We hired some 'electricians' recommended by the maintenance manager in our complex to install our newly purchased light fixtures from Dragon Mart. I put electrician in quotes because while they seemed fairly competent with a straightforward installation, give them something that requires problem solving and it gets a bit sketchy.
The goal was to have everything done in one day. That was wishful thinking on our part. These guys are freelancing around the work they are actually paid and hired to do for the complex so we had to flex with their timetable, which meant 4-5 separate trips to get everything finally completed.
They started with the dining room fixture and came by while we were both at work. We got home to find the semi constructed light fixture on the dining room table. Brian, engineer and perfectionist that he is, starting examining the work. A few cuss words later and he was asking me to "hold this" and "give me that" while he assembled the light fixture himself following the cryptic directions written in Chinese. That correct, we assembled the light fixtures we paid the electricians to do. We left it on the table as an example of how to assemble the other one.
Yup, you guessed it, we should have assembled the other one as well because the next day they were both hung and almost working (we needed the correct size bulbs for the living room) but there was a large smudge on the living room fixture (the one they put together) because they forced a piece rather than loosen a screw. Hmmm, something about a screw loose seems appropriate here.
We went into quality assurance mode and thank goodness because in two other rooms, they had put the fixtures together incorrectly - not so much that they didn't work, but just so that they looked sloppy or crooked. The last straw was the fixture in our bedroom. After they finished, there was still a small gap between the light fixture plate and the ceiling. Brian pointed it out to them, helped move the bed and mattress again and they got to work. Luckily Brian stayed with them because at one point the solution was to "drill another hole" in the light fixture plate! Brian helped them see they could bend part of the inside to make things fit correctly. Who knows what we would have had if Brian hadn't been there - another trip to Dragon Mart for sure!
And after about 8 days of this, we finally had our lights up and working.
The goal was to have everything done in one day. That was wishful thinking on our part. These guys are freelancing around the work they are actually paid and hired to do for the complex so we had to flex with their timetable, which meant 4-5 separate trips to get everything finally completed.
They started with the dining room fixture and came by while we were both at work. We got home to find the semi constructed light fixture on the dining room table. Brian, engineer and perfectionist that he is, starting examining the work. A few cuss words later and he was asking me to "hold this" and "give me that" while he assembled the light fixture himself following the cryptic directions written in Chinese. That correct, we assembled the light fixtures we paid the electricians to do. We left it on the table as an example of how to assemble the other one.
Yup, you guessed it, we should have assembled the other one as well because the next day they were both hung and almost working (we needed the correct size bulbs for the living room) but there was a large smudge on the living room fixture (the one they put together) because they forced a piece rather than loosen a screw. Hmmm, something about a screw loose seems appropriate here.
We went into quality assurance mode and thank goodness because in two other rooms, they had put the fixtures together incorrectly - not so much that they didn't work, but just so that they looked sloppy or crooked. The last straw was the fixture in our bedroom. After they finished, there was still a small gap between the light fixture plate and the ceiling. Brian pointed it out to them, helped move the bed and mattress again and they got to work. Luckily Brian stayed with them because at one point the solution was to "drill another hole" in the light fixture plate! Brian helped them see they could bend part of the inside to make things fit correctly. Who knows what we would have had if Brian hadn't been there - another trip to Dragon Mart for sure!
And after about 8 days of this, we finally had our lights up and working.
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