www.mylifeisart.com TM

when the lights have been turned out....

the night and the moon will be my partners in crime.

the desolate concrete fields will be my accomplices,

my ever silent witnesses.

the filthy channel will be my solution.

my fortified shoes will be my translation of anger

guiding me through my walk towards eternal fame

of a life without hatred

nor anguish

nor fear

let the sword swing...

let the game begin...

and just turn out those

fucking lights.

patrick gysemberg

action painter for a better world

june 2006

this is a poem

On this pages I have started to work on a revolutionary new book about what I have been going through during the past months of my life. It is going to be one of the most horrible  stories of this new millennium. The book is slowly revealing some crucial facts that are contributing to a final event that is going to take place after finishing the book. The book is as it were, a kind of introduction to what the future is going to bring me. To me and my family.

Is it a kind of riddle, a question mark, an open end?  Or could it be a very clear information on what is going to happen once this book reaches its final sentences to be published.   Who is going to tell...and who is going to tell me?   Is life telling me what to do or am I telling life what to do?   Is a crime going to be committed?   Or is it all a bad joke?A sad joke, or a terrifying warning?  Is it a handful of passed cliches of someone who is suffering an emotional crisis?    Or is it a honest testimony of a cruel and devastating  truth?    Is this the announcement of a future massacre?    Should anyone be afraid?     Do we have to take some precautions?    Is this real or is this a fantasy?     Do remember that in real life reality often appears to be exceeding the worst possible imagination.    You are welcome to read along as my book is growing from zero towards completion.     I have no idea how long it will take to complete it, but I am intended to do so, whatever it will take.

thank you for your continuing support.

patrick gysemberg 2006

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action painter for a better world

LIFTING ANCHOR 1M/1M OILS AND MIXED MEDIA ON CANVAS

ACTION PAINTING REALISM

SOLD IN BERLIN /GERMANY MAI 2006

My book starts here !

"no one cares for losers"

Just scroll down  reading all, till you reach the end (temporary)

My book, which is developing every day now, is already

 over 299 pages din A4 long

and growing every day. Still i have to cover some more years to reach the essence of it all, the injustice done to me, to come to the final brutal ending, with horrifying results; it is important that you all understand why things happened as they did.

It is a first uncut version, with no corrections, so also typos will be found. I apologize for that.

After finishing up the story

I will correct all typos (writing mistakes) and all text will be corrected by a true English connoisseur.

Then it will be presented to a publisher.

(c)  patrick gysemberg

Every single word of this book is being written for a reason. Read along and try to understand the reason why i had to tell you This story.

"this book is purely fiction and each possible resemblance to any possible person or any actual circumstance is purely coincidental and not true nor valid."

a book about pestering in the office, about reverse racism, about discrimination, about brutal unacceptable behaviour, still overwhelmingly present in our society today, maybe even close or next to you, but deliberately negleted by our gouvernemental organisations,

"no one cares for losers..."  (c) patrick gysemberg

"Was it his  devotion for his Italian love  that had brought him down, or was it his perverted adoration for Anissa, sealed with her golden shower?", I wondered, thinking of the most flabbergasting opening sentence a book ever had in history of writing. I know a book should have a great opening. I read about the many times some well known and established authors were contemplating  about their first sentence and how it inflicted the sales of their book. Now I have to find one for me, my book. I am not just writing a book because I want to write a book, no...Of course not. I am driven to do so. Now, at last, I have to write a book. The circumstances force me to do so. I only hope I get until the end. Because I have a lot to say, indeed I have...So, my opening sentence has to be a unique one, never seen before in man's history. It should blow one's socks of whilst reading (ah, I love this expression!) Come on now, here he comes: (or is it "it comes?):

"Maybe I wasn't born to write a book at all", I thought at the end, insecure, gazing out of the first floor window onto the busy street of my little town. It's crap, isn't it? First class sh*t. Of course, I am not an Englishman, so the quality of my English is at least to say: a bit simple. However, as I was thinking, during the mental preparation of this book-to-write, that in relation to what I have been through and what I have to say in my book, it should be sufficient. The quality of my English, I mean. Furthermore, I could see this as a new challenge in life, some kind of new heroic attempt to reach eternal glory and fame. Sure, right...Stop it, will yea… See now, that is typically me, I have not even yet fully survived my present trauma, or I am already preparing the path towards unknown heights with consecutive depths to fall into and reaching the edge of another depression... Maybe, just maybe, I am mane-depressive, as it were...could be, at least "they" have made me the way I am today.  Who are "they"? "They" are "they", all the others, around me, and especially those who know everything better than I do.  I always have had, for some unknown reason, the idea that other people (them) knew more than I did.

I had (used to have) a tremendous respect for all elderly man and women, for teachers, for priests, for my father… (Strangely enough, I did not think likewise about my mother, something I am dealing with later on) and all those who actually performed a task in society. They all knew so much…about life and stuff, that is what I thought. Why not? Why should I not have believed that they all knew more than I did (or is it me)? I knew nothing when I came to earth, did you? Others have told everything I know now to me. It has all been lectured to me, it has been forced into me by repetition force, as the Catholics like to practice repeatedly in their churches.

(them)

Furthermore, I was a very shy boy. Someone with unlimited admiration for all "them" and a strongly build in self-destructive consciousness of no self-esteem whatsoever. Imagine the Catholics, every day, day after day, telling me that all the sins of this planet were "my fault"! I was to be blamed! Only me! Me, me, MEEEEE....We used to say always the same lines in church (those days I went to church every day, yes sir, every morning at seven o'clock, I sat in the front row of the chapel of my college.) It was, of course not a matter of choice...I had to go to church every day, no question about that! How could I even imagine saying something about this frequency, and to whom? I had to carry all sins of this world on my shoulders, anyway, so… So I’d better shut the f*ck up. Or they (them) throw some other sins on the never ending heap that was already laying as a huge obstacle on my shoulders.

Whilst proclaiming these repetitive lines, loud and clear, all together in church, we all used to beat ourselves with our fists on our chest : "because of my fault, because of my fault, because of my fault..."

Day after day, week after week, year after year, even before puberty....do you think It had some impact on my state of mind? You bet it did…No wonder I couldn't develop some kind of feeling that even came close to self-esteem. Do you think I need to see a psychiatrist? After you have read this book until the end, if you are brave enough, you will conclude that I absolutely need to see one, I guess…

Because this is only the beginning, the beginning of a journey through life with ups and severe downs, with highlights and incredibly dark ages, an awesome but yet devastating journey that I cannot describe in a few sentences. That is why it is going to turn out to be a book. Because what has happened is too intense to summarize in just a few words…This is just not done. That is why I do hope you all read along with me, as these pages grow by the day until my work is complete and my story has been told. I want to tell you this, because I also believe that what I have been through may never ever happen again, not with any other creature on this mother planet earth. Even if your personal hatred is still amazingly strong and vivid and determinate your behaviour amongst those who love you. And whom you try to love back. As an individual one cannot do much about it, I guess, but writing a book. To get “some” attention. Especially from “them”. Because “they” are all wrong, and not you….me, I mean….

Nature made me the eldest child in a family of five children (and two parents of course). This enhanced the feeling of responsibility in me, next to the lacking self-esteem. A dreadful combination.

I have not introduced myself, soo sorry! My first name is Patrick, “hi There….”, nice to meet you through this virtual way and later on by means of my book with no title yet.

