How I Spent the Day: Cleaning Up the Office

Today, I went to my workplace to do some cleaning in preparation for work resumption on Monday. Yes, we are officially resuming work for the year on Monday, January 22, 2024. You might be wondering why, considering it's already the third week of January. Keep reading for more details.

First off, I work at the Hive Training Center in my city, Aba, headed by @fokusnow. The Hive Training Center in Aba is a place for recruiting and training hive members, and basically, my work there also revolves around Hive as well.

So today, being the 19th day of January, I decided to go and do some cleaning at the office in preparation for work resumption. We were supposed to resume work on January 9, 2024, but due to some reasons best known to my boss, we didn't.

On getting to the office, I was warmly greeted by a host of dust and cobwebs. I was expecting the welcome because we haven't been to the office since December 20, 2023, almost a month ago.

You know what they say about the eyes being afraid of work? That was what happened as I saw how dusty and unkempt the office was looking; I became instantly lazy. How am I gonna finish all this big work by myself? I definitely can't do this alone, I thought to myself. Even though I have been doing it, I always feel so whenever I have to clean the offices.

My workplace is a very big apartment consisting of two main offices, a big reception/training hall, a toilet, a mini office, and a packing store. My boss stays in one of the offices, my dad in the other office, and I stay in the reception hall as the receptionist.

I started off by cleaning my boss's office, removing the cobwebs, wiping off dust from the chairs and table in his office, dusting the louvers to the best of my ability before proceeding to sweep the floor. After sweeping the floor, the next step was to mop it, but that was the beginning of my woes.

As I took a bucket to fetch some water from the water container in the office, I discovered there was not a single drop of water left in the two containers we have at the office. Another chore added to the list of chores I already have to perform, and I was already having second thoughts about abandoning the cleaning because fetching water means going through and fro a flight of stairs, and I wasn't prepared for that.

While I was still contemplating the next line of action, I discovered another trouble in paradise. Apparently, someone, maybe me, has unintentionally hit one of the water containers so hard that it broke, making it leak.

This was almost a major issue for me because one container of water wouldn't be enough to clean the office, and I can't keep going through and fro the flight of stairs to fetch water from a not-so-close borehole. I just needed to fill those two containers with water at once and then come back and continue cleaning.

At that point, I was mentally exhausted. I kept thinking of a solution, but none seemed forthcoming. Finally, an idea popped into my head; I have seen my mother and others fix leaking water containers with melted plastic or nylon bags, so I decided to give it a shot.

Finding a nylon bag was a breeze; we have many at the office. Next off was to get a lighter to light a fire in order to melt the nylon. I quickly rushed down to buy a matchbox from a nearby store, and of course, I succeeded at getting one but at an outrageous price. Two matchboxes containing 40 matchsticks respectively are sold for 50 naira at my home, but I got one at the price of two. But that was the least of my worries. I quickly rushed back to the office and set the nylon bag on fire.

After many failed attempts and burning my hand, I succeeded in melting the nylon and using it to fix the leaking water container. After successfully fixing the water container, I then went to fetch water with the two containers. I had to board a tricycle on my way back because I am no superwoman to carry two heavy water containers back to the office. Guess what? The driver was one of my dad's friends. Not only did I not have to pay, but he was also kind enough to take those water containers up the flight of stairs to my office. Phewwww! What a lifesaver he was at that moment.

I proceeded to mop the office, after which I headed over to my dad's to repeat the process: dusting, removing cobwebs, sweeping, and mopping. Once I was done with the two main offices, I then went to the reception/training hall where I stay to clean it up.

This part is a different ball game because the reception/training hall is very big, can I even say extra large compared to the main offices? Any Hive member that has visited can attest to this fact. Secondly, there were gadgets there ranging from the many computer sets arranged in rows of four to the other computer items that needed care.

So, I began by removing the cobwebs first, followed by dusting the chairs, desks, and computers. Believe me when I say I was deadbeat tired after I was done cleaning off the dust. Fortunately, @mesonia arrived and helped me with sweeping the office. All I had to do was dispose of the trash gathered and mop the floor. I was so engrossed in cleaning and making everywhere sparkling clean that I forgot to take lunch. By the time I was done cleaning the reception hall and every other place that needed to be cleaned, excluding the toilet, it was already late. So, I started heading home.

Here is a before and after cleaning the floor. I really deserve a princess treatment. So, who's taking me out? Anyways, friends, this was how I spent the whole day cleaning, and I felt so happy that I really did.