i got clamped!

Yup, the title says it all. There was nothing pressing at the office since I miraculously completed the super urgent ones, so I decided to personally go to KL Sentral to pick up my ticket, prior to coming in for the day.

I turned into the departure area and saw a lot of parking boxes on the right side, a lot with the chain thing around the box (i.e. there is no way in hell you can park in that box) and some without. Traffic was non existent.

My being the typical Malaysian that I am, I decided to park at one of the empty boxes. It is probably only 40 steps away from the ticket office, at most. Parking at the Sentral carpark was not an option -- it didn’t enter my mind at all, given the circumstances surrounding my where-do-I-park assessment.

I mean, why park in bloody Alaska when you can park nearby? It's not as if I'm double parking or anything, there IS a box. Surely people can park in the damn box.

After all, how long can a wait for them to issue my ticket be, this early in the morning? I’ll be done in a jiffy anyway.

Of course they took a bit longer than norm at the ticket office.

I went back to my car, and there it was, an ugly yellow contraption with a pole kinda thing at my front left tyre.

The first thing that came to my mind was, “Seriously?!”

At the top of the pole was a sign for me to contact its customer service manager to release the clamp.

Of course it conveniently omitted the information as to where to find this customer service manager.

What am I? A psychic?

I went back in to look for people in purple (because that’s the KL Sentral people’s official colours lah) and found one. He then walkie-talkie-ed someone. When he finished he just said to wait by the car.

I asked him the procedure to get unclamped. It’s not as if I’ve been through this before. Hello…

It isn’t actually complicated anyway, so I just waited by my car. Then I saw the clamp zone signage. THAT? It looks so pretty that I missed it despite it being 2 meters away from where I parked. Seriously. That?

Some minutes afterwards a woman in an off-white top and purple sarong appeared at the entrance of the building and gave me a smile. That smile was more apologetic than anything. I knew right away I can haggle this one.

After voicing out my take on the whole clamping thing – the available box, the non-busy time, the cute yet ineffective signage, I requested my ‘offence’ to be compounded (I already said I’m a Malaysian what… hehee). She told me to pay a figure less than the one quoted earlier. I quickly did and asked her for a receipt. I then got unclamped.

On my way, I tried my luck and texted my boss asking whether it is claimable, seeing that I was picking up a ticket for a work-related trip. He obliged. Hehehee..

There’s always the first time for anything.