Count-down to Christmas [Part 2]
21 December 2014
Countdown tidbits
People can be random!
I had an older American gent who’d had two too many bevvies recite ‘The Man from Snowy River’ to me. The ENTIRE poem by Banjo Paterson. Firstly, I was amazed that any one would know the poem in its entirety and secondly, that an American would be that person.
As soon as the bloke heard my accent he had me cornered, delivering every stanza with immense gusto and bravado. I have to admit, despite the American accent, I listened in patriotic respect.
I did some Christmas shopping the other day. Just down at the shops close to work. I often walk around the area because it has good vibes. On route to a favourite boutique, I was amazed by the increase in business that the shoe-shining woman was getting. She was on fire with her microfiber cloth! I stopped to watch as she enthusiastically worked the tooty-tips of one patent leather patriarchal client, who I assumed was more invested in watching the attractive woman work, than he was the outcome on his high-gloss footwear.
I often walk past this woman and make note of the customers. They’re always the same types: sleazy, skinny, creepy, ‘male-order-bride’ looking types who sit in her leather barber’s chair as she prostrates before them and gives their banker wanker leathers a good rub down.
I don’t know how she does it. Maybe she gets a kick out of it? I’m sure she knows the gig. In fact, I’m almost certain she gets a kick out of it. Puts on a bit of a show, even! With her sexy little lop-sided bob and tomboyish good looks, she shines ‘them’ shoes real good. You can see the perverted look in their eyes as they watch her, kneeled between their legs, bobbing up and down and working that cloth like it’s her meal ticket and board.
You never see a woman sitting in that chair. Just saying!
New Friends
One good thing about working all these functions has been the vast array of people I’ve met. When the functions have been larger gatherings, Rodge and I have worked with ‘temp’ staff sent through an agency. I’ve met some fantastic people:
DELIGHTFUL: A beautiful Nigerian born twenty-seven year old who has spent the last seven years living in Spain. She recently broke up with her boyfriend of five years for reasons similar to my situation. A hairdresser by trade, she is doing temp-waitressing work before going to university in 2015 to study business admin.
RACHAEL: A cutie patootie Ghanaian born twenty-one year old. About five foot tall, she’s an aspiring fashion designer (and fashion student) doing the odd job here and there to raise funds for her fledgling fashion label. Not a nasty bone in her body, the girl is super-Christian with some mean arse MJ moves.
KASKA: A thirty-one year old Polish painter who recently moved from Ireland. She had a child at the age of twenty-one and left her baby-daddy back in Poland seven years ago. She then met and married an Indian man. She was married to the Indian man for five years before divorcing him last year. She moved to London because she wants to get a job in a museum or gallery. She hates London! Her preference was to remain in Ireland, but the job prospects made that impossible. London is a means to an end for Kaska. She hopes the end will take her back to Ireland.
I’ve become very close to these women. We’ve worked several shifts together and each time, we realise just how similar our journeys are. Different circumstances but similar undertones. We share a bond of being from distant lands and have a passion for the arts and the unknown. We’re adventurers in our plight for self-discovery and liberation.
ROSA: The Sicilian lass who works at the café in the Museum. I pass her counter frequently throughout the day and have come to know her very well. She is twenty-seven years old, small in stature and speaks with a strong almost-baritone Italian accent.
About two weeks ago when I was running down the stairs near the cafe counter, Rosa jumped up and swung over the banister, yelling:
‘Becky, you come here and we talk for a moment. You are my favourite, no? Yes you are! I tell you this because you are my new favourite! I love you! They say you are lawyer… SO AM I! I am lawyer in Italy… you are lawyer in Australia… we are smarter than all these fuckers! I only come here to improve my English! I so excited when I hear you are lawyer… we are the same!’
I couldn’t believe it! Another kindred spirit! Not that I wanted to be a lawyer anymore, but it felt nice to know there was another person ‘just-like-me’ under the same roof. When I told Rosa that I had been working in maritime, she squealed with delight!