My first name will be the only real one in these sentences, because of the privacy of those mentioned. I try to avoid the harm they did to me. Therefore, I will use other names. So, if I, for instance, as a matter of speaking, would want to say something about an old colleague of mine, living amongst us with the name Livia Goldfield, I will not use this name, no sir...I 'll use a name that is "different", it will not be too difficult to follow my story, because the story itself is in focus here, not the people themselves, they but all play a major role, not the leading one...I would call her " Carla Smekens.....”, get it? Moreover, any resemblance with any living creature on this planet will be purely coincidental. I am not stupid, you know...Therefore, in my book I could now easily state that Carla has a big fat ass and that she grows long black hair on her back. This does not actually mean that the person this name is referring to, has the same  deviations or flaws or shortcomings.... No,no....   Well done, Patrick…Well done…Well done , old chap!  Probably they will be recognizable by those who are close to the things I have to tell you. But then they can see that all I have to say is the truth. At least from my point of view, anyway. Because truth is subjective. That's what i have learned. And that is about all I have learned in life. Pretty thin, huh.... I am a painter, an action painter. So, i have said it. That is, this is what I am now, after a long, hard, struggling search for values and truth…in this life. I have been many things in my life up until now… But First of all, I have been a child. The oldest of five, as I told you before. In addition to that, I never stopped being a child anyhow. I honestly believe that the words “adult” and “grown-ups” are the ugliest words ever invented by mankind. I do not respond to the fake world of those who call themselves “adult”. They are “them”. Those who know so much about life, about love, about everything. Some of them call themselves teachers. How awful. How awful it must be, thinking about yourself that you are actually capable of teaching something to another person. It only depends on the will and ability of the receiver if the student is indeed willing to learn. So bye bye teacher…. But I have to concentrate on the book and its end result. All the information that is gathered by the reader, by you, yes you…. if there are any, will lead to one final act at the end of this book. It will lead to a super climax inflicting me and my family.So be attentive and see where these facts will lead to. I have to warn you all : the facts in this book will be hard and merciless; as I have been through them…as I have lived them through, leaving horrible scarves on my soul….leaving them as an open end to a healing process to begin…with this book?  I don’t know….And I do not want to know. All I know is that is has been inhuman and even beyond beastly behaviour….men at their best, so to speak.It is now time to start with some kind of structure, so you can get a grip on the facts as they pass by and as they might tell you what the final result will be as the ultimate lines of this book will be written down.

I am not sure this is going to work.

Too many repeats. Too many times the same blablabla…not to the point. But, tell me something, a book, is it always “to the point”? I don’t think so!

I grant myself the right to be a little elaborate. Maybe you will like it. Fact is that I have to find my way through all.

 Therefore, I left you all alone telling you that I was many things, to start with "being a child". Weren’t we all? Sure. But many of you turned out to be “them”. Many of you were programmed to be or to become “them”. Sometimes I see individuals fulfilling a profession in a such a convincing way that they physically have “become” their profession. They are really a part of the profession they perform. They have grown into their profession, as being part of. A part you cannot or no longer cut off. It sticks to you like an arm, or a leg. "What's that, sir, hanging out of your jacket?? Oh, that's nothing, that's my profession!"I envy those people. Because they are not aware that what they do, determines their lives so much that they stopped being creative and refrained from any critical thinking whatsoever. However, I may not generalize. There are, thank God (I do not believe in God, but I like the expression anyway) , exceptions… Maybe those people have found their way here on this planet. They stopped searching. Because life is giving them what they expect from it.  

In addition, after the long search, through the years, after all I have been through, and what I am going to tell you all about in the next chapters, I do have come to find myself as well, being what I am…"a painter", that is now a complete certainty. I will live my years to come and I will die as a painter, an artist, a visual artist…I do not like the world "artist" that much though, it has of course to do with my being so “shy”…I do not like to think about myself as an “artist”…that sounds so self indulgent…

By finding at last that I can no longer deny that I am a painter, a creative artist, I did find a certain part of me…not all, no, no…there are still some essential parts missing, drifting around in the insecurity of thought and uncertainty of the unstable mind. I need to look for them, and no way I am sure that I will be able to find them before I die…Sometimes I am really afraid to face the final curtain, realizing that I don’t have a damn clue of what I was doing here on earth….at least I would like “some” straight and very clear answers on the way to that last point-of-no-return. One part of myself, I have found.  It makes me happy. It makes me feel a little more assured that everything would be all right. Do you remember those comforting words of some “grown-ups”, telling you, after you suffered a nightmare or some kind of accident leading to exuberant tears shed, that they told you :”everything is all right, don’t cry now, everything will be all right”, which , at that time was a pure lie. I knew this already, at that point, that it was a lie. It did not feel right, it did not feel quite honest…at the contrary, and I found it as being the crying child  a severe violation of the truth and did not understand why those “grown-ups” needed a lie to comfort me.

So, a painter, that’s what I am. Not a famous one, no, no, a very tiny one, but at least I have something to put my soul into; I can run and hide in my creative ruins of not understood paintings, as abstract they are…

  I have to try to stick to a certain time line. Otherwise, I will not be able to tell my story. So I told you that I was at first a child. Then I jumped from child to painter. This is from point a to point z. From alpha to Omega.

In between those two states of my mind, I have been many other things. So, now let us try to proceed the right way. I have to admit, as I said before, that being a child, what I was at birth, as you all were, is something I have kept all my life in me. I, for some reason, did never really grow up. In addition, it is quite a burden to carry, you know. You bet it is. For all those who nicely rolled into their puberty and then stumbled out into final full adultery, this may be very hard to understand. However, I will try to explain: some point I missed the connection to being or becoming an adult. I collected my years as every one else did, but in my head, it could not proceed as persistent as the years did.

No, I was not some "slow" kid. I was as swift as the rest of you. But, at the age of four, when every normal kid starts to ask "why" to his mom, about everything it encounters in life, I did the same. Only, in my head this never stopped. This "why" phase of every child is ending some point in time, in my brain it was continuing to work with growing intensity. Because as older I got, the more questions, why questions I had. So now I am on a point of not knowing anything anymore in my life. Why? I don't know!

I wish I would know. . I am mentally undressing for you, so you could understand to the full what is going to happen in later chapters, why I react in certain ways (and not in other) and why I do as I do, why I did as I did..  (why, why, why....why what? why should we all die?) (Why should I cry?)

So let the story begin....why? Dunno... Guess it's time....time to act.

-------

The building looked like a giant shoe box, it still does, because it still exists. You can see the box when you are driving on the E47, direction Antwerp, a few miles before exit 22, Deurne, at your left side. No windows. At least not at the side facing the highway. Only a sign at the site stands for the main company that had his residence in this building. Now it says "MIXO". In those days, it said "CONIX". It was a huge storage room. We, the company I worked for, rented some offices, cheap offices, on the second floor, no elevator. (see cheap) MIXO handled our goods. But I am running ahead. Again. Mixing up things. Making things hard for you to follow.

