The Geneva Project - Part 5

So the little kumquat returned. By the time I got his call, I was at Starbucks - practically the only place open on the day after Easter - since I was supposed to be working from home that day and the internet in my apartment sucks. There I was, totally in my uninterrupted work groove, when the phone buzzes. I had no idea who it was, but figured it was someone as equally work-burdened as I was and had to work on a holiday. When I heard his voice on the other end, at first I thought it was an April Fool's joke.  He was going off about how he was so upset that he missed his flight blah blah blah and he had checked his bags and it took forever for the airport people to find them blah blah blah but FEAR NOT guys - his Tumi European Style Luggage had GPS tracking devices on them so he would have found them if the airline didn't.

I wanted to kill myself. Or him. Whatever.

He came over to the Starbucks about two hours later, at which point I think I started losing my mind because the entire time he talked and explained what happened in such a serious and frustrated tone, I was so close to bursting out in laughter. I don't know if it was the fact that mentioned his suitcases' GPS tracking device four times, or his King of the Island uncle who was supposed to save him from letting competent airline people do their jobs, or just his overall condescending and dismissive attitude towards EVERYONE EXCEPT HIMSELF.

I don't care how many degrees you have or how many different brands you are capable of carrying on yourself at a time. At 30 years old, if you miss your flight because you decide to keep sleeping for 12 hours on end, THE ONLY PERSON to be blamed is yourself and you are a full-fledged MORON.

After that convo, I went back to my little table (he had enough sense to sit far away from me) and continued working. Meanwhile, from the corner of my eye, I see him take out his phone (Samsung Galaxy Someshit) and start recording himself as he talked into his phone. I can't believe I didn't write about this before, but this kid had been making videos of himself all weekend to send his buddy Seth, whose birthday party was going to be in California the following weekend. Seth's girlfriend had asked Seth's friends who couldn't be there to write in a note or something so she could make a big card of it. But, this kumquat being a kumquat, had decided he would make a video of himself wishing his buddy a happy birthday and apologizing for not being there. So, he had been filming himself all over Europe doing these little videos and was going to pick the most interesting one to send in. They all started with "Hey Seth…so as you can see behind me, I'm at (insert place) in (insert city), (insert country) in Europe. I'm sorry I can't be there blah blah BLAH…(repeat city name at least twice more)" and then they would end with him going off camera suddenly.

It doesn't end there, folks. Because he was actually GOING TO BE in California the following weekend, but thought this would be a good "prank" to show the video, and then walk in the room ten seconds later. SURPRISE!!!

No.
No.
No.

For any other normal person in the world, this would be kind of cool. But thinking about all the pretentious, self-centered, show-offy reasons behind these videos, I wanted to throw up. WHY NOT just show up to a party like a normal person at an appropriate time with an appropriate gift, and just BE NORMAL. This isn't a dance competition. This isn't a wrestling match. You don't need an intro video.

So,  could just imagine him making another video along the lines of "So I wanted to come to your birthday party…but my plane took off without me and I'm stuck in this contemporary café in the middle of Geneva, Switzerland in Europe…" No. You are in a Starbucks, and your dumbass missed your own flight.

UGH.

I put my headphones on, hood up, and got to work. Luckily, he had work to do as well (or something on his computer) so he didn't bother me. I guess now's a good time to mention he's also NOT A DOCTOR. That came out during some moment in Paris. He had originally told me (and had been telling me for two months) that he left his residency program two months before it ended because he was seeing a lot of malpractice and wasn't a fan of the doctors or whatever. Yeah. No. In Paris, he let slip that he was actually asked to leave the program two months before it ended.  Of course, he went into a whole charade about how it wasn’t his fault and the attending doctor made a bad call and blamed it on him or whatever. I wasn't buying it. As a resident, you're allowed to NOT know everything - that's why you're not a doctor practicing on your own yet. The more I thought about it, the more I realized he must have done something REALLY bad, or screwed up multiple times, to have been asked to leave. Now, looking at the situation in front of me - what with him missing his flight and blaming all powers that be except himself - I could see that his residency story probably held the same amount of validity. So needless to say, by the time we got back to Geneva from Paris, I wanted this lying, pompous asshole as far away from me as possible.

And yet he was back in my life. At Starbucks.

I luckily spent the rest of the day in near complete solitude, until Starbucks was closing and we had to go back to my place. Once again, same routine - him snoring, me waking him up, three seconds later he's back at it, etc. andI couldn't sleep. Unlike Sunday night, I actually had to go to work the next day. But, I also didn't want to oversleep or let him oversleep. I ended up staying up the entire night (writing these stories and actually doing some real work as well), and at 7am sharp I woke him up, and forced him out of bed by threatening to spray him with water. He told me his flight didn't leave till 1215 - yeah, I had heard that before but I wasn't taking that shit anymore. He was going to be the first one at the gate for all I cared. I almost feel bad for how "firm" (and borderline mean) I was that morning, but he had to go. I didn't even bother taking him to the airport like the day before - he could figure that out. I had to get ready for work.

The end.

The Geneva Project - Part 4

My new plan consisted of sucking it up and dealing with him.

I was in Paris after all and who knew when I would be able to return? I was still incredibly lucky for being where I was so I figured I might as well just try to enjoy what I could, ignore him as much as possible, and not let him ruin my time.

