Mobily – Experiences of Partha Majumdar

18May2013 Evening

After a rather long day yesterday, filled with some crucial meetings, I sat down at 8PM to revise my lessons of my STAT2.2X program. After studying for about an hour, I decided that I was ready to take the final examination. As I had promised my friends that I would eat yogurt before taking the examination keeping with the Indian belief that eating curd keeps the body cool and thus helps take the examination in the best frame of mind, I walked down to Kingdom Tower to the “Looz and Jooz” shop to buy yogurt. As I was about to enter the shop, a very affluent looking Saudi gentleman stopped me. He told me that I looked very familiar. I was stunned as I had definitely not met him before. He asked me how long I had been in Saudi Arabia. I told him that I was to complete 2 years stay shortly. He saw my Mobily ID Card and told me that he was happy to note that I worked in Mobily and asked me about my role. I told him that I was the Architect. He then asked me about the quality of the FTTH service. I told him that I had high level view of the IT implementation and thus did not know the exact details. I, however, told him that it was our focus area and thus we were ensuring the best of service. He told me that he was anxious as when he had purchased the LTE service, for the first 2 weeks the signal strength was very good and then it declined gradually. He asked me whether it would be the same for FTTH. I told him that technically such possibility was less as FTTH was a wireline service and thus chance of guaranteed service quality was much higher. I was ashamed that I did not have a better answer. However, he did not pursue the matter any more and thanked me for the conversation that we had and we left.

I got the yogurt and had the same and took my test. I did not do too well. However, I managed to pass Stat2.2X and am now all excited to join Stat2.3X from 31May13.

19May2013 Evening

Last time I was returning from Bangalore, I noticed a Chinese Restaurant close to my apartment. As I was rather low today, I decided to have dinner there. I walked to the restaurant. When I entered, I was given a table. The menu arrived. The waiter noticed my Mobily ID. Immediately, he asked me what was the price of Internet connection. I told him to try LTE and told him the price for 2mbps package. He asked me whether 5 of them could use it. I told him that it should not be a problem. He took my order. In between, he would keep asking one question or other. I had to be very careful as I did not understand his English very well. On top of that the Philippine would use some Arabic words in his accent. This made life even more difficult.

Anyway he took my order. He got me the fries and cabbage. Again he had another question. I kept answering him while having the fries. Then, he disappeared. Another waiter got the soup. I found that I had ordered Tom Yum Shrimp soup and I was served Chicken Sweet Corn Soup. I called the waiter and informed him. He took the soup away and after some time got the right soup. As I started having the soup, the Philippine returned with another barrage of questions. I kept answering him while having my soup. When I finished the soup, he took the cutlery away and disappeared.

Another waiter got my main course of Veg Fried Rice and Chicken with Cashew Nuts. I started to eat when the Philippine returned. Again questions. I answered him. Then I was getting tired. So, I told him that I was full and requested if he could pack the remaining. He took it away and returned with the package. This time he told me that tomorrow was his holiday and he would buy the Mobily LTE connection. I paid the bill and have now returned to my room.