On crying at engineers

[tabi_no_sora]

After a stressful week of lots of work to do and no internets at home to do it with (and many other things in my life going wrong besides), Joe and I finally managed to get a BT engineer to come round and take a look at our equipment. When he arrived, we had the following conversation:

Him (after unpacking tools and doing a couple of preliminary tests): Do you know where your broadband cable goes to? I've had a look around and I can't find any cables outside the house.
Me: Sorry, I don't know.
Him: In that case there's nothing I can do for you. I've never worked on this block before. I'll get the company to send round another engineer who knows the local area. *starts to pack up tools again*
Me: Isn't there anything you can do?
Him: Not really. I can't find the cable.
Me: *bursts into tears*
Him: Woah, okay okay! *phones colleague, finds out where cable goes to, fixes internet within about ten minutes*

So, on the one hand I came across as completely hysterical and over-react-y, and in our ensuing interactions he made it quite clear that he thought I was mentally unstable. On the other hand, if I hadn't reacted like that he would have just walked off and left me with no internet for another goodness-knows-how-long, even though the solution to the problem was only one phone call away. And then when he left he had the nerve to give me a little speech about how at BT they don't abandon their customers, they always try to do their best to go the extra mile and get the job done.

The moral of the story appears to be that if you want something done then you should try crying about it (at least, if you are a lady. Maybe if you are a gentleman who wants something done you should try shouting about it, I don't know). It seems rather depressing...but, hey. At least I have internet now.

Comments

[kerrypolka]

Oh, I've had this happen before - not at engineers but at someone I was trying to get to resolve a problem and then they said "no, can't help" and I felt very upset and desperate so I started to involuntarily cry and then they went "oh actually I can help after all it turns out."

The problem is with people not taking us seriously until the proper Signals of Feminine Distress were emitted, but it is totally reasonable to be feeling both cross at the person and at yourself for feeling like you reinforced patriarchy even though it wasn't your fault.

(Also, "we always go the extra mile!" is clearly disproved by "well then why didn't you do that until after you made me cry", engineer guy!)

[tabi_no_sora]

The problem is with people not taking us seriously until the proper Signals of Feminine Distress were emitted

Yes, exactly! It's so weird! It seems very odd that we should need to prove our desperation to people before they start doing their jobs properly, but there we go. My mother always encourages me to take advantage of it ('well, if nothing else works you can always try crying at them'), and I guess I can see her point that it's useful to have a last-resort weapon in certain situations, but it would be so much easier if people would just take other people and their problems seriously to start with! And I do wonder how the situation would have played out if it had been Joe who was working from home and not me.

[kerrypolka]

Yes! And it totally gives the lie to the thing of "oh you shouldn't so emotional, women, eh" because it's like, well apparently emotional is what we have to be to get things done, so actually get stuffed?