The Battle for a Phone....with the UNIVERSE!!

I guess it’s time for me to tell you guys, about my relationship with the gadgets. No, not like James Bond’s stuff or something like that. But you know, less smart: the cell phones. I have evolved a lot over the time in the field with the so-called ‘Cell phones’. To tell from the scratch, I have to start from the first phone that we ever owned.

My Mom’s sister, who now lives in Chennai, gave us a phone as we were headed to Ahmedabad because of my dad’s freaking Bank transfer. See, this phone was not something that we are using these days. Well, you remember the type of phones that you might have seen in old movies where there would be an Antenna on the top that receives the signals of the caller and gives us the voice.

This phone that she gave us was previously used by my Cousin. At that time, he was in his high schooling or something. I was too little then, so I don’t know whether I remember correctly. But he definitely was in school. It’s kind of a badass to own a damn phone when you are in school at that time. It’s like “whatever” right now, given the fact that nowadays even a new-born baby uses an iPhone. Not a Phone….. The iPhone (which costs a ton.) I didn’t even know what a touch screen what until I was in my 9th grade or so. I am going way off-topic. Well, coming back. It was a phone from the company BPL. I don’t know whether people even know about that company now or not. But it was a big firm at that time which met its disastrous downfall few years back.

The phone weighed more like a brick. Can say it weighed around 2 kg literally. I use bricks to do my Dumbbell curls for exercising. At that time, we had to talk to people with a thing that was that heavy. No doubt my dad had nice biceps. That was our first phone. The bigger proliferation of cell phone when I was in my 8th grade when my Dad bought a phone that is vernacularly called “The China Phone” or the “Korean Set”. Well, it had all the features that a branded phone has but in a clumsy and a not-so-decent way. But for a person who doesn’t care about the quality or features of the phone, it really isn’t a problem. But when a guy who uses a branded mobile and he sees someone using this kind of phone, surely he’ll see him like an alien or something. That’s the fact. It’s become like this.

The highlight was that the phone was a Touch Screen. By that I mean, a very crappy touch screen. It had the ripped off version of Apple’s lock screen (which I didn’t know back then) and have been impressed by the concept of this touch screen. It didn’t matter to me back then. Because, I never had to contact people and never required the necessity of having a phone. If I needed to contact someone so badly, we had a Landline at home. But my friends did have personal phones for them just not me. Yes…. I was the technologically-challenged guy then.

After that, my dad changed a couple of phones. Yep, we gave up the China one. Yay! And this time, the black and white phones to the newly famous “Colour Phones.” We then began using the new phone where I was introduced to some new stuff such as the internet over the phone. I was active in the website called Facebook when I was using that phone only.

I did not own a personal phone until I completed my high schooling. During my high schooling, I used my Dad’s phone quite a while as Dad doesn’t use much of calls or messages. I used to send way too ‘Forward’ messages to people. It was at that time when the SMS limit was not 100 per day. Aircel gave us 10K messages for a month for just 36 bucks. 10,000 is freaking hefty for even those who text every minute. I just forwarded messages to people just to finish off the SMSes given for that month. Then, I realized. No one gives a shit about forwards and I was the one sending those forwards… so that makes me…you know what. Then due course, I hated forwarding messages and now, I don’t forward at all.

Up until I finished my high schooling, I have never pictured myself having a cell phone in the very near future. But I did get to own a phone on my own. In my Public Holidays, dad had given me permission to get me a phone. Well, when I decide something, I take literally a very long time. This stupid ‘dilemma’ comes in between and inhibits me from sticking to a decision. That’s why it took me a hell lot of time to select a phone. Thank duck we had internet connectivity in our home back then. If not, I’d still have bought a China Phone.

