Especially a saucy, southern, momma lion! We don't play nice when you mess with those we love, especially when they come from our womb! Our former driver learned this lesson just the other day when his no good butt got himself fired for his crazy antics. Everyone told me to relax. Use the driver when I wanted. If I had something to do I shouldn't feel bad about asking him ( they said tell, not ask, but i just couldn't do it) to take me. It was his job after all and got paid well to do it. So, I said well heck, when in Rome (or in this case Thailand), and put him to work. And boy did he work! Worked himself right out of a job is what he did!
So, to fully understand what went down I must start at the beginning. It's rather long as we have been here for three weeks and put up with a lot, so God bless you if you get through it! Well, God you anyway, even if you don't read the whole thing ;-)
Well, it all began on a dreary, but turned sunny, Monday in Thailand. We were greeted promptly at 10:00 in front of our hotel by a very nice gentleman named Mr.O. Mr. O was to be our permanent driver for our stay here and he seemed like a very nice fellow. Great manners, spoke English, and the kids liked him. I thought to myself we hit the jackpot! No switching drivers for us, which I found out was quite the common occurrence. Anywho, he drove us to another hotel and that was the last we saw of him until house hunting concluded on Friday.
We actually saw Mr. O again the next time on Saturday. Saturday was the first day that we were going to go out on our own after being with our guides the whole week. When he came to pick us up at the hotel I was waiting in the lobby with the kids when he walked in. The hubby had ran back
upstairs to get a forgotten item so Mr. O took the opportunity to ask me why we hadn't called him all week. When I informed him that we were house hunting with our guides he asked where we were
going to live. When I told him where, boy... he actually had the nerve to tell me " oh, well, you no
ask me where I want you to live." Now, anyone who knows me in real life knows that running from confrontation is not something I do well. I run to it. Always have. Not sure why, but note to self: check with a shrink on that issue. Anyway, my filter was working very well that day and I politely deferred to my hubby. He too was a little shocked by the statement and then the follow on questions of whether or not we would reconsider. Turns out that we live about 30 plus minutes from Mr.O and he simply did not want to drive out to where we would be. At the end of the day however, I still liked the man so I asked the hubby if we should reconsider. My hubby, the ever sensible man that he is, informed me that doing so wasn't the right decision. For many reasons reconsidering would have been wrong for our family. I know that now.
So, here we are. The first Monday that hubby goes to work. Turns out that before we were even able
to talk to HR about getting a new driver (because ours still had not dropped the issue completely and kept asking us if we signed anything) Mr. O had carried himself down there to inform them that he
didn't like where we chose to live and to ask them to ask us to reconsider. Oh boy! No he didn't! But... Oh yes! He did! Since we had decided that we were in fact not going to reconsider and since
they told him the same thing, he seemed to accept his fate and informed us that he would drive for us
until they found us someone else, and that seems to be where the real trouble starts.
So, fast forward a week and we land in our new place. Mr. O decided that since he was having to
drive a car to our place instead of his normal mode of transportation ( a scooter) that he would ask for
overtime. Okay. Sounds harmless, right? Nope. Not so fast there, sparky! At first it sounded like he was asking us to " cook the books" so to speak. Hmmm... Well, we assumed the best, that it was a simple communication problem, and told him that once life got back to normal that he could expect a small amount of overtime. Well... apparently Mr.O sharpened up his English that night and came back the next day and point blank asked the hubby to sign his time sheet from 6 am to 10 pm whether he was driving or not. Let me let you guess what he said to that one, lol!
Once Mr. O realized that he wasn't going to get his fake overtime, or whatever you call it, he decided that acting like a certain four legged animal ( the lovely Jackass) was THE way to go! Several times
he showed up late to pick me and the kids up ( loved that...NOT!!), lied about how far away things were to avoid taking me places ( yep we know this for a fact since when the hubby was with me later, he would insist on going on those errands), and then the bad day happened. Now really, the bad day deserves a post all to itself, however, I will spare you some of the names and curses that I wanted to throw at this man and instead focus on "The Day".
