A couple weeks ago, I took a few days off school to meet my friends Fed, Meg and Ben in Bogota for a mini-vacation. We all arrived on Tuesday night, and got some food and drinks before heading to bed to prepare ourselves for a busy five days.
Upon arising the next morning, I took a few minutes in the outdoor atrium adjacent to our room to wake myself up and stretch out the pillow-caused soreness. It was during this time that I met (or, more accurately, was met by) Gary _____, who would quickly become one of the oft-repeated in-jokes that inevitably develop when a group of people spend days at a time together.
It was apparent from the start that Gary _____ was no ordinary Gary. The first words out of his mouth were "Hi, I don't think we've met, I'm Gary _____, from New York and California." New York and California? Who does this guy think he is, the Dodgers?
Gary _____ proceeded to tell me some of the stuff that he had done and gave some recommendations about Bogota. To be honest, at first I wasn't too put off by him - it did seem like he'd spent a few days there and had some worthwhile suggestions. The conversation wrapped up shortly and I headed off to the bathroom to shower.
While sitting in my room with the door open after the shower, Gary wandered by (his room was just down the hall from ours), and poked his head in to ask me a question - having informed him that I am teaching in Barranquilla, he thought he'd ask whether any of my students' parents are computer programmers. I thought it was a weird question, but I barely know what any of my kids' parents do, so the conversation ended there. I thought maybe he knew a programmer in Barranquilla.
A little while later, I had moved into the hostel's main common area where coffee was available. I grabbed a cup and started browsing some tourist pamphlets, the likes of which are always strewn about hostel common areas. Gary _____ showed up and started talking to me, and by this point he was starting to get on my nerves, but I didn't want to let it show, so I asked him what he was up to in Bogota. It turns out he runs an internet start-up that runs couples counseling for couples who can't afford it (meaning, according to him, the vast majority of couples who need it), and he was in Bogota to recruit programmers. Fair enough, I guess. I didn't get around to asking him Why Bogota, but presumably labour is cheaper? I dunno. Anyway, it was then that it dawned on me why he had asked me about my students' parents, and after being talked at by Gary _____ three times now, including a question to which a positive response could have resulted in a fair amount of work on my part, I decided that the thing that rubbed me the wrong way about Gary _____ was that he was nosy.
Ben soon joined me, and in a moment of Gary _____ reprieve, I elicited this newly-formed opinion to him. Ben had only had passing contact with Gary _____, having been present when the parent-programmer query had been posed, but was now aware of what to watch for.
He did not have to wait long. After a brief conversation with an Italian guy who turned out to be a barber (PERFECT) in which Gary _____ of course introduced himself once again as "Gary _____ from New York and California" to this guy who could barely speak English, we were joined by Meg and Fed, and having been given this audience of four young adults, Gary _____ decided to drop some of his best information.
First, after re-hashing his internet start-up and current search for programmers, Gary _____ told us that "you can look me up. I'm Googleable." Haha. Googleable. What a jerk. Obviously we Googled him later. (And since I don't want to cause any ill will or have this traced back to me, now you know why I'm blanking out his last name. But I'm leaving the blank in there because his last name was such an important part of his identity, and we could really never talk about him without saying both names. I'm sure you've encountered similar situations. Oh, one more thing: if we're being totally accurate, it's not "Gary _____" but "Gary _____ with a _".)
Shortly thereafter, upon mentioning that we would be leaving soon for our first day of fun and excitement, Gary _____ asked if we were going to the tienda (corner store), and if so could we pick up a loaf of bread for him. Ben and I shared a knowing glance - nosiness at its finest. I totally called it.
And finally, Gary _____'s coup de grace came when we let it slip that we would be moving to a different hotel down the street. Gary asked us if we could check out the hotel for him and let him know if it met his standards, because he wouldn't mind switching also. He gave us his phone number. Jeez, dude. We JUST met. The programmers, the bread, and now this? By this point we were all really starting to despise Gary _____.
Oh yeah, and his "standards"? He wanted a hotel with an older crowd (Gary _____ was about 55 himself), because he was sick of talking with "people who don't know what they're doing with their lives". Bear in mind, he had just said this sentence to a bunch of 20-somethings. What had started as a light "haha, this guy, what a jerk" situation had turned into a full-on "this guy is a jerk". Of course, after ridding ourselves of Gary _____ and thankfully not seeing him again for the remainder of our trip, we probably got more entertainment out of making him the butt of all our jokes than the annoyance we felt on that first morning.
I'm glad we met Gary _____.
No comments:
Post a Comment