Archives for August, 2006

Inferiority complex slowly diminishing

In Brussels it helps if you have no experience of the marketplace before applying for your first job. Preferential qualifications are up to ten years in various educational establishments, ideally in various European languages, and terrible dress-sense.

It is thus with great pride that I announce that my final university results have come through and I will be awarded “the BSc Politics and International Relations degree from LSE with the classification: Second Class Honours (Upper Division).” I am the best-dressed graduate in town.

Soon I’ll be asking you to call me Dr. Kim Bah Lee.

08/31/2006 | Omphaloskepsis | No Comments

My neighbours are stunts

The bar next door don’t like to disturb their customers, so they only turn their music up to earbleed volume once they’ve all left. This is normally around half-past midnight, but can occasionally be as late as three in the morning.

Because I’m a walkover, I normally wake up, scratch my eyes and call them on the phone. If they hear the phone, they apologise and turn it down for a bit. If they don’t hear the phone, I get out of bed, get half-dressed and knock on the door.

This has been going on for a year.

The owner is charming, if thick, and offers me beer, which I refuse, and says he’s sorry and that it won’t happen again. Then it happens again. So I phone, get half-dressed and etc etc.

This happens three to four times a week.

Now, if Buddhism had patron saints, I’d be the patron saint of Zen. My patience is glorious, my wick never-ending and my fuse not connected to the mains. I’d rather trot sleepy-eyed to work for a year than risk falling out with my neighbours. This is disgusting. I makes me a pussy, a coward afraid to stand up for his rights and suffer for somebody else’s selfishness.

So I was as surprised as anybody, when at half-past nothing this morning I stormed, fuming, through their front door in my slippers. They looked afraid and asked if they should lower the music.

“NO, YOU CAN FUCKING TURN THE WHOLE FUCKING THING OFF ALTO-FUCKING-GETHER!!“

A moment’s silence, then some daft bitch I hadn’t met before shouted back, “Talk to me like that and you can get out.”

“Fine,” I said, a bit deflated. There were eight of them.

I heard them laugh as I walked out.

So I called the police who came and told them off. It’s not the first time I’ve done it, but this time I hung around to see the result. The result was the daft bitch standing in the street, giving me a sarcastic round of applause and mouthing off. So I mouthed off back. The police told her to shut up and get inside while I got an apology from the owner.

Then I double-locked the front-door and worried all night about the consequences of falling out with your neighbours.

Hard as nails, me.

08/31/2006 | Belgium | No Comments

With friends like these …

Between them they speak English, French, Italian, German, Spanish, Czech and Polish *edit* and Swahili */edit*. They have four university degrees, two from Oxford, one from the LSE, one from somewhere in France and a PhD from Cambridge. They count monster multinationals and European governments amongst their clients and have written novels, biographies and penned articles for broadsheet newspapers.

Together, they’re just a bloody mess.

08/29/2006 | Malta, Omphaloskepsis | No Comments

Taxipost stole two kilos of tea

On returning to Brussels (wet), there was a pile of post (largely dry, often junk). The pile included a notification from Taxipost (post that isn’t delivered by taxi, despite the name). It told me that I’d missed a delivery and that they’d keep it for 7 days.

7 days, in the middle of August, when everybody is on holiday.

7 days, before they send it back halfway around the world.

7 days.

7 days later, when I was still abroad, they sent me another note telling me that it would be returned to sender. This was a week before I got back.

So this morning I called them.

It turned out they had it, but they sent it back. To China. To somebody called “Anus Scott”. And no, there’s nothing I can do about it.

So I called “Anus“. Turns out it was two kilos of tea.

Damn.

08/29/2006 | Belgium | No Comments

Geeky post: Is Google punishing me?

I’m not very happy with Google at the moment. Since they’ve launched Blogger beta, I get signed out of Gmail every time I sign in to Blogger. This is because my email account and blogging account should be the same. But I don’t want them to be the same. I much prefer them being different. So this is a pain. And defeats the benefits of tabbed browsing.

I also suspect Google isn’t very happy with me. A few days ago, I inadvertently clicked on one of my own Adsense ads (strictly forbidden) and promptly sent them an email telling them the same. A lady called Winnie replied very quickly and said “Thanks for letting us know about the click on your ads. We appreciate your honesty and your continued efforts toward avoiding such clicks going forward.”
So they didn’t pay me for the click, the advertiser didn’t get charged, I’m happy I’m honest and so are Google.

So why haven’t I had any paying ads on my home page since then? Overnight my three ad banners were replaced one public service one for Gulf Hurricane Relief. Is Google punishing me? After I was so good and honest?

(Note – the situation may well have changed by the time you read this – apologies if so. I also realise I’m tempting fate by complaining in public … perhaps it will be Yahoo Ads on here next time you check in …)

08/29/2006 | Omphaloskepsis | No Comments

Breast is best

Our guests have gone home, we’ve a little time to ourselves, and Mrs K is complaining of there being “nothing to do on this bloody island”.

I have abandoned the survey on Malta’s tourism crisis for lack of bus-journeys, sawdust-filled food and rude locals. There is nothing to report. Malta is as vibrant as ever. This is official. Let it be sung from the precariously-built rooftops.

Yesterday I almost inadvertently bought another apartment. Good sense prevailed.

When I returned from Asia at the beginning of the year and decided to start writing again, I decided I’d adhere to the simple rule of not insulting colleagues or friends. And the other simple rule of not mentioning work. And the other simple rule of never starting a sentence with “and.”

As a self-preservation tactic, this has been wise. The quality of the prose has suffered for the lack of vitriolic spleen, though, and occasionally finding things to write about is tough.

So I was lucky to ogle a few breasts in recent times and am happy to share them with you.

The above picture (update: can’t find it any more, has disappeared into the bowels of the internet, apologies. You might like to google a picture of a breast and you’ll get the idea) is one of several glorious photos adorning billboards over the island, incentivising women to breastfeed and men to spend more time driving around, looking at billboards.

The other major breast-related episode of the week was the happy discovery of two female porn-star-wannabes sunbathing entirely naked on a boat not fifteen feet from ours, liberally applying suncream to each other’s chests. The girls on our boat tut-tutted and said it was disgusting. The boys on our boat told them to shut up and let us concentrate.

In non-breast-related news, I have been sent an email from somebody called Bert, who wants to link to Kim Bah Lee in return for a link to www.lets-plan-our-holiday.com. Although I can’t quite see what their site does, or why I would want to use it, here you go Bert, this one’s on me.

That’s all folks!

08/25/2006 | Malta | No Comments