We woke up Sunday morning, knowing we had to get going to catch our train on the other side of town - or at least that's how I woke up. I immediately went to shower while he updated Facebook, Instagram, FourSquare, MySpace - whatever.  I don't know what it is about this kid but he has no sense of urgency at all. For example, we woke up late, we're already running late if we wanted to get breakfast, and he's just taking his time, packing his things ever so slowly, commentating on EVERYTHING, thinking the train is going to wait for us or something. Are ya kidding? FREAKING MOVE IT.

When we were finally all ready, I prepared myself for the Everest-equivalent hike I would have to endure, what with adding my backpack to the prior day's shopping weight. We went downstairs to the lobby to check out and it occurred to me that I never asked about the price for the hotel - huge mistake. I don't know if this kid has ever stayed in a hotel before, because our total for two nights ended up at nearly 500 Euros, meaning this hotel that we only partially slept in cost us 250 Euros a night. REALLY buddy?! We didn't have a view of the Eiffel Tower, we still had to hike to get virtually anywhere, and quite honestly - what the F was worth 250 Euros a night!? I am by no means a cheap person - I prefer the term economical, or you know, SMART WITH MY MONEY. For example, when my family went to Australia last year, I found us a two-bedroom duplex penthouse suite right on the harbour in downtown Sydney with an AMAZING view for 250 Aus a night - and that was booked three days before we decided to fly out there in the middle of prime tourist season. So when comparing that to this, I nearly flipped a cow. That's the last time I'm ever trusting anyone to do anything. He saw my raised eyebrows when we got the bill and said, "Pretty good deal, huh!?" He was so proud of himself. So. Clueless. I didn't even say anything - just put my card on the counter. There's 250 bucks I'm never seeing again.

Before we headed to the train station, he wanted to have breakfast first, and looked up directions to another one of those fancy shmancy places that actually squeezes grapes to make you grape juice. Unless it's wine, really, what's the point of all that effort?

We entered the restaurant and it was completely empty. By completely, I mean that besides the servers, there was no one in the restaurant. They asked if we had  a reservation. We said no and they looked at us like that was the most ridiculous statement they'd ever heard and we were all of a sudden intruding on their restaurant's ambiance. The hostess stared at us then went to look in some book, flipping through it and finally running her finger down the page. Let me repeat - the restaurant was completely empty. Finally, she sighed, rolled her eyes, and told us to follow her. She pointed towards the back of the restaurant, so, since we had 10,000 things, we took a seat at a table with 4 chairs, but no sooner had I unstrapped my backpack when Crazy Lady came back and asked us to sit at a table for 2.

(Did I already mention how there was NO ONE in the restaurant?) Fine with me. I scattered my (consolidated) bags all around me, and if they had to climb over them to deliver my food and refill my water - that wasn't my problem. They wanted to make this difficult. I just hoped none of the imaginary people taking up all the other tables would trip over it.

I took a look at the pretentiously over-priced and limited breakfast menu and decided on crepes. Figured I'd go with something I know. Turns out, they had "run out" of crepes. I think all the invisible people in the restaurant ate them or something. I ended up ordering French Toast which was soggy and gross. Again, money well spent. I should've just walked out on the street and gotten a crepe or croissant for less than two euros. I definitely would've been a lot more satisfied than I was with the cardboard on my plate. The servers took a year and a half to bring us our bill, and soon we were running late once again.
We grabbed a cab and got to the train station, luckily found our correct seats on time (6 minutes before the train was going to leave), and were headed back to Geneva. By this point, I was too annoyed to deal with him any longer, so I stuck my ear buds in, pulled my hood up, leaned my head against the window and just fell asleep.

Before I knew it….click. Click.


Click.


Click.


Who the HELL still keeps the clicker sound on when using their camera phone? I guess I shouldn't have been surprised - he's also the type who keeps the keypad sound on for every touch on his phone. Which of course isn't annoying in the slightest.

Not. One. Bit. And neither is leaning over me to take pictures through the window.

At this point, the kid finally got one of Harleen's infamous "Shut-the-F-up-or-I-will-cut-your-balls-off-and-throw-them-to-starving-wolves" look that I only reserve for a select few people.

His reaction (completely shocked): "Oh, I'm sorry! Was I bothering you?"

My response: "Of course not. Just like an iceberg didn't bother the Titanic."

Idiot. Rolled over. Went back to sleep.

We were approaching the station in Geneva and usually people get up a few minutes beforehand to gather their things and make sure they get off the train in time. Nope, not this kid. He was sitting on the outside and decided to wait until the train had come to a complete stop (wait, were we on a school bus in elementary school?!) before deciding to get up, carefully wrap his scarf around his neck, pull his arms through his jacket, leisurely gather his bags, and take his sweet old time, as per usual. By the time I was even able to get up, all the people who were supposed to get off had already gotten off. Fantastic. I grabbed my things in half a minute, took two seconds to put my sunglasses on, swung my coat over my arm and plowed through to the exit.

Now, although there are signs everywhere that say "have your passport ready for immigration," no one does that. I kept my head up, walked straight through customs like I owned the place, and no one questioned me.

Meanwhile…

Little tourist over there decided to walk around with his passport in hand, making eye contact with every customs official, and of course - he gets stopped and questioned. For someone who claims to be a doctor, he doesn't know how to answer questions well at all - he told the officer he was coming from Geneva and left France on Friday.

What? It was Sunday and we were in Geneva. We left FOR France on Friday.

Total. Moron.

I finally helped him out to get his countries and dates straight, and although the immigration officers still  looked skeptical (tall, dark, male - what's not suspicious about that these days?) luckily I was somehow able to smile a lot while taking to these officials and they let him go. I should've just kept walking and let him get taken to a Swiss prison. Ugh.

