A couple of weeks ago, I finally decided to place an order on Dr Wong's book and another book on Amazon. This was my first experience dealing with Amazon even though online purchase is not a fresh and new thing to me. I had the intention to acquire Dr Wong's book long time ago but the price was a prohibitive factor that hindered me from placing an order. It cost $99.90 when Dr Wong first recommended it to us.
It was quite small, wasn't it? It was smaller and thinner than my Advanced Taxation's book. The reason I put the mailing address as my auntie's house was she was probably in the house when the postman delivered it here.
I was so surprised when my auntie handed the parcel to me as the scheduled date of arrival was 8th May 2012. It still showed the estimated arrival date as above until now on my Amazon's account. Ergo, I took the book to college on Thursday because I wanted Dr Wong's autograph as promised by her.
She was so surprised seeing me taking out her book. She immediately told her colleague sitting opposite her work station, Ms Connie (if I'm not wrong) proudly:"See, my student bought my book." Ms Connie asked me how much was the book. I said $77.17 last night. Then she said:"Is it in RM?" I said:"No, US Dollar." She said it was quite expensive.
Yes, I agreed with her. $77.17 is still expensive, not to talk about my original acquisition price. Nonetheless, I told them, the book was bought as an investment in myself, so worth it! On top of that, 5% of the proceed will be channeled for charity purpose. Therefore, I was not so concerning about the price. I asked Dr Wong to write some words of encouragement besides her autograph. After that, she repeated again, her book was good for those who are interested in pursuing their studies beyond Master's Degree level. She even flipped to relevant pages showing me the essence of the book.
I'm not doing my Master either. I really treat it as my self-investment. I have no time to run through it but I certainly will do it after my examinations.
Dr Wong borrowed the book from me and announced it in the lecture hall. I was so embarrassed during that time as I could sense all the eyes were focusing on me. Aiya, actually you can promote your book but you may choose not to mention my name. I'm not interested to be famous in college. However, it was okay as it was not something bad, wasn't it? Then, some of my friends borrowed the book from me.
I seemed to be out of topic already. Alright, back to Amazon's experience. I was so nervous and anxious before and during placing the order. This was because all transactions were dealing in US Dollar. It was not worthwhile for us to buy as we were using Ringgit Malaysia. The conversion rate would kill us. That was why I bought additional one book to share the delivery cost.
When I decided to place an order, import duty halted me again. It meant that other than the product and delivery cost, I would have to pay import duty some more! I quickly emailed Amazon regarding the transaction's procedures, their handling process and the import duty. Luckily Malaysia doesn't charge import duty on books in small quantity. Hence, I saved the import duty but this transaction cost me $125.92 which was equivalent to almost RM400.
It was okay so long as the books really improved my knowledge and skills. Due to currency rate, I wouldn't buy things from Amazon anymore unless the product can't be available in Malaysia's market or Ringgit Malaysia appreciates at least until RM/$ 1.50000. Is it possible? Hmm...
P/S: Please click on one of the google ads on the right before you leave, thank you...
