True story about elevator - entertainment stories

Let me tell you a story from my early days as an assistant building manager. I was new on the job with my broken English, and it was a Thursday. I was super excited to start, but my boss, whom I’ll call CS, looked like he was about to fall asleep standing up. He had been working alone for three months without a day off and was ready to escape into the wilderness for a camping trip that weekend. As he introduced me to the role, I could practically see the camping gear in his eyes!

So, Friday came, and at noon, CS dashed out the door like a kid on the last day of school. “Call me if you need anything!” he said, but I could see he was already imagining himself roasting marshmallows. Little did I know, that was the last time I would see him until Monday.

Then Saturday at around 1 p.m., I got a call from a tenant. “One of the elevators isn’t working!” they said. I confidently strutted down to the lobby, ready to handle the situation. When I looked at the elevator display, it was flashing between the numbers 1 and 9. What could that mean? I thought I was in a bad math problem!

I decided to take the stairs up to the 9th floor to check it out. When I got there, the elevator doors were closed, and I pressed the call button. Nothing happened. So I went back down to the 8th floor and pressed the button. Still nothing. I repeated this process all the way down to the ground floor, pressing each button like it was some sort of secret code. No response! I was starting to feel like I was playing an extreme game of elevator hide-and-seek, and I was definitely losing.

Feeling panicked and not knowing what to do, I called CS. He answered the phone, and in my best attempt at calm, I blurted out, “I lost elevator!” There was silence on the other end.

“Hallo?” I said. “I lost elevator! What should I do?”

Then I heard CS say, “Are you drunk?”

“Drunk? No! Why?” I replied, utterly confused.

“Lily, how can you lose an elevator? Can you explain that to me?”

I took a deep breath and tried to explain the situation in my not-so-great English. I told him about the flashing numbers and my frantic button-pressing. Eventually, he understood me and said, “Okay, listen. You need to call the elevator company. Just tell them the elevator is not responding and the display shows two floors.”

“Two floors?” I asked.

“Yes! And whatever you do, don’t say you lost it. They will not come!”

So I took his advice and called the elevator company. I confidently said, “The elevator is not responding, and the display shows two floors.” They were at the building in no time, and soon enough, the elevator was fixed.

In the end, I learned my first big lesson in building management: don’t lose your elevator! Now, this story gets told often with a lot of laughter, especially at my expense.

So, big thank you, CS, for teaching me not just this lesson, but many others!