I arrived there, early, as usual, because I am always early on an appointment (see my strong sense of responsibility) because I wanted another job. I was at least 10 minutes early. My job at that time sucked. Very hard. That is why I was on the lookout for another one. I was not afraid from changing jobs. I did this before. Several times. And every time, it worked out fine. Till my time came, my specific point in time, every time again, after about five, six years…that is definitely my time…a very important sign in my life, those periods of five year….I have no clue whatsoever what it might mean, but I just could nor cannot  ignore the fact that every five to six years, I, for some reason or another had to change jobs…which I did. Every time there was a huge reason to do so…every time I had to take care of myself and get myself into safety, I needed to protect myself by leaving the company. Which I did. Over and over again…

So I did it again this time:

I had a back that was completely blocked. Stress. Negative stress. All the muscles, and I never knew I had so many on my back, were blocked. Hard as a rock. Caused by an impossible woman. My boss. A fifty year old little bitch, called Meddle, Nicole Meddle. But everyone called her misses Meddle. You could not say Nicole. Never! Ever! Nobody. She had a huge status within this company, in fact it was an organisation of Employers in the metal industry, a kind of very fancy organisation where all those very important people, ceo’s, directors, general managers, real businessmen and women from the finest sort, all brought in with fancy black limo’s, met, joined for dinners and lunches, and had early breakfast buffets, came to lectures and informative evenings, organised evenings with our king, the real one, Albert 2 (“thank God, this lunch was not virtual”, he used to joke around, after his sumptuous, excessive meal – every body laughed, because, If the king laughs, you have to laugh too; this is arranged within a special Belgian law to protect  the standards of our Royal Family,  who are, so to speak, not known for their intellectual brightness) and were being sooo very important and indispensable. This was the highest standard in life one could ever see and meet in Belgium, that is for sure. The ultimate upper class. You actually could see how important all those people were. They all had the same kind of expression on their face. Hard to describe. But the same look. A “don’t you know who I am?” look. Very persistent and threatening. This organisation of “the best” of Belgian mankind, this association, had its own building. A former hospital. Know for its brain surgery. Till they went out of brains to surge upon. A friend of my father suffered a pin bleeding and went in a coma. He was brought into this hospital and they operated on him. They took of his scull! Ok, it was back in the seventies, but still, it was quite a story for me to hear as a child. My , quite vivid, imagination (as I might say so) had some troubles dealing with this. Of course he died, what do you think, without scull ! In those days…I bet they did some other stuff they shouldn’t have done with brains and sculls and all… He only reached the age of forty-nine. The poor bastard… So the hospital was closed down and then bought by this very exquisite club of fine rulers of the Belgian metal industry. They changed the building completely. I must say, they made a hell of a building out of it. Complete renovation. Newest techniques and systems, the future is now. They “make” our future, yes sir, that’s how important they are! You can see that they have a close connection to the financial highlights, the bankers, who were invited constantly in their new, beyond-modern palace, as the final result was at least, more than astonishing, words fail actually.

The chairman, the upper chief of these “happy few”, had some very special deviations in his behaviour as chairman. I think it is not very easy to be on top of all those top people, each and every one of them in the highest position they can get. A second “superman” so to speak.

In the huge entrance hall and in the central gangways on the ground floor and on all upper floors, he had two different light systems installed. A blue and a white one.

On “even” days, day two, four, six etc., we had to illuminate the blue lights. On odd days, we had to lighten up the hall and its  gangways with the white lights.

He was very strict in this. You ‘d better never forget, or worse, mix up, the odd, and even days! He had a severe lack of pigments on his skin, so you could perfectly see it coming when he wasn’t about to like something he saw. He became red as a tomato. And stayed that way for several hours afterwards. That was not good. No sir! He got some pills from the doctor, because, it still  is embarrassing after all, when you have an important meeting you have to lead as chairman, still owning a tomato-head.

 And this is one of those moments, where I do not grasp the reality no more…where I lose it…I do not get it…I do not understand, maybe you do, maybe you do, I do hope so…How on earth is it possible that such an upper-class individual, such a unique talent, such a strong representative of real power in society, controlling all those metal orientated companies and factories, is being occupied by this blue and white light thing? Can anyone tell me that this is “normal” behaviour? Maybe this is the way an “adult” should behave? The importance of the blue lights in my life! The child in me likes it, but I cannot understand. Why? Again, why?

Anyway…my boss, Misses Nicole Meddle, former secretary of mr Blue lights (yes, she “worked” herself up the ladder) was responsible for all the conference rooms.

As my looks do not nor ever did work against me in time, I worked at the reception (hey, handsome! Shall we have dinner later? Sorry madam, I cannot, I have to close down tonight and since there is still a meeting going on, I guess it will be after midnight…”ah, my poor boy…ah well next time then…” she said, whilst her driver opened the back door of the limo to let her in) and needed to see that everything was all right : answering complaints, about shortages of coffee, papers, pens, see the people could find the right room to conference in, make invoices, make sure the blue lights are on, on even days…or was it the other way around? etc. Boring things actually. But they had to be done. And since I needed the cash to survive in this society, I needed the job. As simple as that.  I did not feel myself as being mr receptionist, this was not part of me, this was not me. It seemed as if life passed on, right though me, and I just acted without meaning and importance at any time, as if I did not exist, as if I did not matter at all…I was just some utensil people could use, if they needed to. A object to be neglected.. An object with a back of steel…in fact, I blended in perfectly in this organisation with my back condition….

Misses Nicole Meddle could not delegate. She was beyond a pain in the *ss. She was in the *ss. She controlled about everything, from everyone. Constantly, all the time…Mornings, when more than ten people stood before me at the reception desk, asking for the right location to attend their meetings, she used to phone me, giving me urgent tasks to be fulfilled immediately. This, she did every day. One should dare to think she did this on purpose. When I made my invoices, she used to lock me up, so I could work better. When I ordered the sandwiches for our meeting executives, I needed her signature on the fax, so she could discuss the amount ordered.  I crawled on the floor; my back forced me down, after another attempt of her inappropriate superior executive behaviour. I have tons of stories about this woman…she was a drunk…Every morning she was brought to work by her husband. Often she wore sunglasses, by poring rainfall. Or she forgot about the early morning staff meeting. I had the delightful task to inform her about the forgotten meeting, at her arrival, fifty minutes late…I enjoyed her startled behaviour, a bit like mrs Bucket when she got in a panic situation…the sporadic laughs could not relax my back, though…I needed to see a doctor. A specialist. I knew this was not the place for me to be. This was close to hell on earth.

I deserved better than this. I deserved to be alive. So I quit. But first, I had to make sure I had another job. Because without money, no life. So I went to Matrix Systems Inc. They rented some offices in this huge shoe box i told you about. No elevator. I was ten minute early when I opened the office door on my first interview.

It wasn’t my first interview ever, it just was my first interview for Matrix Systems Inc. I have had tons of interviews before, as I had worked in several other companies before. In one of those companies I even had the magical word “manager” on my company name card. “External relations and quality control manager”. What a title! The longer the title, the less you had to say within this company. This is all quite irrelevant, so I try keep track . For some reason though, I must admit, some elements of the past and the past places I worked, do play a role in the final outcome. So, when time is appropriate, I ‘ll inform you about those bygone days and their direct input in what is going to take place when the final letters of this book have been put on paper.

“Maybe I am no more then a  construction aid worker, trying to build my own castle…” I thought by myself, entering the Matrix Inc office. “That’s exactly how I feel. Totally insecure, always afraid of those, “them”, who know things better. Who can do things better, who can speak better, who write better English, who are better…at…you name it…I got it…insecure about everything. ”Quality control manager…where is he now huh, don’t see much of him now…external relations…my ass…”, those days were as if never existed… Sad huh…, I even felt pity for myself…worse, I started even to make fun of  the whole situation. Especially me, I had to go down the drain. I was the failure, the one who got the sack….pathetic person. Why don’t you go crawling in your little corner and weep…weep till you sleep, little baby, that’s what you are ,still a baby…a stupid crying baby….”