Of course, the moment we get out into the general train station area, he starts going off about how he can't believe he was questioned and he was thinking to himself that he might have to call his uncle. (You guys remember, the one who works somewhere in the government of Trinidad?) I wanted to punch him in the face and say 1. Your phone doesn't work here so good luck calling anyone with it, and 2. Who do YOU think your uncle is and how is that even relevant to this situation in GENEVA and why on earth would that even remotely matter!? Unless he was planning on flying out to Geneva and somehow saving your sorry ass (and hopefully taking it with him), newsflash: NO ONE CARES.

We got back to the apartment and my arms were about to fall off after carrying so much. I started stretching them out after putting all my stuff down. He lays on the bed while watching me, then says 'You know, you could really use a massage" as if inviting me over to the bed.

"I don't do massages," I said clearly. "I don't like people touching me." And then I went to go shower. Again. Whatever I could do to decrease the amount of time I had to spend with him,  I would do it.

Since his flight was set to leave Monday morning, it was technically his last day in town. I asked him what he wanted to do, and he wanted to see my work place. Of course he would. That's the absolute number one place I want to go on my day off - my office. Fantastic. So we made the 2 km hike up to the IFRC office, he took some pictures, and then we walked back towards the town for ice cream and dinner (in that order). We went to Movenpick, my absolute favorite ice creamery in the world (practically a sanctuary to me). The flavors were SO DELICOUS but I definitely would have enjoyed it a bit more had I not been sitting across a three year old who doesn't know how to eat ice cream out of a cone.

We ended up at another snooty place for dinner, but this one wasn't as bad as I originally anticipated. There was a set menu of steak and fries and the only real choice you had was how you wanted your meat cooked and what you wanted to drink. The moment you finish whatever is on your plate, they immediately bring you more, which was cool, but dangerous. For drinks, I let him choose the wine off the list and what ended up at our table was so vile, I couldn't take more than a sip. He didn't like the wine either and was upset because they didn't bring a sample first. (He was probably going to call his uncle about that later.)

The food overall was good, but I could feel myself counting down the minutes until he was going to leave. His inability to talk about anything but himself was so unbelievably obnoxious and I felt myself more interested in people-watching and making up stories about the strangers around us than actually listening to the words coming out of his mouth. I'm pretty sure I could have napped under the table while he talked and he wouldn't have even noticed.

We eventually made it back to the apartment and I thanked God that it was my last night with him. We got into bed and he put his arm on me, trying to give me a hug…? He thanked me for letting him stay with me and for such a great time. I said it was no problem, that I'm glad I had someone to go exploring with.

His arm stayed there. I slipped away and got up to paint my nails. He fell asleep.

Thanks to his snoring, I once again couldn't sleep, so I thought I would use my time constructively, put my ear buds in, and begin this novella. There were a few times though that I just couldn't take the snoring anymore and went for walks outside, but even then I couldn't escape the noise. I don't know how my neighbors dealt with him. I kid you not when I say it is the loudest snoring I have ever heard in my life, and it DOES NOT END! There aren't even any breaks!

I finally crawled into bed and woke up around 8am, which is still considered sleeping in for me. I asked him what time his fight was, he said 12:15 or something around there. As sleepy I was, I told him he needed to get up and get ready to go, especially since he hadn't even packed yet. Expecting a 30-year-old to be responsible and get his shit together (literally and figuratively), I figured I did my job so I rolled over and went back to sleep.

I wake up an hour later around 9:15am, and he's still in bed. At which point I again, nearly flip, and tell him he needs to get up and get going. Of course, he goes and takes a shower, comes out and takes his sweet old time getting ready and packing his things. While I try to hurry him, he tries to "reassure me" by saying you're usually supposed to be at the airport an hour before an international flight.

Hold on. What? What the hell kind of international flights does this kid go on?! I burst his bubble a little and told him he actually should've been there at 10 - you know, like right then. While he continues to pack his things (HOW LONG does this take?) all the while narrating where everything is going to go in each of his special Tumi European Style Suitcase compartments. I ignored him and at least checked him into his flight online.

We end up leaving my place to get to the airport around 10:45am. Again, this kid has no sense of urgency. It took forever to find a cab, and we got to the airport at 11:15am. There's one person in line before him so we had to wait a bit more, and finally he gets to the front of the queue. The woman at the counter is of course very flustered, as would anyone be in her situation who now has to deal with a moron who showed up for his flight less than an hour before it was set to take off, and now wants to check his bags on top of that so he can walk around Montreal (his layover) without having to worry about them. She does her best to get his ticket as soon as she can and takes his bags.

With his ticket in hand, we said good-bye, did that awkward hug thing, and FINALLY he was gone. I felt like I could burst out into dance in the middle of the airport. (I actually even might have.) Besides the fact that I was supposed to be working from home that day and I was clearly not, I took my time at the airport and ate breakfast before taking the bus back to my place. The sun had come out for the first time in ages in Geneva, and I could just tell that it was going to be a beautiful day.

When I got back to my place, I showered then cranked my music up, totally had my own little dance party, thanked God, Waheguru, Allah, Moses, Jesus, Gandalf, and all the powers that be in the universe that he was finally GONE GONE GONE!!!!!!!!!!!!! I was actually SINGING, I was THAT happy.

Yeah. Two hours later I got a call. The mother fucker missed his flight and the next one wasn't leaving until tomorrow.

