Simple messages

Subject: Hope you're all right-it's megan from meganblogs

 Dear Tom,

Subject line says it. I can't say why, but you've been on my mind a lot recently, and i just hope everything is okay.

Best,
Megan

John Gray said...

tom
no blogs for a while
u ok?

2 November 2012 20:22

 

I will admit, the shit has hit the fan for me over the landwars.  I don’t want to bore you all with a bitter tirade but I really did want to do something for the community here.  Clean water, a clinic, help with the school.  I have already arranged for all the kids to have four free hours of golf lessons per week to keep them off the street and out of mischief.  Instead the Administradora, the Co-ordinador and the Vice-Coordinador have decided that all my access to the river belongs to them.  This seriously screws my project.

So I am fighting, and will go down fighting but I am depressed.  The single greatest impediment to progress in Africa is corruption.  It does not matter how many bits of notarized bits of paper you have, someone will come along and say, ‘Oh, he did not have the authority to sign that document so you have lost your money’.

Of course I am depressed.

Then there is the petty theft.  Anything that isn’t bolted down WILL be stolen.  I have lost my brand new 45 Kva generator, everything in the shop including the shelves, light fittings and plug sockets, two cameras (so no pics on the blog anymore), a mobile phone, some of my shoes, all of Alex’s shoes and, bizarrely, all my underwear, socks and handkerchiefs. The rough seams of Chinese made cotton shorts really rip into your nuts if they aren’t protected by a decent pair of Y Fronts.

Of course I am depressed.

And yet if I say that Africans are the most disgusting, shortsighted, stupid, venal, vile dishonest creatures on earth I would be accused of racism (as well as a huge generalisation but bear with me, I am stressed so somewhat irrational, after all I am married to an African and she is great). As a foreigner, I can’t even punch them out (everyone else except my wife) which would at least make me feel a little better, until they turned up with the police who would give me the blunt choice of coughing up some serious dough or letting them kick the shit out of me.

Of course I am depressed.

But then we must not forget that I paid an Englishman on the 4^th of January this year to complete my project and he promised delivery in six weeks.  Eleven months later I am still living, with my family, in the 16 square metres of what will be the kitchen of my new restaurant.

So of course I am depressed.

Realizing that if he, the Englishman who I trusted, went bust there was absolutely no way I would get my money back I used my industry contacts to get him a half a million dollar contract to sort out his cash flow problem and he still has only five guys allocated to my project.

So I am depressed.

Marcia pointed out that no-one with even the most tenuous grasp of his senses would pay a contractor up front and accused me of doing so only because the guy was English and in spite of tropical temperatures has been icy in bed with me ever since.

Of course she is absolutely correct so I can add shame and sexual frustration to my depression.

A German friend of mine got into difficulty and needed a bung of five grand.  All I had was two and a half.  He promised to pay it back within a week.  That was three months ago.  I have not heard from him since.

This depresses me.

Ten years ago, another friend had problems and needed to pay his kid’s school fees in UK so I coughed 25 grand.  He fucked me over.

That really depressed me.

I have a pistol in my desk drawer.  I was seriously thinking about using it.  Not to slot myself, but all those bastards who have either let me down or screwed me.  I took it apart, cleaned it and oiled it up nicely.  I even serviced the truck so it was guaranteed, as far as you can guarantee anything built in China, to get me into town.  I hadn’t considered getting back.  I was that close.

Then I get a couple of messages through the blogosphere from Megan and John.

The gun needed a good clean anyway so it can now continue to rest comfortably in its drawer.  The truck is breathing easier through its new filters and with fresh oil, there are a few moving parts blessing my effort.  Alex seems to have picked up a bit of a cough so I will now make him some German Brust Tee. Marcia is busy cooking a Portuguese Feijoada with rice which you would have to be an absolute philistine not to enjoy, especially with lashings of ultra spicy local gindungo.

Tomorrow is another day.  So I shall just wake up and face it.

Funny how a couple of simple messages can make all the difference.