I know…I know…I should stop this, but still, once again, on the run for my former work, I was a fugitive again, again pleading for myself, trying to sell myself again, to “them”, in order to save my body, to restore and upgrade my physical condition, to get rid of my back of steel. Those moment of truth were difficult for me. Although I tried to analyze the lot, asking myself why all the time about everything that happened, I did not make my life easy. But I should concentrate on the interview. That would be much better. Because that was important right now. Nothing else. As a worm I had time enough later to crawl from underneath the rock of life to try to see the sun again.

Focus, concentrate. Enter…Would I please enter this bloody office now?

I did.

I entered.

I looked around and saw what I expected to see.

Those attacks of insecurity of mind, behaviour and soul came regularly, on unpredictable occasions, making my life miserable...I never had the opportunity, nor found the guts in my life to develop the basic human right to feel a person amongst others. The lethal combination father/catholic church, catholic education (I refuse to use capital letters here, because there are no grounds whatsoever to do so, since capital letters were born and created out of respect for the words they stand for) had left its non-erasable marks on my soul and my mind.

Even now, as I try to enter this office, or try to describe this moment on my pc, these vast lakes of insecurity, these devastating thoughts of total failure, this awareness of the complete uselessness of all these actions, performed by me at this moment in time, make me wonder why I am doing it all..."why", indeed again..."why"...

"Nobody can or will ever feel or understand what I am feeling now as a human being." I was thinking.

"Nobody ever would know anything about how hard it is to be me...", "to be as I really am..."

I definitely was feeling lonely again with my devastating thoughts and feelings and self pity wasn't far away either.

But it was not about self pity only. It was about a state of mind. I was born with. I am born with, up till now. I had no reason at this time to be in such mood. I was being fairly successful, I might say, although grades of success are always to be taken with pounds of salt as they would say in our region, meaning it is not all as hot as the soup is served….meaning, ah well, you know best…. but I did have the chance of my life to make a definite change to the physical demoralizing  position I was in, with someone a mrs Meddle as chief in charge, causing my debacle.

For the first time since long, I would have the prospect and opportunity to be selected again for my linguistic capacities, My German knowledge would save me, once again. But save me from what?  From feeling lonely? Guess not…from feeling less in pain? Guess not….from feeling lost in performance and words, being seated on a secreted island, where not one single sole in this world would know its existence about? Guess not….

It would just save me from mere accumulated   substantial  physical pain and reprieve me from bodily discomfort. I would be able to restore and regenerate the values of my human flesh again. Maybe my mind would pursue these slow steps to improvement of my direct environmental variables …

Maybe I would be able to rehabilitate my state of psyche.

I bite my fingernails.

I still bite my fingernails. All of them. And hard. Till the end, cruelly bitten till the end, the ends of anguish.. Till nothing is left. To bite. Till it bleeds. Till I get dismayed by the looks of my fingers. Would I bite my nails if I were cured? I dunno. Maybe, maybe not...

I could not help it. It was, once again, stronger then myself. As many things seem to be stronger then me. Am I soo weak a person then? Biting my nails was only one of the few elements one could easily detect as a token of my inner devastation and chaos. The inner wreckage shown by destroyed fingers. I have been biting my nails since birth so I clearly know that I was not gifted by any possible powerful creator by a authoritative inner defence system. I have been like this all of my life. Insecure about it all. About everything, about everyone. My fingernails are the worst part of my body. The most nauseating thing you 'd ever see. Appalling...still, sometimes in the cause of time they were actually present in my life. I had once real nails. Very nice ones actually...beautifully capturing the ends of my slim line long fingers. Now they wait there to shock people as rude graveyards of daggered out graves. The bastards...why do i have them? Maybe because all this is not over yet? Maybe because I still have to finish what i have started on these pages? I know I have to write quite a lot more to reveal the horrible truth and painful reality towards it all. But I am patient. Therefore I ate and eat  my nails. My time will come. That is for sure. Not one fibre in my veins will leave this kind of injustice not judged.

-

Are you all still there? Are you still with me? I certainly do hope so. Cause I need y’all. Very hard!  And very much indeed. If you are, you can always inform me by sending me a mail or by leaving your commentary in my “guestbook”. I can always use some help and support in the construction of a masterpiece as huge as I am creating now with an impact I can only dream of. So let know of you…Maybe you ’ll get a part in the story as well. On the right side. On the just side.

Did you know that I actually hate, using this word only after starting to work with Matrix inc., people with nails bitten of? I despise them. They are scum. Big losers; that is what I thought indeed. Deep down I know they are not but they are stored in my brain as human trash, as extremely weak persons, with small or no individuality at all. As you see, I like to shred myself into tiny pieces. Nothing I would leave in one piece when it comes down to me and myself and I. But this does not mean I will take all the credit for what is going to appear at the closing stages of this libretto. My obvious functional deficiency is not going to be the foundation or reason of it all. It will merely be functioning as the key to the birth of all final accomplishments, clearing up the dark clouds and misty horizons I live in today. My state of mind is only and merely a hinder and obstruction to a hasty outcome. It allows me to set things straight before ending them. It allows me to explain to you all why it had to end this way as it all will do.

I do not like  see myself as a loser. I do not like to see so many deficiencies on me. I wish I knew who I was, who I am, now at this point in my life. Somehow I do need an enclosure to be able to find myself.

I hate mediocrity. I fear mediocrity. It’s boring. It’s bad. It’s sad. And it is making all people who stand above mediocrity, laugh at you. I hate being laughed at. But I am. Still at my age. I am not bringing myself down, no sir. I refuse to do so. However, time has taught me more personal deficiencies and bodily as well  as mentally derisory and inadequate functioning than I ‘d ever hoped for.

The funny thing is, that, seated on a life boat of a cruise liner, being brought back from shore to the ship in an exquisite surroundings like the fjord of Geiranger in Norway, one could believe, it all does not matter at all. The tiny air of swift happiness, floating between one’s fingers, leaving a thrill in the chest behind, not grasping the full extend of all external fuss, is sooo hard to catch or to hang on to. It’s all just a matter of seconds. Seconds that make your day, even your life. Rare they are, these moments of ecstasy. But I had them. Even several times.

Am I thus blessed? Partly yes, I guess so. But I did not yet enter Matrix Inc. for the second time. To see Mr. Dujournot, the general manager of Matrix Inc.  The big chief. This was taking place next Friday. At 10 o’clock, was it? No silly, he likes to sleep till ten, the appointment is at eleven! Be attentive.

Let’s all go to the meeting, to the interview.

Chapter four : supremacy conquers the intellect

I wanted this job at Matrix Inc. I wanted it so badly, you cannot imagine. My forbearance boundaries had been  reached. My back was under medical treatment; weakly shots directly in the cramped muscles should loosen things up and redirect the threat of a cordial dysfunction, since the heart is a muscle too, remember? And I surely did not want any cramp in my heart muscle, that’s for sure. I’d do anything for this job. It was my hope for a better life, nicer hours, a more regular existence from 9 to 5. The endangered nightly returns home with the local tram, filled with shaggy drunks and stoned nitwits, could soon be belonging to the past. Mrs Meddle was on the threshold to be buried alive in the forgotten margins of my memory.

Of course I wondered what I, a former international – why don’t you say  “world” tour leader, a ex cruise ship customer care representative, even a former quality control manager, would or could be of any significance in this company, on this echelon, just above nil; a company that  manufactures an artefact that I did not even know to position in  the  scheme  of things.  I just wanted to get rid of mrs Meddle and all connotations to this atrocious woman. Give me this job, man…ah, come on now…The office looked the same. Same people, same desks. But no Maria. I did not see Maria.