The Geneva Project - Part 3

Our final train ride to Paris ended up being not as bad as the first half - in some respects. I mean, at least I wasn't standing next to that bathroom again. Like I said in my last post, our assigned seats were taken (at which point X wanted to throw a fit, ask these people if they knew who he was, and threaten them with his uncle who works somewhere in the government of Trinidad - I don't even know), but luckily some kind strangers offered to let us sit next to them, so I ended up sitting across from X. I almost immediately put my ear buds in, pulled my hood up, slouched over, and closed my eyes, thus entering Harleen's "Leave-Me-The-F-Alone" Mode. I think I need an even clearer sign that I don't want to be bothered though, because X wanted to keep talking, and as much as I pretended I was sleeping, he would keep talking. This train (like all the other trains I rode that weekend) was exceptionally quiet. Besides the occasional fussy baby, it was next to near pin drop silence. Why anyone would want to ruin that or have the rest of the train overhear your conversation is beyond me.

I pretended to fall asleep until I actually fell asleep, waking up occasionally to make sure I was still alive and that this train was still going somewhere. Every time I opened my eyes, he was just staring at me. Maybe his Apple iPad extended battery died or something, but I would wake up to find him watching me sleep, and finally, he decided to take out his Samsung Galaxy and Stilus Pen and draw a cartoon version of me, which was highly inaccurate and made me look like a South Park character.

So we got to Paris in the late afternoon on Friday and eventually found our hotel after some currency exchange issues and finding a cab (finally). Since he was fairly batshit crazy, I realized that the only way I was going to survive the weekend was if I too brought out my inner ridiculousness. So, with that being said, I decided from the moment I got off the train, that I had no idea we were going to Paris and that I thought I had been on the Hogwarts Express on my way to Hogsmede to be picked up by Hagrid. At first he was really confused since he's never read a Harry Potter book (WHO IS THIS GUY) which made it all the more fun, especially when I told him I didn't appreciate him kidnapping me and distracting me from my magical studies and that the Ministry of Magic aurors were going to come find him. I described my deceased buddy Mad-Eye Moody, but told him if I wanted him to, Mad-Eye would come back from the dead and obliterate his dumbass. He started giving me some weird looks, kind of like the ones I had been giving him all week. FINALLY, we were on the same page.

The hotel room was really nice, kind of small, but quaint enough. We only really used it for sleeping anyway - or I should say he used it for sleeping and I used it for fuming and ranting into my phone to whoever I thought might listen (thanks, Anne!!)

We started the night off getting all of our devices Wi-fi-ed up, because letting the world know (but not know) where he is in the world takes high priority of course. And it's not like our internet access lasted very long because it only lasted in the hotel. We went out to dinner at a really cool Italian place and I have to admit that I very much appreciated the way everything was so much cheaper in France. Dinner overall was good and we ended up walking back about five miles to get to the hotel. I didn't mind the walk - just the company.

His smart self decided to only pack a thin leather jacket for his trip to Europe, because he claims it's "very European/GQ" to wear layers as opposed to a thick overcoat. That's great and all, but I would rather have common sense and bundle up with my long coat, scarf, and gloves and be warm than freeze to death. Meanwhile, he froze, but maintained his "fashionable" appearance. Don't worry though guys, he had his Versace scarf at the ready if the temperatures dropped too much far below zero.

On our way back, we spotted the Eiffel Tower, and it was nearing the top of the hour so it was about to start sparkling and going crazy. As we walked more quickly towards this majestic sight, he turns over to me and says, "Wow, isn't this romantic? What are you going to do when it lights up?" At which point I nearly barfed up my dinner before casually responding "I think I'll take a picture of it. Maybe a video." I could see from the corner of my eye that he looked a little disappointed, but I mean, what did he expect? Ew, I don't even want to think about that. When we finally got to the tower, he asked if I would take a picture of him with it, and of course I did, capturing him in the picture with the entire tower in the background - pretty amazing shot if I do say so myself. When I asked him to take one of me, what did I get? My blown up face with maybe 1/100th of the tower in the background. We tried again a few times, and finally I just ended up setting up the shot for him, told him how to hold the camera and where to stand, and even then it was blurry. I have to say that he is hands down THE WORST photo-taker I have ever seen in my entire life. I can't even call him a photographer - that would be insulting to anyone who has ever picked up a camera.

We finally got back to the hotel, got ready for bed, and for some reason my feet were absolutely freezing. I kept rubbing them together under the blanket to make them warm, but it was taking forever. He noticed my feet were cold and tried to move his towards mine, but then realized that although the bed appeared to look like a queen size, it was actually two slightly-larger-than-twin size beds that were pushed together. And the BEST part was that these beds were separately made, so my covers were all tucked in on my own side of the bed and he couldn't get his feet anywhere near me - DENIED. Woohoo, haha the hotel gods were definitely looking out for me.

I think overall we probably walked about 20 miles throughout our trip in Paris. I can say that because X has a Nike Fuel Band that tells him exactly how much energy he expends per day, how many steps he walks, etc. He can then plug his little bracelet into the computer and get a statistical update/track record and see trends of his exercise patterns. He had been trying to get me to get one, but really? What the hell would I do with that. I have no desire to systematically exercise, and whenever I do exercise, the last thing I want to know is how many calories I lost or how far I traveled. More importantly, it's really ugly. And in the grand scheme of things, WHO CARES? I exercise because it's a cheaper stress-reliever than drinking, so if you see me all of a sudden start exercising a lot, it's either because I went broke and can’t afford booze, or I'm so stressed out and need to find an alternative to becoming an alcoholic.

