Now without going into too much detail about what I do for work, it's about trouble-shooting pc and other technical things, mostly pc's however. This of course means that 90% of the time, the problem isn't technical at all, it's human. I will write on the human cluelessness part quite some more in the future, however this time it's not about people and their hopeless pc skills, it's about culture, and integration.
You see, there are people that pay the price quite clearly written, people that pay double because they want to make sure they are a priority, and people that, you guessed it, would rather not pay at all. This post of course, is about the latter. Having done this for years, I can see them coming from miles away, in fact, even over a phone line. This one however, I've visited before.
me: Hi, this is ..(me, obviously)..
her: allo
me: hey there, how can I help you?
her: I have problem
me: (thinking "no shit") What's the problem?
her: it broken, no more work
Now, I'm assuming by now you guessed that she's not a local. Of course since I am leaving tomorrow, I have plenty of other stuff to worry about, so I told her I can't help her for another week because I was going away a while.
Nothing extreme so far eh? That's right. So I asked if that was ok with her, or if she wanted to get help elsewhere, since a week pc-less is quite a problem for most. She said she'd rather wait for me... oh the flattery...
or not... because this is where it does take an unexpected turn..
"because you here before, I pay you last time, you help me"
Did she just? Surely it's a misunderstanding. So I check to make sure if I heard her correctly, and apparently I did, and "where she come from is normal". Now, being a reasonable person I figured I would give her one chance to admit she's retarded, had a brain-fart, and to realise how life in the west works, by explaining it to her in nice and simple words. I did so in a few sentences that started with "I'm sorry, however.." and ended with "I hope you understand."
Of course I wouldn't be posting this if she had taken up on this educative opportunity. In fact, she did quite the opposite.
She called me a racist.
That is literally what she called me. Now I've heard a fair few things, but this goes beyond anything I've come across all these years. This really is too much to comprehend even for a rather well developed brain like mine. I guess I'll just use my friend Darwin again, and say that some monkey's clearly never evolved.
Dear Miss, I'm sorry feel victimised for having to pay per hour just like the rest of the bloody country. I wish you a safe flight back to Morocco, and all the best convincing the baker to give you free bread since you paid for one last time and you ate it all.
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4 comments:
Oh gawd. As much as I dislike people treating other people differently because of race, sex, religion, skin colour or favourite tv series, I hate it even more when people expect to be treated differently because of the above mentioned reasons.
I've had run-ins with people like that before, not directly mind, but I've certainly noticed them. Not necessarily retards either, just people trying to work on established steriotypes to get out of doing something.
In britain old people are the worst, feigning senility/whatever to get out of paying or trouble. I've heard of the odd Chineese person do it too, but never actually had the pleasure of witnessing it.
Usually people get so embarassed/flustered with having to deal with them they'll just accept whatever buttons they're offering and be done with it, nothing funnier than watching a train guard squirm cause the little old lady he's pestering for a ticket is on the verge of tears.
But then that's britain for you, we're a nation of people who'd rather not make a scene in public. Watching other people make scenes in public, however...
Oh yes, the old, but quite capable, people that insist to continue on driving and believing they're as sharp as ever while at the same time assuming you will stand up for them in a bus or train (Not that I use public transport).. lovely.
And Lac, yea, exactly.. yet if you say that they are the cause of discrimination debates, you still get labeled a racist.. so meh. Sickening.
"My people have once, at some obscure point in history suffered injustices, whether real or percieved, or possibly self-inflicted as well. You must now give me free stuff to pad the emotional damage you have caused me by not immediately solving my problems while at the same time giving me money for the time I've lost calling you to get it fixed."
Oh, wait.
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