Finally, after hours and hours of searching over the internet, I found the one; well, the to-be-chosen one. The Motorola Backflip MB300. It was an Android phone with the version 1.5 (Cupcake) in it. No, the phone did not have cupcake in it. The android version was called the Cup Cake. Grow Up, man! Android was very new at that time. The phone cost me like 15000 bucks which was hell lot. But you know what my dad did when I told him on the phone standing in the phone shop looking at the phone that I was about to buy? He just said “15K huh? Okay. Get it if you like it”. That’s the generosity of my Father. Not everyone gets a cool dad as mine.

But the phone lasted only a couple years with me as it broke down mid-way during the second year. See, Motorola was a very big company in the US. The main drawback of that company in India was that they didn’t have as many Service centers to provide services to the consumers of India. I don’t know what was wrong with that phone, but it went off one fine day when everything was just normal the previous day. I took it to every single Service centre hoping to get it fixed but it was of no use. Also the news was that due to loss incurred by Motorola, thy decided to close the company and all its related service centers. So, if I wanted my phone to be good then, I should act quickly.

But you know, Universe decides everything for us. It’s decision being, me getting separated from my Motorola. It may seem childish that I was worrying over a phone but I loved it more than anything else. So… *sniff* yeah… *sniff* I am not crying. Okay, moving on.

When doctors of the Cell-phone world told me that there’s no other go for the Motorola to be fixed, I had to get a new phone. Now that I have broken (it broke and people blame me for) my phone, another costly phone would not be there as an option. I knew that and I decided to get the least smart phone which could just make calls and send messages and doesn’t support any external memory cards or support songs or whatsoever. If that’s the case, everyone knows that Nokia is the best option to choose. Yes, I bought a new Nokia 1616 which just supports FM and I never really heard songs from the FM. Seriously. That phone has been my awesome friend till date.

The difference having a phone like a "Smartphone" and "ordinary" phone is that the people owning a Smartphone usually get sick using their phone and finally feel that basic phone is what they actually need. On the contrary, the people using the ordinary phone yearn to have a camera or a music player in theirs. It's always greener on the other side. Anyhow even I've had incidents like this.

So I used this basic Nokia 1616 for like two straight years and finally decided to get myself a new phone and that too, a smart one. There began my search for the next buddy/bro/friend. Basically when I said I wanna buy a new phone my dad's first answer was "Sure". It was kind of spontaneous without any hesitations. Now that I have got a step to proceed, I had to select the phone that I needed to buy. That was the big thing to do. When I previously bought the Motorola Back flip, it went bad. People still think that's my fault or something. But what can I do to stop a cell phone tragedy that was to happen?? I was certainly not a Phone Super Hero. Anyways people started asking me to be careful with the phone that I buy next. So I had to be cautious this time.

When you want to buy something, there is this whom you ou ask first. GOOGLE. I asked it. And found out plenty of suggestions for my price range. So I began ruling out the not-so-impressive phones from the search results with more and more filters that matched my specs. The fact that runs the human mind sometimes can think in mysterious ways. When more people have the same of something, you clearly start developing hatred for that thing. Be it a Book, a phone, a pen, underwear... whatever. It was this that took place in my case. I started hating Samsung for that. I'd prefer pure Android anyhow. Then the user interfaces if other companies also didn't quite impress me per se. be it the Sony or the HTC.

HTC, at times looked pretty good to me. But when I see the specs and proceed to accept with the price range and all, there comes this one thing that I hate even more. The concept of Dual SIM. This was in so many if the phones that I thought was better which lead to me not buying.

My search for the phone was nearly for like two months or so. I had to choose the best for me. I wanted to feel the exact same of what I felt with the previous Motorola. It was when my mind thought why don't you go for a Windows phone? But sources who used Windows phones at that time didn't give me fruitful results that I expected. Windows phones didn't support as many apps as iPhone or the Android. You only get the minimum of customization to your phone. I didn't like the sound of that. I'd lost the mind of buying the windows phone on hearing that itself.