So, Paris was super fun……………….and he continued to do things the entire time that would annoy the hell out of me. For example, on Saturday we went shopping practically all day. At the beginning of the day, I had one small bag with a set of coasters in it. He asked me if I wanted him to carry it. I told him it was fine and I got it. About 8 hours and 17 bags later, I'm still carrying all of my things while he has two small bags - one of which had shoes, while the other had white pants, which are "a staple for spring time". At one of the last stores we visited, the man at the counter even asked if he was going to be carrying things for "the lady" and he responded "I wanted to, but she's so stubborn and wouldn't let me."

Hold on there buddy boy, WHAT? Sorry I said I could carry my own bag at the beginning  of the day when I was carrying ONE THING - had I known that he would carry that answer into the whole day, by all means I should have just let him take it. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. I kept thinking to myself that there's no way this clown would survive a day with my family. If he pulled that shit in front of my dad or brother, you can guaran-damn-tee that he would not get anywhere near me for the rest of his life. I don't understand why it's such a difficult concept:
Woman + Man go shopping = (Woman + shopping) (Man + bags)
Woman goes shopping = (Woman + shopping bags)

Really. Not. That. Difficult.

Especially when the girl is this tiny 5 foot tall thing and he claims to be some 6 foot something bodybuilder who sees a personal trainer twice a week?? What the F.  Granted, my arms could use a bit of a tone up, but a little help would have been nice. In any case, my arms got an amazing workout from that and were STILL sore three days later…

While shopping, he also kept complaining about how he wasn't seeing any "high end" shops that he wanted to go into…that was his complaint for the majority of the day, and then the moment we ARE in high end city, he says he doesn't have time to really try things on. Because you know, there are so many people in a completely empty store with salespeople who wait on you hand and foot. Of course you wouldn't have time for that. He was all about trying to get fancy shmancy stuff that they don't have in the states because "most of these stores don't send the entire collection to the states, so there are very rare pieces that you can only get in Europe".

Yeah. Okay. I would rather buy ten unique and different articles of clothing that you can't find in the states because the brands don't exist there, than spend the same amount of money on say, a pair of name-brand shoes.  But that's clearly just me.

At some point during the day, we ended up at the Love Lock Bridge where couples come, write their name on a lock, hook it onto the bridge, throw the key into the river and supposedly their love is supposed to last forever. If I was with ANYONE else in the world, I might have thought it was cute, but given the circumstances, it just seemed like a load of crap and a money-making scheme, considering how many people were trying to sell us locks. When the first little peddler came up to ask if we wanted to buy a lock, before he could say anything, I immediately said no. Again, he looked a little taken aback from the corner of my eye, but there's no way  I was writing my name next to his on anything - not even on the sand on a beach before high tide. No thank you.

I spent the entire week sending him signals that I was clearly not interested, and yet he would still try to put his arm around me (I would slip away and move my bag to the other shoulder). I kept up my Harry Potter routine for a while, but that just made him laugh and tell me how cute and funny I am (which is obviously true, but I wasn't trying to be!!)  Ugh. I had to think of a new plan.

The Geneva Project - Part 2

Hardly two weeks after I touched down in Geneva town, X arrived, toting his brand new fancypants European-Style (and size) Tumi luggage and all (and he brought his fancy weird shiny pants as well).

Lesson learned: Never invite someone to go/come somewhere unless you REALLY want them to be there and are fully prepared for them to be there.

I have to admit, at first I was incredibly skeptical when he said he was coming, because how many times have I been given false promises? I've lost count. Besides, I think any normal person would assume that if a person says he'll fly 8 hours across an ocean to see you, he's either severely medicated, or you know, crazy. Although it was a nice surprise for him to just jump on a plane and hop the pond, immediately I felt awkward with him being in my already-tiny studio space. He arrived around 6:30am on a Monday morning - fantastic timing, of course because on Mondays I find myself particularly excited to get out of bed at 5am and trek out to the airport in the freezing cold. I found him at the airport, we went back to my place to drop off his stuff, and then walked a little ways to get a quick café and croissant before I had to go to work.

I think that was probably the most awkward part. I mean, yeah it's great for him to come out here for a week, but when I'm working my butt off doing two jobs at once and in a completely foreign country with new people who don't know my work ethic or reputation yet, it's really stressful to try to balance all of that and do well. On one hand, I have a new boss who is more than happy to dump work on me for this huge global platform; on another hand, I have my coworkers from DC still requesting random things from me; on one foot, I'm trying to figure my way out around this new city and navigate the language, culture, and everything in between; and then this friend shows up whom I feel obligated to entertain since he did come all this way. (I really only had one foot left at that point - should've used it to kick him back to the states). So, needless to say, I found myself in downtown Stress City.

I ended up managing it pretty well - being super productive at work so I wouldn't have to work too late and I would come back to my flat to spend a few hours with him. The first day, he wandered around and went grocery shopping (for himself). He later told me "Yeah I went grocery shopping today because I thought to myself, Harleen could use some snacks, like as she's working at her computer or something." He brought back walnuts, which is strange considering he should know by now that I'm allergic to them, especially from that day when my throat started closing up after accidentally eating one and he was right there watching me struggle to find water. It took him a few minutes to realize I was having an allergic reaction. Thanks, doctor. Anyways, he also said he "would have gotten me chocolate, but…" I don't even remember how that sentence ended because my brain stopped processing after those few words. What on Earth would lead any human being (or martian) to NOT get a girl chocolate, and then TELL HER you didn't get her chocolate…? I mean, am I missing something here? I don’t know anyone who would respond to that by saying "Yeah, actually, I'm really glad you didn't get me chocolate". Well, besides an Oompa Loompa maybe.

