Soulparking

Sunday, 24 October 2004

Tack.

Or thank you in Swedish.  So as I sit in business class with a young Swedish boy pacing and running through the airplane aisle and pausing to lean into my seat and watch every word I type.

But first, the obvious question is – how did I get to Sweden?

Long, rambling answer.

I thought my days of traveling would be over when I moved to South Africa.  Hey, that was one of the reasons I moved – to slow down, relax.  Get my head screwed on straight.  But as I emailed my parents and told them last night – the problem with becoming specialized in your field is – if there is a global emergency – you get called. 

What I think is ironic is – being a specialist doesn’t mean you are the smartest person on a particular topic.  It just means you are numb to inconvenience.  It means you have empathy for other people in your field that runs into seemingly insurmountable technical issues – and you understand that need to feel being “rescued”.  Or you want to be able to say – “Hey, we brought the best specialist we have, and even he couldn’t figure it out – so we got a BIG problem here.” Or:  “See I am not stupid!” 

I love the frequent flier miles.  And I have finally visited every Scandinavian country there is.  But man, I wish I was at home in Cape Town taking a much needed afternoon nap in my flats’ furnished couch. 

Since I have moved to Cape Town (only two weeks ago), I have not one day of peace. 

If it hasn’t been arguing with customs to wrangle my personal belongings from the Port Authority and being told repeatedly:  “You cannot have these items because you are not a South African citizen!”  Okay, sure, I am not a citizen but that does not deny it is my stuff…  And the longer you keep it, the longer you have stolen it.

Or rushing up to Johannesburg to fill in as a keynote speaker when one cancelled at the last minute.   Going through the hoops and paperwork to get my work VISA (I am an illegal immigrant!  I hope I don’t get deported.  Hell, I guess I am working for free.)

Then there’s the obvious stuff when you move – finding the cheapest place to buy groceries, where to buy electricity (you have to pay for your electricity as you go in South Africa and then punch in a number in the utility box in a wall), and discovering that if you buy 180 Rand of talk time on my mobile phone you get a 20 Rand discount (who knew?).  And then discovering how quickly 180 Rand of talk time goes just sending SMS’s to your fellow co-workers and having to call customs repeatedly.  And last but not least, how capitalism is in full swing in the newly democratic country of South Africa but customer relation skills have a long way to go…

Me:  Is this still on sale?

Store clerk:  No.

Me:  But the sales paper says it is.

Store clerk:  (rolling his eyes) I will check (and they pull the card board price description out of the see through plastic holder – and when its pulled out an even cheaper price than the newspaper sales price is displayed)

Me:  Hey wait a minute!  What price is it?  This says its 100 Rand cheaper than the newspaper sales price.

Store clerk: (rolling his eyes) I will check.  (disappears and then returns)  It is not on sale.

Me:  (pulling out the sales paper) But it says right here it is.

Store clerk:  That sales paper is wrong.

Me:  And what about the price that is displayed there.

Store clerk:  (rolling his eyes) It is wrong.  (leaves)

And then blithely checking your email, you find an email exchange between your boss and your project manager asking who gave me the go ahead to come to Sweden.  Then feeling like shit – or that I am already failing at my new job. 

And right now, I am rushing like hell in an overnight flight to get back to Cape Town for a meeting at my office on Monday morning at 9 AM.

I wonder if I went back in time about 50 years and told somebody I met on the bus – that I had to fly to Sweden from South Africa to fix a problem in two days and then fly back before a meeting at 9 AM on the third day – would they call me a pot-smoking, lunatic?

So I did the American thing on this trip.  Yes, I came to the country.  Did I see Stockholm?  Okay, sure – I saw it from a car.  But I mostly saw a server room and drank lots of coffee and ate a bag full of candy to keep energized with my fellow Swedish company employees from 8 in the morning until 8 or 9 at night – every day I was here.  I bought souvenirs – Swedish chocolates to take back to my neighbors and a mother of one of my friends in South Africa who just had surgery (who cant eat it because of Ramadon).

I am feeling my world connectivity falling away…  I am getting emails from friends all around the world with – that I used to chat with every other day asking if I am still alive.

I just want to rest.

Heck, I just want somebody to tell me “Thanks, for a job well done.”

And you know, when all things were resolved they didn’t even really need me.  They figured out the issue on their own.  I just made them laugh and get a new perspective on things.  But it makes me look like a hero.

And when they ushered me off to my airplane, my Swedish counterparts patted me on the back and said to me, “tack.”

And that’s all I needed.