 25 minutes. (I also learned to call maybe 15 mins before 6pm – after that on bad days you might have to wait more than an hour.)
I’d never timed my pizza order before. Every time Kings or I am on hold, it just felt like an eternity – today when I actually looked at the call time on my cellphone, I’m flabbergasted. This has been one of the times our almost weekly order has taken exasperatingly longer. But from the call time, I’ve actually only been put on hold a minute or two, here and there. When did we become that impatient, that used to/ spoiled for speed?
PHD Pizza Delivery - I had to get a pic with their guy running like Flash Gordon
I recall one trip back to Seremban, Kings tearing his hair out at a KFC counter in a mall. In the then-empty outlet at an off-peak time, he was trying to get me a Zinger with no mayo. After almost 20 mins and a few grumbles at the frontline staff, Kings asked to see a rather bewildered manager. “No, it hasn’t been 20 minutes, it’s been maybe 17 minutes sir…”
She couldn’t understand what he was so upset about. Kings could not understand why it wasn’t obvious why he was so upset. (Now I find this hilarious, but of course when my husband was dancing about going mad with impatience at the counter (I’d joined him only later, oblivious he’d been waiting that long) none of us thought it was that funny).
We left without the Zinger we’d paid for. Kings really couldn’t wait. It’s not the first time.
It’s only after timing our latest pizza order that I realized the “jurang perbezaan”, massive difference and why everyone felt the way they did. Living here sometimes you don’t realize how used you are to how fast things move. We should sit on our hands longer, next time we go back.
The delivery guy is standing on out doorstep in about 20 minutes, after I fail to buzz him up. Our apartment reception desk must’ve done it while one of us was still in the bath.
And then I remember once overhearing our admin staff in one of the HK dealing rooms on hold with someone in a Malaysian office going “OMGeeee I’m going crazy, they’re sooo slow!!” <laughing – aforementioned HK admin staff btw was an “auntie” with 2 grown children> “But then you feel really bad snapping at them to move faster because everyone on the other end is always so nice……”
ps: pic was from the pizza website
Wow, your BM still boleh tahan la! I know many people who has returned their BM to their BM teacher.
I once waited more than 1 hour in a queue in Kyoto just to enter a dessert place to eat some macha ice cream. There were many people queuing patiently in front of me. I guess when we really, really want to eat something, we gotta be patient! Hahahahaha!
I used to practice my BM every chance I got with our “nice colleagues in the Malaysian office” 😀 They used to be really tickled at my fumbling but well I still got some practice in!
Aileen: Would you like me to to send you the phrases in a kind of pinyin Cantonese?
I’m not sure if zmun2 is of Chinese ethnicity because if (s)he isn’t then it’s interesting to see how the idea that one has forgotten all the stuff they were taught at school is phrased as one having returned their (subject/ skill) to their teacher. It was a phrase I learnt from my mum who is Chinese & I thought it was only a Chinese terminology.
Wow that’s so kind of you! Except I feel bad making you do that, maybe I could mail you when I need to have another Canto conversation like that? Say, phone company or bank or something 😛
I think Mun should be of Chinese ethnicity and currently residing in Malaysia, but I’m not sure re the specifics so will leave her to elaborate if suits, when she drops by again please… (Since you are BBC I thought to mention I do know Mun has resided in the UK for some years though 🙂
“Malaysian Chinese” is actually quite a wide term to us “Malaysian Chinese” 😀 The Malaysians who’ve been to Chinese school (I attended English school and my whole family speaks English – even my grandma can’t handle Chinese) often have a very sound command of Putonghua… And then there are “Straits-Born Chinese” like me whose families have not spoken Chinese in several generations, wear Kebaya and like to eat banana leaf curry with our fingers 🙂
Yes, I am of Chinese ethnicity but I can’t confirm whether this is only a Chinese terminology or not because as I remember, my teacher who is a Malay also uses this phrase in the Malay language.
Yes, I am of Chinese ethnicity but I can’t confirm whether this is only a Chinese terminology or not because as I remember, my teacher who is a Malay also uses this phrase in the Malay language.