So, I had grocery shopping to do. I felt somewhat bad about asking to go home decor shopping, but grocery shopping was something this momma had no trouble asking to do. I needed food for the babes and by God, food I was going to get! The hubby had told Mr. O to come right back after dropping him off at work. When did Mr. O show up??? Two hours later! Yep, he did! And get this... He only showed up after Hubby called him to find out where he was. Once he got here he was somewhat polite and helped me load the two little ones and off we went. As we were leaving I told him to take me to my favorite spot for shopping because I could get just about everything I needed there as well as get the big kid his lunch box for school. So picture it: white woman ( yes this important as I tend to stick out amongst all the dark skinned Thais), two blond hair blue eyed babies who draw much more attention then their mother, no stroller, ABANDONED in an underground parking garage that is attached to a CLOSED mall! Yes people, that is in fact how it all went down!
We drive up to the entry way which is in the underground part of the garage and as he is helping me get the kids out I turn to him and say " what time does it open?". You see, it was rather dark and well, I'm not from here so I had no idea! Well, what does he do? He looks at me, tells me 11 and then hops in the van and speeds off like a bat out hell before I even have the chance to tell him to wait and take us somewhere else! So here I am, two kids, alone in the underground garage. I was a little pissed at this point but figured that we could manage by just going mall walking. Well, apparently here in Thailand gangs of old people clad in matching track suits do not mall walk before opening. Here, malls are closed up tight until that 11 o'clock opening. As I am frantically looking around this very nice gentleman walks up to me and says what I already suspect, that the mall is closed. So, I ask him ever so nicely to point me in the direction of Starbucks which I knew to be open. Thankfully this very nice man helped me carry the kids up to the street level and then we booked it about a quarter of a mile to the Starbucks. By this time I was steaming pissed. I mean, no. Not steaming. Boiling Pissed!
As we are waiting at the opened Star Bucks I felt the need to call the hubby and complain very loudly and very aggressively that if he didn't fire the man that the he himself would be in serious trouble. Poor man didn't know what hit him. All he heard was yelling and cursing and threats. SO SORRY BABE! It wasn't his fault and he didn't deserve that. Anyway, after the mall actually opened we did our errands (the hubby called me more that day to check in then he probably has in our entire 10 years of marriage!), and then called the crappy Mr. O to come and pick us up. Even though the hubby told the company not to tell Mr.O about his firing until the end of the day when his driving duties were over, I walk out to find him in a very heated conversation on his cell phone. Turns out I do understand a few words of Thai (or he was throwing some English into this conversation) because I understood the words "my fault" and "madam" (what he called me) very well.
Here is where the scary part really starts. Since he was so pissed about what happened, he decided to put the life of my babies and mine in jeopardy by driving like a crazy person all the way home. Speeding. Taking turns way too fast. Almost flipping the van around tight corners. Going 40 in a 20 through our neighborhood. Flying over speed bumps. And that is only naming a few of the bad things. When we got home I was so thankful to God that he watched over us and that we made it. Once I unloaded the groceries (Mr.O usually did this as well as he usually let us out of the car, which he did not this time) I told him we were done and went in the house to tell the hubby about the latest stunt of bad driving.
After a chat about all the crappy things Mr.O had done, hubby's company told him that we would have to wait a week for a new driver. The hubby responded with a very firm "NO" because I was not going to put the kids back in the car with him. After the hubby informed them about the over time incident it was clear to them that Mr.O was in fact DONE! Oh, and get this. After the new temp driver started, Khun P, our maid, walked out and saw the new man. She asked me what happened to Mr.O and I told her just a general "something not good". She said "Oh, he no like kids, hmm?" Say what??? Apparently he informed her that he didn't like my kids. Okay, dude was so lucky he wasn't around me when that revelation happened!
Anyway, we should be getting a permanent driver here soon. The hubby was told that he could interview them if he wanted. He said no, but I insisted. They need to know about me and the kids. They need to know that my kids cry. They hate the car. And, they need to be given the choice as to whether or not they want to drive for a family. In the mean time we will stick to the tricked out Sponge Bob golf cart. Oh yeah buddy. We have Sponge Bobbed it out!
Well, better jet. Until next time, I hope all is well.
Kristen
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