‘My dream! That is my dream! You know, Italy does not have good maritime lawyers… not many… I have always wanted to do maritime law! Now you excite me, Becky! I have plan! You and I… we go… we go to my country and we open up a firm. We treat people nicely… not like this shit place… we be nice to employees. This is a plan, no? Yes! This is the plan. We do this! I am excited!’
It only took that one conversation and Rosa and I had formed a bond. I really like Rosa but have no intention of moving to Italy. She mentions out ‘joint venture’ almost every time I see her. I wonder if she really thinks we’re going to open a firm in Sicily together?
During the days leading up to Christmas, Rosa and I exchanged knowing winks and smiles. Affirmations of the fact that we both know we’re going onto bigger and better things.
Our bond extends to Rosa sneaking me Milky Ways and coffees from the café, and me covering her coffee counter while she sneaks out for a quick cig. It’s the perfect working relationship: she facilitates my eating and I facilitate her smoking! HEALTHY.
OLA: A thirty-one year old Lithuanian woman. Bless her, I know she’s only trying to help, but she needs to back off. Her story is much like most women in their thirties. She isn’t married but hopes to be one day. For the time being, she’s happy with the way things are going with her Lithuanian boyfriend, whom she met in London.
For this reason, I cannot understand her angst over my single status. She admitted to being single herself at my age, so it’s odd that she’s in overdrive trying to set me up with one of her boyfriend’s mates. I mean, the woman is working overtime to find a moment where all four of us can go out.
The thing is, I’ve been so busy working Events, I literally don’t have time. My life has been work, alcohol and sleep.
I know her intentions are good but to be honest, I’m not in the ‘sharking’ space. I’m telling myself that I’m over my ex, but deep down that’s a lie. I need time. Bottom line, is I don’t want to share my time, mind or body with anyone right now. I don’t want to be single forever but right now, me, myself and I are just having WAY too much fun to share it with anyone else.
I’ll get back in the game when I’m good and ready and not a second beforehand.
An eye for an eye
Amadeo, the sneaky little arse, continues to eat my food and drink all my milk. I don’t have proof that it’s him but I know it is!
I’ve taken to only buying half-pints of milk so I can consume the majority in one go. I’ve also attempted to hide these bottles in plastic bags at the back of the fridge. So far, no luck in quelling the thief but at least the half-pint stops him from guzzling a litre at a time.
The other day when I realised my blue-vein cheese had been eaten, I decided to lower myself to his level. ‘Don’t get mad, get even!’ While I recognise that an eye for an eye does not restore full sight, it was time to run blindly towards justice.
I love potatoes! So, when I saw that he only had two left, I took one. I stole his potato and it felt good. Really good! It tasted even better! That sprinkling of thievery gave it extra flavor. I left the ONE remaining potato smack bang in the middle of his shelf. I was impressed with myself. Retribution felt good and gave me back a sense of control. The solitary tatty practically screamed, ‘FUCK YOU ARSEHOLE!’.
From stealing to giving, and taking to receiving. I had one housemate stealing from me and another gifting. Emilio asked his parents to send him some tinned tuna. Apparently, my aversion to English minced beef was matched only by Emilio’s disgust for English tinned tuna. Emilio was adamant that Spanish tinned tuna was superior, just as I was certain Australian beef was also.
Emilio’s Mum sent him FOUR KILOS of tinned tuna and kindly, Emilio gave me a tin. He’s so gorgeous and I really have a deep affection for him. He’s become somewhat of an adopted brother to me. When he gave me the tin of tuna with pride on his face, a wave of guilt washed over me. Grasping at the tin, I had flash backs of cramming his little cupcake into the bin. It made me hate Amadeo even more!
Diary entry
Miguel keeps on giving the gift of un-flushed shit. He caught Emilio by surprise the other night when he left a mega-log in the loo at about ten at night. Emilio was so scarred, that he sat on the end of my bed for ten minutes venting. Together, we giggled over how AMAZINGLY HUGE this dude’s poops were. Like seriously, SERIOUSLY huge! Is he healthy or risking injury?
