Colleen, Prue and I all started part time jobs in the same bar/club/restaurant this week! Really great place to work - managers are friendly and quite understanding of our
unusual situation, the people that work there are great craic - in fact it continues the AIESEC atmosphere for us as it is a veritable mini UN there are so many nationalities there...in fact I'm probably in the minority as an Irish person! But thats all coolabula! The hours are somewhat unsociable but sure who needs to sleep right?!
Anywho, having finished our first week at work, Colleen and I stayed on for a pint last Saturday night after work...aparently tiz the tradition! So we are sitting in the corner with our new found Polish, Lithuanian and Columbian friends when the nastiest little man I have ever had the misfortune to meet pops out of nowhere. Well not nowhere, he is an employee of the same establishment. He proceeds to have a go at myself and Colleen on entirely fabricated grounds. Telling us that nobody likes us, that we come from a bastard country (he insisted I was from the US even though he knows I'm not!), that we have an attitude problem, that we were being disrespectful toward the Polish guys and their country....oh the list went on and on!
We were both so absolutely shocked that we just sat there! Two of the guys that work there did their best to shut him up but he just kept on heaping abuse on us. When we answered him we were being smart, if we didn't answer we had an attitude problem. In the end we realised he wasn't worth it and left the bar with those people he said didn't like us and that we had allegedly been disrespecting!
I left the bar sooo angry! For lots of reasons, first and foremost that anyone would speak to another person like that, secondly that he committed mortal sin in my eyes by rattling off the kind of anti-US rhetoric worthy of the sun/the mirror - completely incapable of backing up any argument that he made and quite obviously pulling statements from...well I don't need to lower myslef to his level! And finally the fact that he dared question and undermine my nationality. The longer I thought about it the more that got me mad! The angry man in question is from Northern Ireland, earlier on in the evening he had been at great pains to explain to us how he was not from NorthERN Ireland but in fact the North of the country, implying the island of Ireland was as one. Maybe once I have calmed down I will write a post on my feelings on that issue!
At the end of the day, disgusting and all as the episode was I have learned something from it both about people in general and myself. His uncalled for attack on us says an awful lot more about him than it does about us. People that are unhappy with their lives feel the need to dump it on others...bullies are generally people that are incredibly unhappy with their own lot in life! I know that neither Colleen nor I did anything that could have justified one tenth the abuse, so any response would have been justified.
I wanted so badly to answer him, but I knew that in the heat of the moment whatever would come out of my mouth would have been just as vile and hateful as what he was throwing at us and you know what I'm not kind of person. He may think that he scored some kinda of points against us last Saturday night...truth is we saw him for the spiteful little man he is and I know we certainly did not take any of what he said to heart. I am glad that I had the self control not to let go...although Colleen may have had to listen to my rant for the rest of the weekend...at least I retained my dignity when it counted.
I quite like my life, I have a job I love (despite sometimes thinking that I live in the twilight one!), I have amazing friends all over the world and I have truly incredible opportunities to grow and develop myself everyday of my life! So why should I care what an angry, bitter man thinks?!!!
You see these GPs (China and Japan) were meant to be Alonso's, here he was supposed to capture his second consecutive title! And now things will go right to the wire in Brazil, a circuit that will quite honestly (and unfortunately) favour the other champion. So what is my mind preoccupied with right now?!
