No Whine Before Its Time

There used to be a television commercial for a brand of wine, the slogan for it was "we will sell no wine before it's time." Well, I have my own version of the slogan that relates to me: "Its time for me to whine."

The photo is of a mom and her daughter driving their "restaurant on wheels" to their Sunday place of business. They have a much worse career than I. But their facial expressions match about how I feel right now.

I've been here over three weeks, and language, culture differences, project problems and work pressures are taking their toll. I was going to title this post "space,lanes and sucking teeth" but I realized my list of whiney complaints covered more ground that just those topics.

There are several things that take me from a relaxed, peaceful state to a not-so-relaxed, somewhat annoyed state. First, drifting across the lanes of the road. I have noticed that the driving habits here are not aimed at remaining centered in your lane, but seem to be aimed at remaining centered in the paved section of road. That changes when encountering a corner, where the rule seems to position your vehicle anywhere between physical barriers (trees, telephone poles, street vendors), preferrably in the lane of oncoming traffic. I'm not exaggerating to make a point. It seems that most drivers really don't want to move too far from the center of the road, so when the oncoming vehicle is within, say two car lengths away, they reluctantly move as little as necessary back into their own lanes. I have not seen side view mirrors snap off yet, but they get very close.

Second, I've noticed that a lot of the older Japanese men suck their teeth. As they slowly walk along, hands folded behind their back, they suck their teeth. It makes this little noise similar to eating jello with your mouth open, and it bugs me. I stood about 6 inches away from a man in an elevator who sucked his teeth all the way down 12 floors. I don't know why, but that bugs me. I wanted to tell him to try another nervous habit, like twiddling his thumbs or messing with his hair, just something not so noisy.

Third, eastern people drift towards other people like magnets. Even when there is room, they tend to crowd together. They don't keep a space (30-36 inches) between themselves and others, they get within 3-6 inches. I was ladling soup from a large pot into my bowl at the buffet the other day. As I brought the ladle out of the pot toward my bowl, an older Chinese woman thrust her head between me and the pot. Just about two inches away from my face. She looked into the ladle, into the post, sucked her teeth twice and drifted off to another part of the buffet. I was glad she didn't take a sip from the ladle.

Okay, I've released a little pressure from my whine bottle. Thanks for your patience. Like I mentioned, I could have it much worse, I could be driving my restaurant to work each day.