Today I couldn’t hold out any longer and wanted to take my run-over phone to a service center, because that phone was simply great and I would have a hard time accepting that I buy a phone for 5,000 CZK, have it for 4 days, and then a bus flattens it. After waking up I called the 2 nearest authorized service centers – one was in Karvina and the other in Ostrava. In Karvina they were much friendlier on the phone, while in Ostrava the call was picked up by a lady I later spoke to in person right at the service center.
Karvina, however, barely had a website, whereas with the Ostrava service center I could track by the phone’s IMEI where the phone is right now and what stage of repair it is in.
Price-wise it would have come out the same, since in Ostrava they told me over the phone that diagnostics cost 150 CZK, while in Karvina they wanted 200 CZK for the same thing.
On top of that I have an IN25 card from Czech Railways, so I would pay 74 CZK for the ticket, and comparing it with Karvina, there I would have paid even more than 24 CZK for the ticket. OK, so I was for Ostrava and Mom was for Karvina, back when I still thought I would save money. Then it dawned on me that I go to Ostrava every day anyway, to the library, so it was pointless to make a special trip, but I had simply made up my mind that I would take the phone there today, period. But since I had no shoes, only sandals with a ridge running around the back (and it didn’t occur to me to tighten them at the back so my foot would be pushed forward), I went in slippers.
I know, you’ll say I’m a lunatic, not because of the “distance” (which wasn’t even a distance, everything was “close at hand”), but because I walk among people in slippers. Fortunately they are ‘closed‘ slippers, not open-heel mules:
I walked to the train station in Ropice, got off in Cesky Tesin, bought a ticket to Ostrava and boarded the train via Havirov. I arrived at Ostrava-Kuncice at about :20, and the train to Ostrava-Stred didn’t leave until :52. I went to check in the station hall whether I had heard correctly, and sure enough. On my way back from the footbridge, some old lady asked me when the train to the Main Station was leaving, so I told her that unfortunately not until :52.
So I wanted to walk to Ostrava-Stred, it’s only 2 stops, but as soon as I set off and a train came right toward me, I thought better of it and went back, so I wouldn’t get a fine and so nobody would suspect me of anything. Once back, I copied the phone’s IMEI into my other phone, in case they took it and didn’t give me any receipt or anything, so I could check online what stage the repair was at. The train arrived at about :46 but didn’t leave until :52. It was a really bad train, though, and when braking it squealed horribly. Because of that it bothered me a bit that we also stopped at Ostrava-Kuncicky.
Anyway, it was survivable, and I got off at Ostrava-Stred, quickly made my way to October 28 Street, and then found Vystavni Street without a map and without any trouble. I walked into the first entrance with a Sectron sign, but there was only a wholesale store there, I think. I walked into the second one, where there was a service desk, but only for phones bought from them, see below. I had to wait while they dealt with a woman who was there probably with a warranty claim. Then I told the man my problem, he just asked whether I had bought it from them, and when my answer was No, he sent me to the next entrance door. There I went to a guy on the left, because the women on the right looked busy, but when I told him I wanted to hand in a phone for out-of-warranty repair, he sent me to the women behind the counter next to him.
I repeated my problem for the umpteenth time, pulled out the phone, and the lady started telling me the phone was completely bent and that the motherboard could be damaged, which costs almost as much as a whole new phone, and above all that they would send it off right away and that it costs 500 CZK – a deposit plus postage – and if I didn’t agree with the repair price, the money would be theirs to keep. Of course it’s clear to me that 500 CZK is just the beginning. The lady wanted to suggest a price of 2,500 CZK, while I suggested that I would put in 2,000 CZK at most.
In the end she consulted a colleague and said definitively that it would be not worth it for me and that I would be better off buying a new phone. A bit disappointed, I left and took a faster and more direct route back to the station. On the way I only ran into some “guys in ties“, high school graduates collecting money for their last day of school, and when they approached me I quickly dropped some money into their collection box. Only at home did I find out it was about 65 CZK, which is a bit much, but I was happy to give it to them.
That was already on the bridge by Nova Karolina, right next to the Ostrava-Stred station, and just as I was approaching, the station announcement system was saying something, and although I didn’t know what, I picked up the pace to make it, whatever it was. On the way I just passed a mom with a stroller who was trying to get the stroller up the steps onto the sidewalk by herself. I wanted to help her, but I really didn’t have time, and I didn’t even tell her she’d be better off walking a few steps around and getting straight onto the sidewalk without any steps.
But that only occurred to me later, and actually I don’t know whether there is a ramp there, though I think there will be. Again I only rode as far as Kuncice, and there the train to Cesky Tesin was already waiting for me. So in total I rode 4 different trains, each time with a different conductor, and not one of them wanted to see my ID card or any other proof of identity, as happened to me on that express train to Ceska Trebova.
I walked back home on foot from Cesky Tesin, only stopping at Tesco to buy tuna sandwiches. They didn’t have Tesco baguettes anymore, only 2 ham baguettes and a half-size one for 47 CZK, and tuna and ham sandwiches for 42 CZK. I didn’t want to walk through the checkout with nothing, so I took one pack of sandwiches and at least enjoyed them on the way back :).
And the slippers thing won’t happen again, because I found out that the sandals can be tightened at the back and nothing will push into my heel :-).