Amazon has truly spoiled the American consumer. For US$119 a year, all qualifying items purchased on Amazon are shipped to you at no cost.
Some purchases can be delivered on the same day if there is a fulfilment centre in your city! Included in this membership is access to Amazon Video and you can stream thousands of movies and TV shows for free. Everything at your fingertips, on demand, no waiting for anything anymore.
That’s until you buy something outside of the Amazon market and have to experience regular snail-paced postal service. The wait is unnaturally agonising.
I recently made a purchase directly from Japan and I find myself feeling extremely impatient and on the verge of sending an angry email asking, “Where is my package?!” I constantly kept checking my email for updates and refreshed it every time I picked up my phone.
I would pay attention the time difference too as I actively monitored the delivery status at night since it would be daytime in Japan. I would search the hashtags to see if others had received their packages. Eat, sleep and repeat all this the next day. It is so unhealthy.
Then I received the shipping notification. “Yes!” I thought to myself. And quickly went back into the habit of constantly refreshing of the shipping tracking page on Japan Post.
Then I heard about Typhoon Faxai hitting Tokyo and read about record-breaking winds and damage from that. My heart sank, feeling sorry for the people of Japan but at the back of mind that could only mean one thing – my package is going to take forever to get here since it also has to clear Customs and that takes time too.
So yes, Amazon truly has absolutely destroyed my level of patience, which was never really that high to begin with.
It’s hard too since the US has a culture of just getting whatever you want. “It’s a free country!” and it’s true.
Need to go somewhere? Uber at your fingertips. Need lunch but too lazy to go out? DoorDash just a click away. Bad weather and need eggs delivered as soon as possible for that French toast brunch recipe on a Sunday? Instacart to the rescue.
Waiting and patience is now truly a trait that will soon go into resumés (known as CVs in Malaysia).
Meanwhile, no more looking at the phone and checking on the delivery status on this package until the end of the week for me. Perhaps when it gets here, I can truly experience the joy of receiving something I’ve been “patiently” waiting for.
This is the personal opinion of the writer and does not necessarily represent the views of Twentytwo13.