Anissa Hamsa came to me the minute she saw me entering the door. She started to whisper immediately : “Maria has been fired…”, Anissa hushed in my ear. It was almost erotical. “She choose the wrong side…”, Anissa tried to explain in a rush, because if anything would be clear, Anissa gave the impression of being placed under severe anxiety and performed like haunted wild meat on stage.

“she tried to defend us, here at the office…”she added, seemingly at the end of her tether and seeking to finish the whole story before our big chief would appear from behind one of those scattered and  dispersed desks.

“…against mr Dujournot…it was no use…”she kept whispering, still close to my ear, so close my trousers started to shrivel up for its content.

“she urged to get some sun protection, on the windows, that is, but it appeared to be too expensive. For mr Dujournot, that is… It all ended in a terrible tussle and at the end, she was sent away, just like that!”, Anissa hushed again.

“Mr Dujournot just said that she choose the wrong side…he actually said this to all of us…” Anissa whispered, still. It was obvious I walked into a scene I did not want to be part of. Destiny choose otherwise. “She got the sack…”

I, in fact, could not believe what was really happening here…Could this mean I was to fail my job? This question must have been written all over me, because, without even having spoken one single word, Anissa continued : “but this has nothing to do with you…Mr Dujournot is expecting you. He just came in. He was late. He always is late.", she added, kind of hateful. or did it just seem to be like this? Her voice suddenly became sinister and razor-sharp. It shook me up. Out of nowhere or at least from behind one or another cupboard, a small creature materialized behind Anissa. Out of the blue. I did not see him coming. He just stood there.  Saying nothing, just observing Anissa Hamsa and me.

Bizarre, won’t you say so?

Small creature, I said…and so it was. When I say small, it is small. He was clearly undersized.  I have no gain at all by twisting or bending the specifics as they are in real. He had a skeletal visage and his costume appeared too big. I spotted his nose. His nose, my God, did he have a nose! You effortlessly could open any tin can in the world with such nose. Huge and sharp. Sharp as the hateful voice of Anissa and colossal as opposed to his body length. 

His hair gave the impression of being very greasy and appeared to be stuck or cemented on his head. It had a very clear shine, not the outcome of the usage of some creams or hair gel, but of clear plain bodily fat.

His suit, although to big for his tallness, was a high quality big label “made by Hugo Boss” ensemble, probably pure silk, stating his wealthy upper class  position within this strange company.  

Anissa spotted immediately that I was not giving her any attention anymore because I was busy evaluating this rare human specimen at the back of her and she suddenly turned around, as she probably felt the huge nose on her hirsute back. “Mr Dujournot”, she shouted, quite unnatural. “This is Patrick. Patrick, this is mr Dujournot.”, she concluded. We both shook hands. “Shall we?”, mr Dujournot spoke, for the first, and pointed towards a separate room which appeared to be his personal office.

“Thank you, Anissa, thank you…”, he added towards Anissa Hamsa in a way to tell her that her part in this encounter was to be ended. But she did not seem to feel this and kept smiling and kept observing our first encounter. “I’ ll take over from here.”, mr Dujournot added, to make clear what he indicated before. We entered the separate office and whilst I took an offered chair, Mr Dujournot closed the door, before taking the outsized seat in buffalo leather at the other side of a massive hand carved  mahogany desk.  It was an hilarious scene to me. As if he was drowning in his furniture. Like all those shrunk old ladies behind the steering wheels of an American car. But I could not afford to explode into laughter, although the urge to do so, was never so close.

So this is mr Horrible, I thought, whom one should be afraid of. One wrong word and you’re  out. That’s what happened to Maria actually. For some strange raison d'être, I did not feel anxious, I even felt myself quite relaxing and comfy, opposite a midget with power.  Life is a huge lie, can't be otherwise. We all live a lie. Each and every one of us. Some know about this, other do not. This whole society is a gigantic lie. Sometimes, on the most unexpected moments in one’s life, certain “things” happen, things that alter your life or try to change it permanently.

My pc just broke down. First the specialists thought all data were erased, but this seemed not to be the case. They could save the data and thus, now I am working again as I cannot be stopped telling you this story of resentment, hate, human disgrace, pestering and torture.

Many times I have a feeling that I do not even exist. It is a strange feeling, that is the least I can say. Whatever I do or write, or act, no reaction whatsoever comes from no one, not even as to say : hey, you are still alive and kicking…no, nothing. It is as if I live in a parallel universe where people can see me, but the more they see me, the more they seem to ignore me and my whereabouts. These are dangerous thoughts. I could try to cross the road with my eyes closed, see what happens then…would they see me? Would this huge truck driver spot me on the midst of his rushed  expedition to a commercial “just-in-time” triumph? I would never know, I guess…and I value my life at this point too much, so I do not intend to practice these malicious thoughts of mine.

But the harder I think about this matter, the stronger I come to see that most crucial events in my life were completed as a consequence of pure circumstantial luck and not as a result of considerate and proactive performances of mine. I did take some fundamental decisions in life. And they led to drastic changes, but only because of other elements that seemed to join me in my pursuit of human happiness. As a counterbalance to those decisions that caused me to smile more than to weep, I surely had my part of wrong pronouncements that pushed me again and again against the wall of humiliation and despair.

Driven and even obsessed by the urge of gaining money and getting rid of the atrocious and  rotten character of my current superior, I was prepared to take on every kind of job I would encounter. The business of mr Dujournot, the self indulging dwarf right in front of me, was as unknown to me as the life of the elderly and stupid. Do not get me wrong here, I did not, at that period in time, any harmful feelings against mr Dujournot, at the contrary.

Because it was he, who in fact decided to talk to me with the potential of hiring my services for his company, that made me feel even positively strong about him and his managerial capacities. He was my knight in shining armour , my saviour, back then.  And I always have been very loyal in my life towards those people who had but first-class intentions with my person. Especially those in a higher social ranking than me. Although his body language indicate totally otherwise and his nose looked threatening sharp, pointing towards me as an obvious tool he probably used to emphasize his dreadful commands, mr Dujournot had all in favour, back then, back there.

He did not speak a word, just sat behind his too bigger desk, fondling around in his paperwork. There wasn’t much of paperwork on his desk. His desk was as clean and spotless as a surgeons operating table. To me it was clear he did not spend much of his executive time in this air-conditioned and frigid office.  Still, he seemed to have lost something, till all of a sudden, he smiled and stated : “ah, here it is…”, taking my résumé from underneath another pile of a threesome letters in the middle of his colossal working table. He looked at my résumé for about five very long minutes,; till he looked at me and said : “you do have a remarkable past of customer care experience, but then I can see it is merely in the holiday business, in the tourism business, that is…”, “ I wonder why you choose now to come to work for us?”, he added.

“Well, mr Dujournot, the fact that I want another job has merely to do with my health, since I do not have any free own will at my present job, I even have to let sign my ordering sandwiches sheet, so she can start to discuss about anything if she has it in her. “, I stated, quite honestly, trying to be as straight forward as I could be, not in the least because it was the truth. “furthermore, I do not like the terrible working hours, since most meetings take until late at night, and I have to stay put, till the last man or woman leaves the building.” My family life is not all as it should be at the moment, and I like to improve that too.” I added.

