A Day in the Life of a Computer Repair Technician

Boop! goes the sound of the TV as it switches itself on. It’s 6:00 am, the time at which I programmed the TV to go on. I spend the next 30 minutes bargaining with my body to get out of bed as I half attentively listen to the day’s news highlights on TV. I have around half an hour to prepare myself for the day and leave the house.

Boop! goes the sound of the TV again. This is the time I programmed it to switch itself off and a quick reminder that it is 7:00 am and I am supposed to be out of the house.

It takes me 20 minutes to get to E-zone Internet Café in Nabbingo where I run my computer repair workshop. I spend the next 20 or so minutes interacting with my neighbours, a cobbler and a manicurist dissecting the previous day’s stories ranging from football, politics, local events and so on.

8:00 am finds me on my seat preparing my day’s to-do list. I go through my e-mail and check on the progress of several posts on my social networks as I wait for breakfast. Breakfast lands on my table at around 8:30 am as I prepare to write an article for the ICT Teachers’ website. I am interrupted by a client who wants his WhatsApp restored on his phone. What is supposed to take about 10 minutes seems to prove otherwise.

A few minutes after 9:00 am, I have only written the heading for my article, breakfast is only halfway done and my appetite is gone. I get a call from a nearby school to help them fix a server that has failed to go be accessed by other users. After moving round and round in circles, I notice it’s the network cable that I have to fix.

I rush back to my workshop to pic a crimping tool and RJ45 clips only to find a client whose computer needs a ‘small fix’. I decide to solve this ‘small’ problem only to spend the next 40 minutes fighting with a stubborn virus. It dawns on me that I have to re-install the Operating System. We fail to agree on the charges and off goes the client – almost an hour wasted.

I jump on a boda-boda to get back to the school whose server had issues. In less than 5 minutes, the issue is solved. I walk back to my workshop to find a pair of impatient clients whose phones have a password issue and a whatsapp update issue. But before I embark on them, a client with a laptop walks in – problem? Forgotten password.

It takes me around 30 minutes to solve these issues. I am hungry and as I think about what to eat, I get an invitation from another school for a discussion on a quotation I had sent earlier in the month.

I get to the school as soon as possible only to find the Headteacher locked in another meeting. Lunch is inevitably skipped as I wait for my turn to meet the Headteacher. At a quarter to 3:00 pm, I am called into the office and the discussion goes on for over an hour. Luckily again, I seal the deal and wait for its implementation.

It’s close to 5:00 pm and nothing like a decent meal can be found in my neighbourhood. I console myself with a yoghurt and a chapati as I prepare for the gym. By now, any phone interruptions piss me off – but I remember that my livelihood depends on the calls I get.

I get to the gym some minutes after 6:00 pm and workout up to 7:30 pm. I rush to my friend’s place to pick his vehicle as I am supposed to pick someone from the airport at 10:00 pm. However, I have to solve something on his laptop which takes me about 20 minutes.

I finally head for the airport as I munch away on a cob of maize and chicken wings. I fortunately arrive just on time. After a few pleasantries, we head back to Kampala and then back to my place just after mid night after a hectic day.

A quick look through my to-do list shows that I failed to write my article for the ICT teachers’ website, I failed to go for shopping in town, I didn’t post my old inverters on OLX and even failed to post the day’s advert on the school’s facebook page.

One thing that disturbs me is that I felt too exhausted but my pockets had nothing much to show for it. I go to bed hoping for a brighter day when I wake up in the morning.

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Stephen Dumba
E-zone School of Computing
0752 111 223 / 0772 111 223