After hours and hours of sitting in front of the computer, I came to conclusion of two final phones Samsung Galaxy S3 and the Google Nexus 4. Back when I bought Motorola Backflip itself I was intimidated to buy a Nexus. But it was not introduced in India at that time. But now I had Nexus 4 that was within my budget. The problem with selecting the Phone from S3 and Nexus 4 was I hated S3. That alone was the only phone that had all the specs I needed and also was in my budget cover. The other drawback from the other phone Nexus 4 was that, it was a unibody phone. If the battery dies, phone dies along with it. There's nothing we can do to stop it. But Samsung had a removable battery and had plenty of service centers all around.

And I hate the Touch Wiz. My mind was more than just a monkey at that time. An orangutan maybe. Then, I thought. Even iPhone users go with the Unibody design. Why couldn’t I too? Okay. So, I talked to my mind.

(Italicized sentences are my mind’s dialogues)

Okay, Guhan. You sure about this?

“Yeah, I think so. There aren’t many phones that come with my expected specs, now, do they?”

You think so? You think so? You’re gonna put in a big amount in this. You can’t risk that.

“I know that but, Nexus is awesome. It has pure Android. I don’t think no other phones give me that. I am putting my foot down. I’m getting the Nexus 4. I don’t think I can’t take this ball game that my mind plays. It kills me inside”

Okay. Get the Nexus. Rock on. *thumbs up*

After a quality conversation with myself (stupid talk-to-myself thing), I decided to land on the Nexus 4. So you think it ends here and I get the phone and everything goes “Happily ever after”. Freaking NO!

Here’s where the real Story starts. You know that, in life, things go wrong at times. But for me, it’s not at times. It is everytime. That happened with the phone too.

When I decided that I wanna get Nexus as the next phone, I wanted to get a Cover for the phone as it was mentioned to be vulnerable to falls. Plus, I wanted an awesome headphone. That had to be a cool company. And Skull Candy came along the way. It was an extremely super-cool headphone brand. So, while ordering the phone I made sure that I got these too.

There were totally 4 attempts. Here you go. One. By. One.

Attempt #1

My dad had given me the money required to buy the phone. All I had to do was to order the phone. So, when I decided to get it online, I searched for the lowest price available (like everyone). And I found eBay to have the lowest prices among the leading online retailers. I ordered it in eBay along with Skull Candy headphone and a Nexus 4 Case from Flipkart. So within two days’ time, Skull candy arrived. I was at Chidambaram (I ordered it to my home address, Karaikal). My brother called and told me that it has come. And also the Case too in 2 or three days.

Then started the big WAIT. Days rolled and rolled. No word on the phone. I’ll constantly check my mail to get myself updated on what the word on the phone is. After a long period of like, 20 days or so, they said that they didn’t have enough stocks to give the customers and they didn’t like us to wait any longer. So, they refunded me with the money I paid them.

THAT’S 1-0 (Universe-Guhan)

While this was happening, I had already told my friends (and everyone I knew for I am a Blabbermouth) that I had ordered a phone and it will be with me any soon. But since the order failed to reach me, I had to tell them that whole problem from the scratch.

This was a pretty big problem. You can’t just go around and tell a dozen of people the same story over and over again. Yeah, you’ll understand why. Continue reading..

Attempt #2

My mind then started thinking “Is the universe making this in order to stop me from buying a mobile or something? Did I deserve more or I didn’t deserve the phone?”

 The second time, I lost hopes on this eBay website as they disappointed me with my first order. So, I chose Snapdeal this time. They had the second lowest price on the internet. See, I had money in two ATM cards. The first order that I placed was from one card. The refund usually takes nearly 15 days or so for its coming back. When I had ordered the phone with my first card, the second card still had the money. Before the refund came back to the first card, I ordered for the Second time with my other card.

So, yeah. Good that I had money in two cards. See, after this a fortnight went on I guess. It was at that time that Nexus was on hot sale everywhere that the shops were going out of stock sooner and sooner. By the time, I placed the order in Snapdeal the stock went off somehow (Might as well been the work of the Universe).

