How do I feel?

Working in customer service you hear a lot of things. Such as,’ My friends are using free gas for years and I don’t want them to use free gas anymore.’ Or ‘Are you in Melbourne?’

Firstly, it says a lot about your friendship and the second at least they don’t point out the fact that I’m not Australian. They circumvent and ask the safest question they can.

What they want to ask is: I know you are not Australian, but are you even in Australia, or are you talking to me from a different continent trying to help a guy in Australia? Because I don’t want your help. I want to talk to someone who is in Australia.

Even if I can help you now, over the phone? I mean the answer is besides the point.

The point is, I get to experience an individual’s thought process. The accent, the tone they use to communicate, the emotional burden they hold about their work or their life by just a simple phrase they use. Mostly, they just want the job to be done and they want to get it done now. Urgency is in everyone’s mind.

Once we pick up the phone, we want things to be solved. And most of the times, it is not so simple. Why you may ask? Well, that’s life. It is never too simple, but it is simple if you are patient because all we ask is time. Sometimes 4 hours and sometimes 40 days. It is part of the process. The reason I am telling you this is because everything is intertwined. As people with big-brains say: I live in multitudes. And so everything works in multitudes.

With each call, probably not all, I tell myself I will listen to the customer as best as I can. I will listen to their name, the way they speak to me, like a small part of the life they have, I will grasp it.

You can call it a curse or a blessing when I do grasp it. Because all is not sunshine. Some people turn into nasty creatures when they don’t get what they want right away. Or if they hear something different to what they’ve heard before; there are many reasons why people turn nasty. But there is only one reason people are calm: they listen.

So going back to the question, ‘Are you in Melbourne?’

How do I feel when I answer this question?

It’s not vacuum. I do feel something. But mainly it is that ‘Do you really have to ask that to get a resolve of your enquiry?’ Like do you have to point out the fact that I don’t sound Australian?

So do I get offended by this? A little bit because now there is one more thing that tells me I’m not Australian. And being outside of your country and frequently having conversations which relates to staying in Australia, it takes a hold of your mind to the fact that you are not Australian, as if being one is the end goal that would dramatically change who you are.

The reason I get offended is that people don’t ask about who I am or where I am from. They aren’t curious, not even a teeny tiny bit. Some people even don’t say my name once they ask me my name. They say, okay. Well, it is easier than saying, ‘Shubhanga’

Try it!

People not being curious bothers me. People can tell I’m not from [O] + [STRAY] + [LEE] + [UH].

I guess in life, there is always something that points towards you and shows you a part of you that you never think of your own. Others point it out and you smile and nod as if it is true. Sometimes, you even believe it. But you wish you didn’t have to. Wouldn’t it better if this way of thinking didn’t exist?

I am trying to censor the thought process in itself. And that is an abysmal process. Like censoring a history that shows us the monster because the monster never did anything good but only destruction. Well, there is something to learn even from the monster. The main point being hopefully, we don’t create another one, within ourselves or in other people.

But who is going to share this thought to the people? Will they listen if you do share your thoughts on this? Is there a way to make people think beyond their own bubble of life that distorts and molds someone else’s life? Somehow it all falls under the writer to strategise and make sure they stay until the end to listen to what you share.

I know what I have written above is quite fragmentary. But I’m not going to edit and make it readable or interesting to the reader. If the above doesn’t make any sense, write a comment to share your thoughts. If it did make a semblance of sense, you can still write a comment to share your fragmentary thoughts on it.

Have a good weekend!