I digress.

So in the evening we would usually just go straight out for dinner at a place he would have picked out earlier in the day, which was cool because I probably wouldn't have found these places on my own or even had the time to go exploring to such an extent. I appreciated his efforts, but just not so much his company, as horrible as that sounds. At first it was nice to have someone to converse with outside of the office since I'm so used to having that back home, but there's a difference between talking with someone, and talking at someone. I felt like he was doing more of the latter, with not as many opportunities for me to add my thoughts. Waiting to get a word in the conversation was like waiting for a Metro door to open on a ride - you wait around awkwardly and finally get a brief window of time to breathe or add to the conversation, and then you're back underground and smothered by everyone's smelly armpits.

This routine of working all day, coming back and going out to dinner/exploring continued for several days and soon (probably one day after he arrived) I found myself counting down the days until he was leaving. It seemed like on average, every 27 minutes or so, he would start a conversation like this:

"Wow, I can't believe I'm in Switzerland! None of my friends know I'm here. I mean, I told a few people, but I don't need everyone to know my business, you know?" He then takes a picture of something, uploads/instagrams/tags/checks in/comments.  "Haha my friends are commenting and wondering where I am right now…this is just so crazy. I was JUST in DC [insert number of days]  days ago." (Repeat this paragraph every day, at least seven times between the hours of 7pm-11pm; triple this number on weekends.) More: "You know, I wasn't sure if I would come here to Geneva, but I thought to myself, why not? I can do my work from anywhere, and I haven't traveled abroad in a while. Last time I was in Europe, it was for a violin tour (with his elementary school, blah blah blah)…and I was thinking to myself, I should bring my violin and maybe play on a street corner, but it's a really nice one, cost over $10,000. I used to be really good, but then I gave it to my little sister (blah blah blah).." (repeat the Violin Story at least once every other day). Most of "our" conversations were all centered around him and all the supposedly-amazing things he's done in his life. He would occasionally throw a compliment my way, something generic along the lines of "I can't believe how much you've accomplished at 22…when I was 22 blah blah blah…" and he would go back to talking about himself. And no, it's not beneath him to still brag about high school leadership positions…at 30 years old. Regardless of what he's talking about, he'll have the most serious of expressions on his face as if all of humanity depends on the words coming out of his mouth. Pair that with my inability to take anything too seriously and viola - you get these ridiculous docu-mockeries!

It's not just the annoying, pompous, arrogant part of him that bothered me, but he was also very pretentious and thought he knew everything about everything. He would make a huge dog and pony show (is that the right term?) in a restaurant when sampling wine because he learned how to "properly sample it in Napa Valley". I'm pretty sure I could have French braided my entire head of hair in the amount of time it would take him to tell the waiter he was okay with the tiny sample of wine they would pour into his glass. First he would sip it, then swirl it around and stick his nose in it to test the "aromaticity", followed by taking a bigger sip and sloshing it around his mouth, before he could tell whether he liked it - he had a whole routine down. Meanwhile, I counted ceiling tiles to prevent my eyes from rolling out of their sockets.

As if that wasn't bad enough, he would constantly name and refer to his things by their brand, e.g. rather than "sunglasses" they were his "Ray Ban Sunglasses"; it couldn't just be a "suitcase" but a "Tumi European Sized Suitcase", etc. When we went to an Italian-Indian fusion restaurant one night, he said he would fit right in. I asked why, and he said because he's half Indian and he's wearing a Versace scarf. I didn't even know how to respond, but I felt stomach acid rising. Not only was he so branded, but we would oftentimes end up at such expensive restaurants, and Geneva is expensive enough without trying to go out of your way to find a nice place. For anyone who knows me well enough, prissy restaurants are NOT the way to impress me, and especially if we're splitting the bill? I can tell you right now that as amazing as some DC restaurants are, my favorite meals consist of hotdogs off the streets, Chipotle, and Vapianos. The fanciest thing I will do is eat pizza with a fork and knife - and if there is more than one fork and knife at my place setting, I start feeling uncomfortable. I don't care how I grew up or what kind of stuffy restaurants my parents love, but that's not me. I could tell that he REALLY likes/liked me though, and was constantly trying to impress me with his "knowledge" or whatever, which was even more of a turn off. I never seem to like the guys who actually like me. Plus if you're trying too hard and it shows - that's just sad.

What I found most weird about the whole ordeal was how little I wanted to do with him physically. As in, I didn't even want to touch him, let alone hold his hand. After our first "date" on Valentine's Day when we went to Vaps, he tried to kiss me and I recoiled. It wasn't the right time, place, moment - nothing. Plus I don't like kissing just anyone? I mean, ew. I'm of the opinion that a kiss should mean something - you don't just toss those around - unless you're married or something, but even then mean something and are reciprocated by both people involved. In any case, the entire time he was here - no kisses, no hand-holding, no cuddling, no nothing. Barely hugging, maybe? If you could call it that? And even those were more awkward than the half-hug uncles give you at parties. It's not just my brain that doesn't like him, but my body doesn't either which I find strange because I'm normally such an affectionate, cuddly/snuggly/huggy kind of person, and my body was definitely showing signs that there's obviously something off in this whole situation.