“But what about your customer service, then? How do you see this then?” he tried to find a way to bring me out of balance, but did not succeed, with this additional question.  “I honestly think that customer service is always the same in its essence, that is; no matter what product you deliver to your customer, all customers are the same to you and deserve to be treated equally, not in relation to what or how many they buy from you. The product should be OK, of course, I cannot work for a company with lousy products (I did not know at that time what the quality of the product of Matrix systems Inc was all about, they could be the worst on the market, I did not care back then, my major issue was to get rid of…you know…), the products have to be good.  And when the quality is ok, then all your customers have to be treated in an equal way.

“I ‘d do anything for my customers.”, I added, pretty self-confident, because this was one of the certainties in my life. I even crawled for my customers, as long as they were pleased with my service.

“I have a very clear vision on customer care, and I have been practicing this during all of my career, until now, with success!”, I threw in.

“Whether they come to meet in one of our rooms or whether they go on holiday, or whether they buy your product…, they all deserve the best possible care, and that is what I am always trying to accomplish in my work.”

Mr Dujournot smiled and put my résumé back on his small pile of papers. “Ok”, he said, “for me it’s ok. You can start as soon as your term at your other work has finished. I am happy to welcome you to Matrix Systems Inc.” He stood up, reaching is skeletal hand towards me, bending a long way over his oversized desk. Of course I was happy, it seemed to me the happiest day in a long time in my life. I think I glowed. For pride and relieve. My God, how I would enjoy my saying goodbye to Nicole Meddle, the bitch.

“What about my salary?”, I tried to insert into the development of things. “Ah, yes, Ill pay you what you earn now, plus I’ll multiply it by 13.9, so all extra months and legal requirements are settled, plus do not forget that you are now part of our bonus system, which means that you can earn again one extra months salary on top of this, if the annual results are ok for the States.;”, he declared triumphantly as if he had to pay this out of his own pocket. We shook hands and I left the office, followed by mr Dujournot.

“Patrick is going to work for us.”, he shouted into the office, so everybody know at once the current status of our negotiations. I had a smile from ear to ear, feeling as if I could fly in the air, and I guess that is how I got home, because I cannot remember how I did this. I wasn’t drunk, I went straight back home, eager to tell the good news to those who would benefit.

 Mr Dujournot was a saint. That’s for sure. The ease and decisiveness  he hired me (I did not even had to prove my German capacities) proved to me he was one of the few great leaders of this planet. Boy, was I wrong. How could I ever be so wrong in judging a person, just blinded by the fact that he practically saved my life at that moment in time.

I hate these thoughts. Sometimes I do really think and believe, which is even worse, that it all has no reason. No reason at all. If I would have been here or not. If all those brave men, fighting for war in bitter red sands, between scattered houses of disgrace by strangled and raped women, unseen by any authority, passed undiscovered through the eye of the believer, that all ends well, those freedom fighters who are ripped apart by the next self-exploding terrorist who is expecting to get his seventy virgins awaiting at the other end of total emptiness, would believe they were here on a purpose, then I must admit that I do not see the ultimate drive those guys hang on to. I can not be that there is a bigger purpose to it all. We are. Nothing more nothing less. And I am starting to see now that just “being” here, is a bigger challenge then I ever could have guessed in my early days of my existence, where all those “others”, were trying soo hard by each and every means they had, to let me believe the “other” truth of life.

But, since my last technical stop at Matrix systems Inc. They only have become stronger then ever. These thoughts, I mean. Of course, strengthened by the behaviour of super dwarf mr. Dujournot and his disciples. But I should not run ahead of things. I tend to do that. I dunno why. Maybe I’d like to see this story to an end. I dunno. As in I do not know. Actually, I do not know much at all. About nothing. All has been said. Lets not repeat the said. Nor the done. Let’s move forward, firm and strict, keeping myself to the facts. As fact only will enable you to see. To see the end result of things to come. Focus. I will.

Still, at the time being, I was grateful and happy that mr. Dujournot had hired me to be part of his team. I even had a clear objective. To start so to speak from “scratch” to build up the German speaking and new eastern European market, together with our guy in the field, our “sales”, mr Wolfgang Hansen. A real German, of course. No one could be more “German” than our Wolfgang. But I ‘ll tell you later about him.

This was some “improvement” for me personally! I came from a surroundings where I couldn’t even go to the toilet without the written consent of my direct superior. Now I had it all clear and free for me to handle. Mr Dujournot, being part of his international “sales” team, was still combining his job as managing director with the “sales” for France and some scattered European clients, reaching from Island to Northern Africa, to Greece. I bet He like travelling. So he would not be around that much, maybe once, twice a month? Maybe.

For me this sounded like heaven. Freedom at last. Freedom of speech, freedom of handling, freedom of acting. Of course this way of working needed a strong sense of responsibility, but with my background over the years on delivering perfect customer support, even on different levels, I clearly had the odds going for me. At that time. Life was great! It all would turn out fine! At last! Life is a feast! A sumptuous excessive dinner, I only took the wrong doors to get to the opulent banquette, but finally I would have reached my haven of recognition and appreciation of inherent and unmistakable customer care qualities.  So maybe, just maybe, there was a God, then. There.

Was there?

Time was back then like walking on roses, thrown on the floor by a bunch of the most splendid and magnificent Sri Lankan beauties, making up your bed and leaving a “good night sir”back on your pillow, written by freshly picked flower leaves, sooo sweet. The future seemed bright. The sun wasn’t strong enough to match my inner glow of intense happiness and firm believe in all mankind.

I think my scrotum has enlarged. On the usual scratching session, this evening, before hitting the sack, i realized that I had quite some amount of skin in my hand. My balls have not enlarged though. They have gained some space. Sometimes on the most impossible moments, one is confronted with some unexpected issues. I do not think this is something to worry about. I just have a huge sack. Nothing wrong with that.

Far more worrying was the attitude of Anissa Hamsa. This was not conform her age. My scrotum is, i guess. It develops with the years. It does what it is supposed to do. It expands. This is disgusting, isn’t it? Or is it nature?

Chapter seven : back to the future

I have to take you all to the present for a second. I have to inform you about some activities and developments occurring at this very moment in time, being a result of what I am unfolding to you in this book. Only I have just been started with my résumé, with my exposé, with my story to let you all in the details of this repulsive, sordid but true chronicle. Between the point where I was landed just last chapter ago, at the point where Anissa Hamsa announced her first hoaxing manoeuvres towards the company by clearly stealing obvious working time, and this very moment in time, lie at least five full years. Yes sir! We go back to April 1999.  Five years of harassment, of mistreat, of pestering and disgraceful human neglect. As I said before, I have the full intention of unravelling all details to you, so you can be your own independent but true judge. Five long years of humiliation and terrorization, intimidation and threats. Five years of mental instability and mental cruelty.  I take you now for an instant to November 2005, because I had some great news coming out of the States. I have to tell you this, I am soo excited. Maybe it is premature, but what the heck, for the first time in all those years I receive a sign of hope, a sign of justice.  (I ‘d better not count on it, because the forces I am fighting are incredibly strong and wicked, their ways dark and totally illegal, based upon back up lies and false deception manoeuvres towards even own internal audit members ) Did I tell you that Matrix Systems Inc. is part of, or better : owned by a huge financial share holders corporation called “Stardor”?  They own many similar companies all over the world and the sole purpose of this corporation is to collect all the potential and feasible profit that all of these individual companies produce.