The situation is always funny when it surprises someone else, but when it get you… it’s distressing. So, you can imagine my disgust when the grott failed to flush right before I went to leave for work.
He came out of the toilet and I popped in before leaving, and BAM… a bowl full! Except this time, there was nothing solid about it! It was mad spitty-bum and the damn flush wasn’t working.
I left for work cursing the fact that I pay way too much money for a room in a house with a toilet that doesn’t work properly. I ran to work desperate to wee and followed my angst up by sending the housing agent a really nasty text.
Needless to say, the poo was gone when I got home fourteen hours later and the flush was working again.
‘I just wanted to thank you for working in Events. I know it isn’t easy and I know it isn’t easy working with certain people. I appreciate it. I wanted to let you know that.’ I was surprised that Peeter Creeper thanked me. Shocked! When I told Rodge about the impromptu appreciation, specifically that I was hopeful it would result in a bonus, Rodge laughed. ‘Don’t hold your breath or bank your rent on it. You Australians are too optimistic. This is London, Squire.’ We both started laughing.
‘He better give us a bonus! We deserve medals! I’m going to tell him to just give us a hundred quid each and we’ll call it even. It’ll be cheaper than repairing the damage to this building when I burn it the fuck down! I WANT a bonus.’ We laughed again… laughed as we stood in the cellar cramming cookies into our mouths.
I guess, on the plus side of things, in the absence of a bonus, I can say with certainty that between the two of us we would have consumed about fifty quid, easy, in cookies and biscuits!
I didn’t see Hans until mid-week post Malta. When I had my first shift with him, he was amazed to learn I had spent the weekend prior in Malta. Specifically, in Malta on my own. He was mesmerized at the fact that I could travel by myself, or that I even liked my own company. He asked me several times if I was ‘over’ being alone before detailing at length that he was lonely, sad and over it. I was honest and told him that I had no desire to lock myself into another committed situation. I couldn’t even commit to a country, let alone a person. ‘I’m literally free and I love it. I mean not forever, but for now it’s great!’
I could see Hans process my words. SILENCE. Then, seemingly out of nowhere he said, ‘You should have asked me to go to Malta with you.’ I laughed in a detached/ trying not to offend kind of way. How to respond? I opted for, ‘Next time, for sure’. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that he was part of the reason I needed the holiday in the first place!
Christmas Crazzies
Christmas time just brings out the crazy in people. I’m sure people weren’t this loose when I started in November. Intoxication, aggression and simple absurdity seems to have incrementally increased as the number of days to Christmas have decreased.
Following my fun post-work drinking session with Leja, I had another double shift. After I finished with the Christmas function, I joined the staff on the bar floor to help see the evening to a close. Rodge still needed to be relieved so he could take his break. I’m not at all experienced in bartending, but I stepped up to the challenge.
In the thirty minutes Rodge was gone, I had a patron order five beers in the space of ten minutes. He was absolutely obliterated when he approached me for the third time to order his fifth beer. I asked him if he had drunk too much, to which he haphazardly assured me he hadn’t. I followed up by asking him if he drank his last beer or spilt it. Doing his best to stand upright, the patron clenched the bar, leaned in closer and said, ‘I did not spill a drop’. I looked at him straight-on, doing my best to avoid his mulberry-coloured nipples that were blazing through his saturated white collared shirt. ‘Last one’, I stipulated.
We were minutes away from closing the bar, affording the revelers about forty minutes to finish their drinks, have their last dance and fuck off for the evening. I turned to the bar manager who gave me the hand signal for ‘cut-off’ time. As he did so, a woman approached the bar yelling, ‘I still have nine seconds to order one last mother-fucking-drink, bitches!’. It was nuts and I was relieved when Rodge returned to start clean-up.