NOT TO MENTION the absolute worst thing about him that drove me absolutely insane - his snoring. I don't care how much he spends on going to a personal trainer however many times a week or whatever, but this kid's money would be better spent thrown at a sleep therapist. I have never heard of anyone in my life who snores as badly as he does. Which, by the way is the reason these little novelitas were drafted so late at night when I should have been sleeping. I would literally spend nights on end awake writing instead of sleeping. He claimed when he came here that he didn't want to distract me from my work, but when his dumbass can't stop snoring, nor position his head and pillow in such a way to reduce the amount of snoring, and I can't sleep properly for an entire week - YES, you are distracting me from my work. I tried to wake him up in hopes that it would get him to temporarily stop, but that didn't work at all and within three seconds he would be back at it. I found myself going for walks in the middle of the night and could hear his snoring DOWN THE HALL from my room. I would come back and work at my desk, and could still hear him THROUGH my earbuds. Motorcycles and buses would pass by outside the window and yet his snoring was still the loudest! Granted, I don't have Beats by Dre Headphones like he does (and let's not forget that he calls them that every time he refers to them - they have a specific identity, after all), but that was just SO unacceptable. I was trying to gauge the noise between a lawnmower and  chainsaw, but I think it's closer to the noise level of an airplane. Damn, as much bad karma as I'm going to have for writing all this, I feel even worse for whatever unfortunate man or woman has to spend the rest of their life sleeping in the same bed as him. At the rate he's going though, I don't even know what kind of creature would want to.

Every night I would pray that I wouldn't get a noise complaint. Funnily enough, one night he had the nerve to tell me that he couldn't sleep well at night because I was being too loud. He said that I grind my teeth at night when I sleep and he thinks that's a consequence of my anxiety issues. Excuse me? What now? I have, what? Better question - how the F can you hear what the hell I'm doing while I sleep OVER YOUR OWN SNORING. If he can't wake up to his own snoring, I have no idea how the hell anything can wake him up. Of course, I have a million flaws and whether or not one of them is that I "grind my teeth due to anxiety issues", okay whatever. So I'm not perfect. But me? Anxiety? Hmm, I wonder why - maybe it has something to with juggling twelve different things at once while being sleep deprived and simultaneously doing my best to NOT kick someone's butt for keeping me up all night. UGH.

I'm pretty sure I could go on and make a list of another 10,000 things that annoy me about him, including his terrible table manners, lack of gentlemanly traits, and the fact that he claims to be a medical professional and doesn't cover his own cough. I don't understand how you be a doctor and studying public health, and NOT understand the spread of germs. That's just unbelievably stupid.

For the record, his stupidity by no means ended there. It just goes to show that as perfect as someone may seem on paper - what with being a doctor, coming from a family of doctors, etc. - that doesn't necessarily translate in person. Especially when the person totally sucks.

We ended up going to Paris together from Friday afternoon through Sunday, but by Wednesday evening (he arrived on Monday) I was planning on telling him I had no desire to go. I needed to SLEEP, and catch up on work, and I needed a break from him. Of course by the time I got home on Thursday evening, he had already gotten the tickets and my choices were quite limited. I ended up waking up at 6am on Friday morning (after another nearly sleepless night) to get work done so I wouldn't have to worry about it over the weekend. Meanwhile, he of course slept/snored in.

He also conveniently didn't tell me what time our train was leaving and agreed with me when I asked if it was leaving at 3:30pm. So while was under that impression, working away at the Starbucks down the road, at 12:30pm he came over to where I was working and told me the train was leaving at 1:30. THANKS, BUD. So, I had to quickly finish up my work, sprint back to the apartment and throw some clothes in a backpack in less than five minutes, then run to catch the train. And of course he had already showered and packed up his little Tumi carry-on bag before coming to inform me of this. Really cool.

By the time we got on the train, I was absolutely exhausted. The seats weren't assigned in this train, so as soon as we picked out two empty seats, I passed out almost right away. We had to change trains in Lyon, where we got another boarding pass. I asked the kid about thirty times if the seats were assigned - he kept saying no, but lo and behold - they were. We spent about a third of the next train ride (45 minutes or so) hanging out in between train cars near the bathroom without a seat because he didn't think we were assigned one. We met a little stowaway there, who started talking to us in French. I was about to let the man know we didn't speak French, but X, being X, had decided upon coming here that he didn't want to speak English and would only speak Spanish or whatever little French he knew. So, the gentleman kept asking him questions and watched as X struggled to answer in French. After about ten minutes of this, the guy finally says in perfect English, "Man, your French is terrible." I think I laughed out loud for a full two minutes - and then internally for the rest of the trip.

Turns out, our assigned seating was all the way on the other side of the train from where we had gotten on. Translation: at the next stop, we had to sprint down the train to make it to our correct compartment. Of course, when we got there, someone was already sitting in those seats since "no one had gotten on" at the previous stop and the seats were reassigned. Luckily, some nice folks let us sit next to them in empty chairs, but holy CRAP that was the most ridiculous moment in the world. French trains are cray. I don't travel by train often (or really, ever) but for someone who claims to travel by train often (no, not just the Amtrack, but the freaking lightning-speed Excelsia version of it or whatever) X was pretty dense when it came to reading a train ticket. For the record, numbers and letters next to your name usually indicate that you have an assigned seat. Moron.