So “profit” is indeed the magical word here.  The more “profit” we gain, the happier the shareholders are.  It is all about money, and power and wealth. But, because “Stardor” is a 100 % American company, they do have some kind of ethical code valid for and applicable to all its employees in all their companies. One day mr Dujournot came with a bunch of papers in the office, a bunch of at least seventy five pages, every single one of them filled by statements about regulating inside terms and conditions and human behaviour guide lines. “Procedures regarding reports of misconduct or alleged misconduct” was the official elaborate but appropriate title of this scripture we all had to sign to.

Of course we could refuse to sign but then it would be noted in one’s archives, which is, at the least to say not very preferable when you aim high in this cluster of companies. So we all signed up, one by one, that we agreed to the content of this. It was a kind of reassurance that we would be protected by this paper, since our high hot shots in the States declared themselves defenders of the truth and well fare and fare trade and honest behaviour within the company structure. They created an actual internal police office so to speak. Word came around today that they started (at last!) an investigation about the current position and the whereabouts of Anissa Hamsa within Matrix Systems Inc. Furthermore I had a phone call from the Belgian foreign ministry of external affairs and immigration department, that they opened a file on  Anissa hamsa and her family members located in Belgium. The problem is that those kind of investigations take sometimes ages before they come to a conclusion or a profound action, so I probably will have the occasion to go back in time to explain to you all the rest of this shitty tale, as the content is inevitable to get a proper idea and just conclusion on the subject.

So lets go back in time, to the forth month of the year 1999. As soon as something moves in the present, I will not hesitate to inform you on the outcome, even if the structure of this book is ruined by the development of all elements involved. Sometimes it is more fulfilling to jump on the present development of things than to hang on to these times of yore of cruelty and repugnance. How come this investigation on both levels, internally as well as nationally by our own foreign state department? Anissa really must have pulled off some stupid shit this time. I knew she couldn’t go on like this. I doubt it if she knew. Since she must have had protection. Already in 1999, when I started at Matrix Systems Inc, word was spread during those first days that she had a plain fucking relationship with mr Dujournot. They would be on “screwing terms” with one another.  These were more than just rumours..  Fed by the “you – cannot – touch – me” attitude of  Anissa. It came especially from the transport company people who treated the storage of our goods on its final way to the customers. They were located in the same building, in our shoe box.  I guess some of them must have seen or noticed something, sometimes. In the shoebox or outside.  I did not get into this kind of gossip, only it was an clarification for what we endured. This sounds cheap. It is cheap. And I always had my serious doubts about those words of malice but joy for the participants involved. Clearly it could be an rationalization for the astonishing performance and gross  and coarse approach Anissa presented herself towards her colleagues during all those miserable years. She could not be that stupid, could she?

Fucking mr Dujornot? The  midget ?  The  dwarf ? I bet he would have had a hell of a time, screwing darkeyed Anissa. Would he have noticed her hairy back too? I guess he did not care for her back. He had other precious holes to fill. Naaaa, my stomach turned by the thought of it only.

 I knew that this day would present itself as a start of purification. Only the size of the investigation and its results would define the final actions.

You ain’t seen nothing yet!

It was all on the verge of developing before my wondering eyes. Strict catholic parents have many principles and strict laws of order and care. They imposed these thoughts and values upon their five children. I admit, as the years passed by, they became more flexible as both grand-parents passed away quite rapidly, because of the unknown lethal powers of the wrong and bad  high cholesterols values in the blood vein. So my youngest sister did not have to endure the strict catholic nonsense we had to submit ourselves to purify our souls whilst living. Grand-parents are, when alive, still a kind of watchdog over the way the children handle their lives, even if they are close to fifty. They are self regulatory. They are social watchdogs.  My grandparents died too young. All of them but one. I barely knew them at all. My grandfather (dad of my father) was 57 when he got struck by a brain damage, which caused his death shortly after. I was only 3 years old back then, still I can see him lying on his deathbed. Even now. Because of my shy character, combined with my extremely low self esteem, I endured these laws and inter human regulations between family members. I had such a huge respect towards about ever one and everything I encountered. When the doctor came on a house call to visit my sick mother, all kids were practically and literary driven in the back room of the house, door closed and locked. Till the visit was over. A doctor was for me in those days some kind of incredible intelligent wonder boy with almost magical powers that he used to heal people. He stood next to God, since any possibility to deny or question this superficial creature was totally out of the question. Of course, when years passed by, this all changed bit by bit. But the basics are still there. The force of this early artificial implementation of unnatural thoughts and irrational believes was of such magnitude that even today some elementary traces still hide beneath a wounded skin of realism.

April 1999. The next Monday I arrived at nine. To guard till six in the evening. When I entered the Matrix office, I immediately sensed something was wrong. When I approached our island, I saw that Anissa Hamsa was crying. Her head hidden behind both of her hands.

“What’s wrong?” I dared to ask, this early in the morning.

Inez sat right in front of Anissa and she even smiled a bit.

Anissa looked up and I noticed that she really had cried.  With real tears and all. Nose all full of shit. Eyes totally wet. She looked at me and made me feel redundant again. “Inez is going to leave us.”, Anissa snubbed.

This was not a big surprize to me. It did not startle me, nor made me sad. I kind of stayed completely immune to the message that hit this Monday morning office start-up.  Inez had never really spoken to me directly. Why, I do not know, not even now, six years later.

She never told me. She only spoke to Anissa. My God, did she speak to Anissa. There were days that her blabbermouth never stopped blabbering. But the blabbering only went straight forward towards Anissa, they seemed to be true blabber friends .

I never listened to those conversations, only, at times I could not help it to hear what they said to one another. You know these kind of conversations about all and nothing. Furthermore it was highly hazardous to try to interrupt those waterfall of words Inez produced during the day. Once, our engineer tried to. I was at the time not really aware of what happened, but all of a sudden, I heard Inez voice shouting around the office : “ No, I won’t, you just leave me alone, I am not your secretary, do it yourself!”, where she turned again to Anissa, continuing what was seemingly to be tremendously important she had to communicate to her, back then, back there.

So she never spoke to me. No time left. Only Anissa. It appeared to me that it was quite natural that her message of leaving Matrix would be a disaster to Anissa. I wasn’t really unhappy that she never spoke to me. She wasn’t discussing the job, nor the customers nor the procedures, nothing about all this. Private conversations are inevitable when you are on each others lap the whole day, so I can understand their existence although I never understood the drive and intensity of female personal gossip and common talk. That’s because I am a male, I guess…

So we did not have a real office relationship, actually. There was absolutely nothing between us, nothing at all.  Inez and I, I even doubt it if she noticed me at all. She, owner of a divine beauty, was constantly struggling with her attractiveness and her relation to men. She shared all of her thoughts with Anissa and both they worked on strategically clever plans of attacking the male species in order to manipulate him to their benefits. I just heard.

So I was kind of relieved that she left. Because at times their blabbering was so intense and had so little to do with that what we were in the office for, that it disgusted me to the top, because I had several problems with my picking and shipping orders that the bloody system would not accept, but I dared not to ask Anissa, who was devotedly listening to her major example in life, Inez, who would never accept an interruption of her discourse since her personal problems clearly outgrew those of Matrix Systems inc. Furthermore I did not want to cause such an outburst of words into my direction as our engineer just suffered from.  So I waited. And waited. And waited some more. Till the ladies agreed on something and Inez stopped talking. This was something that happened about twice a day. Then they had to go for a pee to the  lo and I sat there, left alone with my struggle of shipping and picking… After the first few days I even started to think that I wanted to leave Matrix Systems again, because of the blabbering position of both ladies, part of my team, but what team?

There was no team. There was “them”, blabbering “them” and me.