Same thing happened here too. I didn’t get my order. They let me wait for 15 freaking days and they tell me that they don’t have stock. The thing that pissed me off this time with this Snapdeal is that, after I ordered in eBay and didn’t get the product, I called Snapdeal customer support and told them what had happened with my previous purchase and asked them whether they really had the phone in stock. Apparently, the customer support guys know nothing of the stock availability and they give an answer “Yes, sir. There’ll definitely be Stock and it’ll reach you in 2-3 Business days.”

My brains and heart knew that I wasn’t going to get the phone this time too. And as per my brains and heart thought, I didn’t get the phone. This time, too, there wasn’t enough stock. Then why the hell do you put “IN STOCK” sign on the website when you don’t have the products “IN STOCK”??

I was upset, again. A tragedy (more like a mild one) for the second time kind of made me sad you know. So, by now, the refund for the other order came back with this card’s money being in the hands of the owners or whomsoever of the Snapdeal Company.

My parents were really frustrated at this point. They really aren’t supportive of buying a phone online. They asked to get one in the stores. The thing I chose online shopping was that the price was like 2K bucks lesser. Parents said “Don’t look for just 2K bucks, just get it in stores.” But then, there was again another problem. Nexus was not available on the stores but the Google play website.  So, it had to be online or it had to be another phone. Another phone would never have been my option. Online it was, decided.

THAT’S 2-0 Universe

And yet again, I had to tell my friends that I ordered but the phone didn’t come. The same whole similar story that I told them the last time. Some seemed to start frowning at me as if I stole the money and I was telling them “stories” that the order couldn’t be processed. It was getting awkward then.

Attempt #3

So, now I had two Debit Cards. One card that had money and another card did not any money. I had to order the phone once again. So, I chose to use the card with the money in it (well, that’s the only option now, isn’t it?)My brother kept telling me that I should order in Flipkart so that the order would reach for sure. But the cost was 1000 bucks more than what was available in the online stores and the Maximum Retail Price (MRP, in short).

This was the third time and it has already become a Mock-thing for everyone around me. When I say to someone that I was going to order something online, they would say that I will just get the refund and not the product. Yeah, well after what I’ve been through they are bound to make these kinds of jokes.

This time, I chose the online store, Amazon. This was the only website that, at this time, had the lowest price. And to my surprise, when I ordered from this website I actually got the phone. My joy knew no bounds as it was something to be cherished for sure.

The phone was ordered to my home address, Karaikal. It was my brother who received the parcel. I even let him open the phone and turn it on (which is a big thing, believe me). So, you think, it’s over now. No, it isn’t. As my brother uses everything in the phone and tells me that the phone’s awesome and everything, there’s one big glitch in it. The phone’s front camera was not working. Darrrrn!!!

It was pretty freaking frustrating, really. Why did have to be me? Why did I have to face everything? But I thought maybe an update would do the job by clearing it. I can’t just rely on it you know. What if the update didn’t fix it? I can’t risk that. And while this process was going, Google released Nexus 5. Say whaaaaat?

Yeah, they released a whole new phone and I am still trying to buy this Nexus 4. They introduced Android Kitkat in this phone and I thought maybe I will fix to that. But no, the android kitkat update was freaking awful in the Nexus 4. Then people advised me that, “why don’t you just buy a Nexus 5 then?” It seemed legit though.

It was quite expensive you see given the budget that I was doing for this phone initially being too damn high. So, what was I talking about?? Yeah, the camera was faulty. I returned the phone and got myself a refund. Now the other card had the already refunded money from the second attempt and now this one was empty. Hell of a Round-about game it was.

