Why is that?
Oh well, too bad.
I’m sick at the moment. And
I’m not very good at it. I become a bit depressed when I’m sick,
because I hate not being able to do what I normally do, and from feeling
like people think I’m faking it when I take time off work (in this case
from “overdoing the partying in Banda” – which I must say is not true. I
had a fairly tame party on Sat night, which included shooting fireworks
out the front and accidentally into the mosque across the road, plus
fabulous dancing until the wee hours. Then there was a bit of a late one
on Monday night with the boss and his barbeque before my early morning
flight to Medan. But that’s it. I swear). After getting back to Simeulue
I found myself with a crappy head cold, and a blocked right ear. It’s
driving me mad! Hopefully it will sort itself out soon.
I went to
Banda Aceh on Saturday. I went around to my old boss Paul’s house, to
see him and his family. His little boy Adrian is so big now… he is
Gigantor next to other Indonesian kids of the same age! It was cool to
have a few beers and a chat. He’s moving to Medan soon for a new job,
which is good for his family because his wife Popy is from there, and
her family can help look after Adrian.
I usually enjoy going to
Banda. But I didn’t enjoy being in that office this time because one of
my colleagues, who is dating a local staff member, was basically
ignoring me. Fair enough. I broke the news to her after the party early
on Sunday morning that this ‘boyfriend’ of two years had been fooling
around behind her back, including with me (I didn’t know!). This was
going on while she was away at home in Scotland; she was under the
impression that they were still together. So I had to tell her. It
wasn’t fair otherwise.
Anyway, we had planned to go surfing the
next morning, and in our hungover state we didn’t really think much
about the fact that it wasn’t a good idea if the three of us went
surfing together after the events of the previous evening! But out we
went, and I really wasn’t in the mood for surfing – I don’t like being
bad at things generally, particularly when I’m hungover and in a
“three’s a crowd” situation. So after less than an hour pretending to
enjoy being really crap at surfing, I made my way back to shore and
amused myself on the beach until they were finished, then got them to
take me home. Even more unfortunately, I happened to be staying at her
house!
It would have been pretty funny being a fly on the wall. But I hated it! It wasn’t my fault, but she made me feel like it was.
When
you’re staying with someone, it’s nice if they take care of you. Just a
little bit. I don’t expect her to hold my hand; but after Sunday I
hardly saw her, and she didn’t talk to me at all in the office. So I had
to amuse myself by finding other friends to play with. Not difficult
really – the other delegates live around the corner, so I hung out with
them for dinners and we played a bit of tennis (even with a sore arm, I
can still play if I don’t serve – but I feel like a bit of a wanker
serving under-arm! This time, I didn’t get to thrash the boss, but a
run-around was awesome, and much-needed!).
In addition, the
office in Banda Aceh felt really unfriendly. I arrived with my engineer
Rinaldi, and hardly anyone came up to say hello and introduce themselves
to him. It was much different to usual; maybe because there’s been a
few changes in the delegates, and a couple of the teams have moved to a
different shipping container in the compound. But normally when us
Simeuluenians go to the office, people are friendly, inclusive for
lunches and keen to have a chat. The usual bright, cheery people were
great. But there was none of that from anyone else. The admin and HR
staff were particularly unfriendly, and even made Rinaldi organise his
own briefing schedule – instead of organising it for him, they made him
go around to everyone in each department and find out when they were
free to give him the run-down of the different programs. How rude!
So
I came back to Simeulue and became sick. Crap. And then on the weekend,
I wanted to go out to Anna’s place to go kayaking. When I approached my
housemate with the request to take the car, he got all narky with me
and started carrying on about how I always take off with the car with
little consideration for when he wants to go somewhere. We’re a bit
short on cars at the moment, because of maintenance needs outside of
Simeulue.
I can understand his point. I do often just go tearing
off with the car to do things on the weekends. Being stuck in Salang all
week really makes me ansty and I enjoy the freedom to be able to get
out and about. But I usually check to see if he’s around, and he’s
usually sleeping or off having coffee on Sat and Sunday mornings, so I
just take the car and figure he’s big enough and ugly enough to call me
if he needs to use the car. In the past, we’ve had enough cars for me to
do this and it hasn’t been a problem.
But also, let me paint a
picture of my housemate. At a guess, he’s in his late 50s, and spends
his free time on weekends and after work doing the following things:
reading, sleeping and smoking. All in the house. Or, he goes to the
office. So he hardly goes anywhere. The only time he ever really needs
the car is to go to the office (if he's too lazy to walk! it's only 15
mins up the road), or if he wants to go into town for a change of
scenery on the restaurant front. So I thought it was a bit rich to
hassle me for using the car as I do. But the main thing I was mad about
was how he spoke to me, just launching into me without even really
saying hello; and then when I asked Anna to come pick me up (I wasn’t
able to take the car) he started mouthing off to her. That really pissed
me off. I was almost in tears.
And then I WAS in tears when
almost straight after our argument, I get an sms from my sister Ange: “I
miss you! :( Can you please hurry up and come home so we can do fun
stuff?! Love you xo”.
Anyway, the upshot of it all is that I’m
just pissed off with being here at the moment. Counting down big time
til December 10th. Bring on those holidays!
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