‘Have you heard the secret news?’ Rodge leant in close with a look of excitement.
‘Ooo… I have not. I love secret news! Tell me.’ Rodge pulled me to the side of the bar, ‘Leja is leaving. She quit yesterday. Apparently, she’s over it all here. Don’t tell anyone though, no one knows. She only told me, so if it gets out, she’ll know I spilled the beans.’
I winked at Rodge, ‘secret is safe with me’.
After clean-up was complete I walked to the locker room to grab my bag. The Bulgarian came running around the corner and closed the door. ‘I have a secret to tell you, Leja is leaving! How great is that? The wicked witch is leaving! Yayyyyy! Tell EVERYONE! We need to celebrate’ and with that, she opened the door and danced out of the room.
So much for secrets.
As I collected my shit and made my way to the exit, I wondered if my drunken discussion with Leja the previous night about ‘living once’ and ‘embracing the moment’ had convinced her to resign.
I mean, the kid is twenty-two and a manager. That’s a pretty good wicket, which I’m sure she will have trouble finding elsewhere.
I also felt bad that people were happy about the news. I’d gotten to know Leja and actually like her. She confided in me that she used to lie in bed at night crying, wondering why people didn’t like her at work.
Behind the aggression is a lovely person. She’s just misunderstood.
I find this sad.
Grand Final
I would like to tell you that my last shift with Hans (EVER, as he will be moving to a new site after new year) was a happy one filled with nostalgia and laughter… but it wasn’t!
This is probably because I was at that point where I could see the light at the end of the tunnel, but still had a ten-hour shift until I reached it.
You know when someone drives you THAT nuts, that you envisage scenarios as a coping mechanism? I’d been imagining fly-kicking Hans’ duck-sauce mouth on repeat. It wasn’t just the patrons that were growing increasingly intolerable in the lead up to Christmas! Hans had me teetering on the edge of my sanity.
I’ve worked with some pretty intense people. I’ve also come across some amazing egos BUT, no one has been as difficult as Hans!
CONTROL FREAK is an understatement.
He asked me to tablecloth the tables and lay out napkins. I put the tablecloth on the first table and then the napkins. As I did so, Hans ran back into the room with his hands in the air yelling, ‘No, no, no, no, Rebecca! Rebecca, Rebecca! That’s wrong! Table clothes all on first!’
I gave him an odd expression. ‘What’s the difference? There are ten tables and I’m the only person setting them. I’ll just do it all as I go.’
I could see Hans was getting visibly flustered. ‘No, no, no, tablecloths have to go on first. Table clothes have to go on all the tables FIRST.’ He then turned and pulled his STUPID radio out and radioed for the porters come and move tables around again.
I couldn’t believe the degree of control hysteria this person had. It wasn’t that I cared what order I did it in. If he wanted all ten tables to have tablecloths on first, fine! That wasn’t going to keep me up at night. What I did care about was being redundantly controlled and micromanaged. The bloke is psychotic. I was worn down.
Before I could respond, the porters arrived to rearrange the tables for the tenth time that morning. I wasn’t interested in fighting. I left the room and went into the other function room that had just had a Christmas lunch. Looting the spoils of the leftover Christmas crackers was a much better use of my time. People had left behind little bottle openers, a wine stopper and some weird screw set thingy. I pocketed them all. I needed a bottle opener!
Diary entry:
And so, I sit here and it’s Sunday. I’m packing my bag!
There was no way in HELL that I was going to spend Christmas alone in London. Having worked approximately a hundred and sixty hours in three weeks, I decided it was time for a holiday (again).
In my twenty-nine years, this is the first Christmas I’ve ever spent away from my family. Based on this, it made total sense to holiday somewhere where they don’t celebrate. So, I’m off to Marrakesh, Morocco…
Viking Ventures and Nordic Nonsense
This entry is part of the title, Viking Ventures and Nordic Nonsense. If you missed the earlier entries, you can find them here.
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