Haidhuru

Mass Murdering Mutumia:
My first ‘legit’ job was working for an international NGO. At this time, Central Africa had massive amounts of refuges fleeing Rwanda into the refugee camps in Tanzania, the first Congo war was just starting and we were already seeing large numbers of IDPs and refugees out of eastern Congo etc. So Nairobi was the hub for many humanitarian and relief activities. For one of these mega-operations, head honcho (HH) asks me to send a telex and a fax of some customs documents to the DRC (where the fax number was say, 84 Kinshasa. I’m not kidding). So the telex goes through but fax does not go through on my first attempt. And as I’m standing at the fax machine punching in numbers, head honcho comes out and asks “Have you sent the fax?” And, still at the machine, I tell him that I’m working on it. So he looks me dead in the eye and says “You should not use 3 hours to send one fax. You’ve just killed about 300 people with your causal work habits”.

Shock and horror. I just want to cry at that point.

Thank God for my line manager who told head honcho “Come on!!! There’s no way she’s killing anyone with a fax machine unless she drops it on their head.”

Bastid!!!!!!!!

Phone Ducking Mutumia:
During grad school, I worked as a mental health counselor for these four women with mental retardation and mental health issues. We used to call our boss “client” as she was as nuts – if not more so- than the women we worked for (and yes ‘nuts’ is a psychological term. It’s right there in DSM IV ). So, she had these bouts of crazy where she would follow us on outside on our smoke breaks and if she caught us in the act of speaking Kiswahili, she would go berserk. See her main gripe was that she was certain that we were talking about her and she would storm off and cry in the office.

So this one day, people call in sick as they are all planning to go to the Boston Marathon. And she has no one to do the afternoon shift. So she calls my house phone and cell phone trying to get me to pick up and do that shift. Me? I’m already hukos enjoying and my cellie must have been off. But when I finally do get home, the stupid woman has left me 25 messages on my house phone and I have like 60 missed calls on my cell phone. I was sooooo pissed off and when I go to work, I’m like “WTF? Why are you leaving me 25 messages on my house phone? Is you crazy?” Damn stupid client of a boss asks me why I was ignoring her. Anyway, shouting match later, I tell her that she should NEVER, EVER call me more than once when I’m off -especially not on my home phone (which I share with my roommates) . Aaand if I’m on duty, she should not leave more than one message on my cell phone.

Just then, this guy from Uganda that we used to work with comes in. He’s also steamed as he and his wife have just had absolute domez since the boss called his house repeatedly. So he says “Hiki ji-mama hakina fikira salama. Kinanipigia simu mpaka bibi yangu ana anza kufikiria tuna njama” (This woman is crazy. She’s calling me until my wife thinks my boss and I have something going on) . So we proceeded to talk the hell about her in her presence, in swa, as we watch her mind disintegrate. And boy were we rewarded!!! She totally flipped out as she’s running around saying “You talking about me? You are talking about me!” as we proceed to ignore her. Do you know she brought duct tape and tried to threaten us that she would duct tape the mouth of the next person who spoke a non-English word?

*rolling my eyes*

Stoopid heffa.

Phone Ducking Mutumia (reprise).
I take a commuter train to work. Often times it’s on time, but every once in a while, it will be late. So the other day, when I get in to work, my boss is like “what happened?” and I’m like “the train was late” (Please note that he knew I was running late as I’d called him to FYI him). So he’s like “Oh okay” and he lets the matter drop. When I get home, he calls me and asks me “Do you want me to give you a wake up call so that you don’t miss your train tomorrow? ”

Huh?

See, that’s when I knew for certain that he was a bona-fide, card carrying member of “Boss without Borders” . Dude!!! WTF?? I mean, putting aside the fact that the TRAIN WAS LATE!!! Not me! The train!!! And that no one wants the sound of their boss to be the first voice they hear. Plus it’s not like I’m late every day. Max maybe 10 days a year!!!! Sheesh!!!

Boundary-less Bastid!!!!!