Antony’s Life Blog

Finally… for the first time in my life, I visited the Niagara Falls, one of the biggest waterfalls in the world. The Niagara Falls lie on the Niagara River at the border of Canadian province of Ontario and US state of New York.

There are three falls in total. Two of them, American Falls and Bridal-veil Falls are in the United States side. The biggest one, Horseshoe Falls, is mostly in the Canadian side. Interestingly, most Americans say that American Falls is more beautiful than the Canadian one (Horseshoe Falls); and most Canadians say that Horseshoe fall is more beautiful than the American one.

I took a panorama picture of Niagara Falls yesterday. The left ones are American Falls and Bridal-veil Falls; the right one is Horseshoe Falls.

The second picture below is American Falls. Do you see a little boat at the bottom? It is Maid of the Mist, a boat tour going to the Falls.

The last picture is Maid of the Mist boat tour going to Horseshoe Falls. It looks very scary, isn’t it? I can tell you, it is indeed really scary when you’re there.

(Picture is from Tom Toles, Washington Post.)

Well… my life is not as bad as the guy in the picture above. Thanks God…

However, my life is more or less affected by this financial crisis.

• I almost lost my job. More than 80% of my colleagues at my previous company have been laid-off. Last year at the peak, we were a team with about 50 people. From what I heard last week, there are less than 10 people left. Had I not make a quick decision relocating to Waterloo, I would have been unemployed (just like the guy in the picture).
• Our house is not foreclosed; but we cannot stay in our own house now. I had to relocate to another city because I couldn’t find a job in Vancouver. Now, we have to rent an apartment… hopefully we can stay in our own house again.
• My retirement fund is down more than 50%. Yes, it was my fault. I chose very high risk investment; and I had a faith in “buy-and-hold” strategy. I just realized that “buy-and-hold” simply doesn’t work in the last 15 years or so.

(Picture is from stock.xchng.)

I never like Rogers services since the very first beginning; but unfortunately I am one of their customers. For those who don’t know, Rogers is the biggest (and only?) GSM operator in Canada. There is another GSM operator, Fido; but Rogers bought them a couple of years ago. So… I don’t have any other choice.

Yesterday, I called Rogers customer care because my caller id doesn’t show up.

• First, I dialled Rogers customer care number (1-888-ROGERS1).
• There was an automatic answering machine, “Welcome to Rogers… blah, blah…. How can I help you?”
• I answered “Talk to representative”.
• The machine asked another question, “What kind of help do you need?”
• I answered “Technical support.”
• …
• I felt very stupid talking to an answering machine….
• …
• A couple of minutes later, a real human being was on the line, “Thank you for calling Rogers technical support. My name is …. May I have your phone number, please?”
• Okay… I gave her my phone number.
• Then she asked another question, “For verification purposes, may I have your date of birth and postal code, please?”
• Okay… I gave her my date of birth and postal code. I am not sure why they need that information. She doesn’t even know what my problem was.
• …
• A moment later….
• …
• I explained that I am having a problem with caller id.
• She asked me, “What kind of phone do you have?"
• I said, “Nokia N95 8GB”.
• Then… she said, “Sorry sir, technical support for Nokia N95 8GB is handled by another department. It is considered a PDA. Let me transfer you to the right representative.”
• …
• Oh my God…. I was very sure this has nothing to do with my phone. I was very sure it is a problem with the network… somewhere.
• …
• Waiting for another representative….
• …
• Still waiting…
• …
• After 15 minutes…
• …
• Someone answered my call.
• …
• After explaining my problem again, the representative asked me to remove the battery and reboot my phone. Oh boy… I was really sure there was nothing wrong with my phone.

Anyway… Rogers customer care just drove me crazy.