As for what happened when we finally got to Paris aka the "City of Love"?
Stay tuned, sports fans…

The Geneva Project - Part 1

Alright, so…where to begin on the latest horror story of my comedic life…

I guess it began the night before the Superbowl - Saturday, February 2nd. This was the night that I decided to go out with my co-worker and friend Anne and her friends who were visiting from home, Cathy and Steph. This also happened to be the night Abhinav was also in DC wandering around with some of his friends. He wanted to meet up, as did I, and we figured eventually our paths would cross. I prepped the girls about him, told him he went to U-M, told them he's one of my best friends and I hardly ever see him, so they understood how quasi-important this meeting was. So, we go out that night and start off at One Lounge in Dupont Circle. We're drinking and dancing, having a great time etc., and then Steph and I break off from everyone else - she started dancing with some guy and Some Guy's friend asked if I wanted to dance, so I obliged, and he turned out to be a really good dancer - not the kind who wants to grind up all on you, but can actually take you by the hands, twirl you around the dance floor, and make you feel like a princess. Yeah, that crap. This guy also happened to be wearing a University of Michigan shirt. We started talking while dancing a little bit and he told me he was a doctor. He didn't look more than 26 though so I figured he was one of those weirdos who actually goes through medical school on time. He asked me how old I was, and I said 24. (What did he know?) After a few songs of dancing with this character, I looked around and didn't see Steph, nor did I see the other girls. So, I told the doctor I had to go find my friends and I would see him later. He wanted to find me on Facebook and asked for my name (which I guess is the 2013 way of asking for someone's number). In any case, I looked myself up on FB for him on his phone, requested to add myself to his friends list (weird), and then went to find my friends and ask them what the hell possessed them to leave me alone dancing with a complete stranger, albeit a charming stranger.

I found them at the bar (naturally) and they were asking me how things went with "my friend". Excuse me? What friend? They thought that guy was Abhi. Nope, no, not at all. This guy's name was X (or at least that's what we'll call him for the purposes of this blog), and although he was nice and everything, he was no Abhi. Anne's boyfriend and his friends eventually showed up to the lounge and joined in on the drinking and dancing fun (X disappeared in the mean time). Quite a few drinks and shots later, we decided to go find Abhi, who was out practically across the street with his friends and girlfriend. I think I ended up seeing them for a total of 30 seconds, but the rest of that night is for another novelita.

The next day (Superbowl Sunday), I noticed the friend request from X, checked out what I could from his About Me, and saw that he was indeed a doctor. I don't think I need to explain how appealing such a profession is to a girl, but it's not the least attractive thing. I added him and we started talking through FB messages. A few days later I left for the Caribbean, we messaged each other the entire time while I was there (I love to write and he loves to talk, so these messages got pretty lengthy), and we started getting to know each other a lot better. He's actually part Trinidadian, so he's got a good amount of knowledge about the Caribbean and cool things to do or taste or try. We continued talking when I got back and I found out he's working on a Masters in Public Health from USC (remotely) - as if he isn't educated enough. As part of his program, he has to do a group project on an NGO and its contribution to the health sector - or something like that. His group had picked the American Red Cross before we met, and then low and behold, look who showed up into his life. We met up a few times to talk about the Red Cross, I set up a few contacts and interviews for him to meet with, etc. Things were going pretty well and after just a few weeks of knowing him, I felt like we were very compatible people with similar interests and views on the world.

Almost immediately after I got back from the Caribbean, it was his birthday (February 13). He invited me to his birthday dinner the following Friday night, but I didn't end up going. I told him I fell asleep, which did happen eventually, but I also just didn't feel all that comfortable showing up to someone's birthday dinner with all of his friends who I don't know. Speaking of birthdays, he was turning 30. How old am I again? Oh, 22. That Thursday though (all in the same week), he ended up showing up to an Anti-Valentine's Day happy hour that I helped organize for Feb 14 with my coworkers. I had casually mentioned it to him, and he came towards the end. He didn't bring anyone, just showed up and mingled really well with everyone, which I thought was pretty cool and showed he had a lot of confidence in himself. Afterwards, we went out around the corner to Vapianos together and ended up getting so lost in conversation that we were talking until the restaurant closed.

Regardless of that though, I knew we didn't have any chemistry. There was no spark. It just felt like hanging out with a much more talkative (and later realized, obnoxious) version of my brother. He was someone with a wealth of knowledge and wasn't afraid to share it. Normally, that's pretty attractive and impressive - until it becomes condescending or even sometimes not even factual, which again, I didn't really catch up on until later.

Skipping forward a little bit, we hung out a lot more, went to a Caps game (my brother had a pair of extra tickets that he couldn't use, so he gave them to me and I took X). We went running together once, watched a Michigan basketball game together, got dinner a few times, he had come over to my place, met some of my friends/co-workers, etc. Things were looking pretty up.

Then, I was going to leave for Geneva. In the back of my head, I kept telling myself he's not one of those clingy types or weirdos or anything, despite the fact that we met in a club and got to know each other through Facebook. We spent time together in person, which I felt like made things not as weird. Besides, my friends in DC seemed to like him, so at least I had their approval.

When I arrived in Geneva (March 16) we had still been talking through FB messages, and he found out he didn't get matched for a residency program the night before. Although he told me he had almost completed his residency at Washington Hospital Center, he left the program about two months short of completing it and had been working on getting rematched for the past few years. He was pretty down about it, and I jokingly said he should come to Geneva to get his mind off of things.

Little did I know, he actually did.

To be continued…