Mr. Tony Martin(in the middle) - is the Community Director of the Jefferson Apartments and a student of Missouri State University who is major in Sports Medicine.
I knew him on the second day I reached in Springfield and signed a leases with his company to rent an apartment in the building he managed on Sep 13, 2013, to rent an apartments in the building of Jefferson. :-)
Since I started to live in Jefferson, I have been getting the good looking after by him, his colleagues Mr. Steve Reed (on the right)- the Lead Maintenance of the Jefferson Apartments or his company (I am not sure about it), and a young clerk names Charlie.
Mr. Tony Martin was very responsible to his work, I was impression the first day he signed the first lease with 16 pages with me on Sep 13, he explained every thing patiently and seriously. Then on the second time, I signed the second lease to live in their build for another 3 months, he did the same jobs as he did on the first day to explain each item as same as he did to a fresh customer.
Every time, when we had problem, as soon as we called him, very quickly things were resolved. When he found we had difficulties, always, he would give us a hand. For example, it was him to drive me to his another office to carry my new albums of paintings and also it was him to carry the heavy albums to my apartment on the third floor...
Even though we were just the guests of the building, we were organized some wonderful events outdoor in the bright weather. I was impression on how people did the game to learn and to remember the knowledge of fire protection while to eat in the bright autumn day... :- )
As a guest who lived in the building for 5 months and 20 days, I did have seen and felt a part of the good management of the Rental housing in the USA. Every student is asked to clean their apartment when they left from it. Then, the apartment would clean by at least 3 groups of workers. Someone clean the bath room; someone clean the kitchen, living room and refrigerator; some one check the equipment, such as the laundry, window curtains and electrical appliance and so on.
I remember very clear, on the second day I lived into the apartment Sep 14, I left for Seymour to teach. Before I started off, I wrote to Mr. Tony Martin for some of the electrical outlets did not work, and lacked a lamp in the bathroom (in fact, it was very bright with two lamps in the bath room, since I needed to paint in it, and there were the place for 3 lamps, so, I wrote it to him), when I came back from Seymour, not only the electrical outlets have worked already, there were 3 bright lights in the bath room and I got 2 emails from the company to inform me that everything had been fixed already... So that I did feel comfortable to live in the building, felt to be respected and be looked after very well in their building in the USA.
Mr. Steve Reed - the Lead Maintenance of the company or the building did the most of the jobs to keep the apartment working well. Very often I saw him working on the washing machine, dryer, refrigerator... especially during the cold winter, as soon as met the snowstorm, we could see Mr. Steve Reed around of the building to spread salt on the floor, to clean the snow and to keep the building working normally...
And in most of evening, I saw a young man -- Charlie, kept watching in the office...
Just for the good work of Mr. Tony Martin, Mr. Steve Reed and Charlie in Jefferson Building, every day, as long as I see the big Stone with the word Jefferson; and each night, when I came back from the work, study or eating, as soon as the green words -- Jefferson from far away, I did feel: I would be back Home...
Yes, when I was in Springfield, MO, USA, in many snowstorm days, when I looked out of the window, saw everything under the white and thick snow and heard the sounds of the strong wind, but lived in the warm, peaceful and clean apartment, smell the sweat smell of my food in the gas cooker, I could really not help thanking God for he had sent so many good messengers to help me and to create a so comfortable life condition for me in the far away America.
With so much appreciation, before I left for China, I went to the office of Jefferson, send Mr. Tony Martin and Mr. Steve Reed (I did not see Charlie since 2014) two small paintings that I had painted in their lovely apartment, to express my thanks to them.
Do you know? After I left for China, it was them to help my former classmate Zhu Bin to store my big painting board in his house as well.
I do hope Mr. Tony Martin, Mr. Steve Reed, Mr. Charlie and their boss: Mr. Lonnie Funk – the President of Rolling Oaks Group of Companies LLC, his wife and all of the managers and clerks in the company happier, luckier and more successful now and in the future.
If you have any questions, comments and suggestions, please write to
shirley@ebridge.cn . You are welcome to publish your opinions in
Message Board as well.
Shirley Yiping Zhang
March 8, 2014