THAT’S 3-0, Mr. Universe

Attempt #4

I decided that if I don’t get the phone at least now, I am never getting one ever. Ever again. The only mistake I did was I stupidly, blindly, non-sensically, moronically and other-such-words-that-mean-I-was-stupid-ly, ordered it again on ebay. This was till now the worst move I’ve ever made. I ordered (as the price was freaking low) in eBay and what happened this time was that, some freak from the Courier Company STOLE IT!!!! Why? Why? Why? Why? Why ME?

Universe, you know, I am just sick of this. Why would you do such a thing to me? All I wanted was to have a Phone, just like everybody else. Why do you bother me so much? This is where the go-back-and-forth-ball game started. I contact the bluedart couriers asking for a solution. They repeatedly kept saying that they are trying to retrieve the product and help me in the process. And when time went by, (by this I mean, a really lengthy-time went by) they asked me to contact ebay for the process.

When I always call up the guys in the eBay company, they kept telling me that they are not properly updated on the issue (why the hell do you have computers then?) I was so close to being a serial killer. I almost was raging with fury of anger. My mom on the other hand kept telling me that I lost the money to the company whereas I argue that they wouldn’t do such a thing to their customer. But they quite didn’t understand what was going through my mind.

I raised a “Guarantee claim” there in eBay and they didn’t process it for 45 days. (I mean, come on. Seriously?) I nearly had no idea what I was going to do. I even started to feel guilty that I had just lost money to people on the internet (this was because my mom was telling me that I had lost).

Then, I had a routine thing that I did once in two days. Call the Customer Support Executives. All they say is “We’ll call you back in exactly 48 hours sir” “Sir, our floor manager Mr. Ashir Gupta will call and fill in with your details in 48 hours.” But there’ll be no calls or mails from their side. I get even madder. I call them back and ask for this Floor Manager but still no proper solution.

Then finally one day, I was sitting with my friend Raj Kumar (Dindugal) eating a Ladoo given by my friend Rajyalakshmi on the terrace where I was making the call just like every day. I was on a big hold when suddenly I was answered by a Female representative. I thought “They are gonna do the same this time too” and was very casual about it, you know. But while I was on the hold, listening to the hold-music, I got a text. Well, I checked it and it said: YOUR REFUND HAS BEEN INITIATED AND WILL BE REFUNDED TO YOUR BANK ACCOUNT IN 5-7 BUSINESS DAYS.

This was the most romantic text that I have ever received. I wouldn’t have been happier even if I had got a text from 100 girls saying “Rajaguhan, I LOVE YOU!” But this text made my heart light and I literally jumped up and down on the terrace. The female representative connected again while I was smiling my mouth out and all I asked was “Is it really refunding now?”  And I couldn’t even let her talk anymore and I continued “What’s your name? Yeah, what’s your name?” She said that her name was Preethi. I responded by saying, “Thank you so much Preethi. Wish you a very Happy New Year” and hung up.

Yeah, it all came down with a girl named PREETHI.

And that’s 4 for 0, Universe.

So, that was it. I was getting the money. It might sound dumb in words but this was the most pathetic time of my life. And in few days, I got my money back.

After sometime, my dad said, “If you think, this new phone Nexus 5, is good, then buy that. Don’t bother about the money.” That is my dad. He just wanted me to be happy.  

I did order for a Nexus 5 in Flipkart as Google play didn't support Indian debit cards per se. Flipkart’s price was 1000 bucks more than MRP as I told earlier but I ordered anyway. The only available color was White so I ordered that. Thought it was girlie at first, but it’s not like that. It’s awesome. What you’ve just read is like, 60 days of my life. And I am so grateful that I finally got a phone. Now that the phone’s name is Nexus ‘5’, I beat the Universe in out Ball Game.

That makes the score 4-5.

Take that, Universe. (Don’t take it seriously, Mr. Universe. I am just saying it for the blog’s sake. I have to live for at least 5 decades. I don’t want to make a bad impression)

Anyways, in all seriousness, thanks for bearing with my words.