How stupid can one be? Even if it is clearly stated on different levels at the beginning of this novel, that all is fake, all stories are false, all persons are invented, all circumstances sheer imagination, still some people have the unbelievable impressions that some of the stories told are actually about them….What a token of self-indulgence . this is sheer decadence and inappropriate self pity of individuals who think way tooo high about themselves..

Honour. A fine word, a fine aim to live up to. But where does one see the element “ honour “ in the fact that one is digging into trash bins to search for information on a salary a new colleague has acquainted? Where does one see honour in the fact that one is illegitimately looking in a private booklet of your direct superior that has been stolen from his desk during his absence in order to gain illegitimate information on the salary increases of all of ones direct colleagues?  Where does one find honour in the fact that one steals methodically and systematically over a period of several years actual working days from one’s employer by deliberately failing to inscribe the holidays taken,  into the proper booklet, so they are not counted for, nor taken into consideration by the annual remuneration? The nice thing here is that witnesses indeed are existing about all these elements, it is just a matter of pushing them to the point of telling the truth. Where does one find honour in the bursting into the office each morning one’s mood wasn’t  up right for a laugh or a smile? Where does one find honour in unsuitable accusing colleagues of racism as a cheap way to defend and hide one’s gross and foul-mouthed behaviour towards everyone? How much more do I have to endure before this malignant behaviour is forcing me to end my life? Am I a racist when I see all of those things mentioned above and when I react against them because I do not agree with them for the reason that they are against my inner believes and against all I stand for in life? No sir! Am I a racist because I shiver when I hear  the word “hatred”, used on a daily basis by some colleagues to defend a sluggish  and lethargic office attitude? No sir! Am I a racist because some colleague only was trying to abort and avoid all possible workload, diverting it onto other colleagues, partly  due to improper education and lacking training? No sir! Am I a racist when I find people sleeping during their working hours in the back of a container in stead of unloading it? Am I? No sir! This is a fantasy story about inappropriate human behaviour, not about some skin colour, nor about  descendant countries, nor about the origin of some human species. It is a imaginary made-up story about abusive office conduct and misbehaviour towards others, and in no relation to any racial connotation. Racism may not be used here (although this is done so) to defend despicable  and shameful deeds amongst colleagues. To accuse one of racism is only a cheap way to try to hide one’s own wicked and disgraceful technique of demeanour. It is not at his place here. This is my website, where I write and make my fantasy story come true. If some  recognize themselves in what is displayed on these pages, it is very pitiful indeed and maybe it is an indication that one has to alter ones way of daily conduct. Very urgently.

Racism is bad. It is a bad word, it is bad behaviour. Racism kills. Question is : whom does it kill?

I think time has come to inform Stardor. Debriefing is essential here.  About the content of these web pages. Since I am only at the beginning of my more than five year stay at Matrix Systems and many essentials still have to be told. I have to protect myself. As soon as Stardor is able to join in on my fairy-tale, I will have protection granted.

I am kind of curious though, how their ethical code will deal with the methodically stealing of working days, with the intrusion of the paperwork of a superior? I 'll keep you informed.

Witnesses keep me strong now. Firm as a rock, in the desert of the truth. The truth of a fairy tail.  Indeed, I am only at the start of my magical fable. So many things still left untold.  I do have to hurry. Only 50 pages ready, of a book, ending at about 400 pages.  What is there still to tell, tons, my dearest, tons of new intrigues and false pretences…and the marvel of it all is : I did not even have to look for them.

They just unrolled before my very eyes. Every day again. At matrix Systems Inc. 

The best thing though that could ever happen to me and my fairytale, is an official complaint from one of those who think they recognize themselves in all what has been written so far. Even though it is all fake and ingenious. Can you imagine the press attention I would get? Of course I would immediately evocate and present my secret but confident eye witnesses to back me up. And believe me, I do have a bunch of those! Eagerly waiting to contribute their part of this unbelievable story. Because the sad part of my tale is that many others do experience the same kind of irregularities at their offices. Ort even at the same office. Every day again. Confronted with despicable attitude and beastly behaviour.  Can you imagine what grander and splendour triumph I would make when all of this would reach the news papers? I would be “instant famous” and my book would sell by the millions.

May I have a pleasant dream? May I ??? In these dark days of despair, fraudulent  and inappropriate behaviour?

I had no idea how hard it would be to let the truth conquer. It has all been too gross what I have endured these last months. It is in fact quite unbelievable. People with no ethical standards, nor any company loyal attitudes, with no moral codes to live up to, pursuing only their personal gains and individual favours, are being promoted on the back of those who quietly but honestly try to do a normal job. How rude can life be? Does the truth have the strength to beaten this kind of abhorrent attitude? I know my parents always said : “Even when  you produce  a lie with supersonic speed, the truth will catch up with her, yes indeed! “So, eventually, the truth will conquer. I still believe that. I must believe that. It keeps me going. It will survive all threats that are used to try to obstruct, hinder and impede the variables that are necessary to reveal the final elements of truth.

Inez was leaving and Anissa was crying. Why? Quite simple. Because : “I am going to miss her…”Anissa sobbed with a self-pitying grandeur only seen in the big New Yorker theatres. I think she meant it.

Even if this is almost six years ago, I quite clearly remember that our big chief, Mr Dujournot also was quite upset by this notice of resignation of Inez. It was clear to me that he loved beautiful women, and one thing was certain: Inez had a sumptuousness, a dignity and a distinction of the greatest creatures on this planet. She was a woman of the highest standards. The only thing that really disturbed her grandeur was the fact that she was aware of her high class appearance. Mr Dujournot, that Monday morning, where he heard this awful news of her resignation , took Anissa aside on the bench outside the office and asked her : “Anissa, what shall we do?”, “What shall we do now???”, Mr Dujournot repeated, with a clear despair in his voice of an abandoned husband who just got notice of the divorce of his wife.  “I do not know…”,Anissa cried, as if she had become a lesbian, seeing her loved one part forever. Two desperate individuals, sitting together on a bench outside Matrix Systems, not knowing what to do. Pretty pathetic and wretched, huh?

Still, this was about the lone time I saw Anissa and even Mr Dujournot in  a state like this. Mr Dujournot usually never spoke that much. At the beginning this seemed quite convenient, but after some time it became rather strange and turned out to be just one of his major managerial highly executive American paraphernalia out of his tricks box to keep his top position as sole ruler of the Matrix Gang. Furthermore it was quite obvious that the star of Anissa could not sparkle that intense without the full protection of mr Dujournot. There was no other reason that ever could explain the hoarse and unbelievable foul-mouthed attitude of Anissa towards her fellow colleagues. She was so clever or even shrewd  and astute to come up with such  delirious hateful stance when no superior was around or about.

As would appear to be numerous times in the years to come, I miscalculated the despair and seemingly indecisiveness  of mr Dujournot. He turned out to be a very bad loser. But a firm one. Only  moments after the “get-together “of Anissa and mr Dujournot, he re-entered the office and without looking for a second at our island, he just blustered, firm and ice-cold : “Inez, I’d like to see you within two minutes in my office.” His mouth was pinched down to shape only a solid stripe, lips gone out of high negative pressure. Fire lit up out of his tormented eyes. Anissa came in also. Her eyes still as red as a baby’s ass.

She remained silent and took her seat at the island. Inez felt quite correctly that it was no time to ask questions en prepared herself to follow mr Dujournot in the office.

Because he was always so many times abroad, or, at least, not physically present at the Belgian office, it was hard for us to really get hold of mr Dujournot. And what he stood for. What his believes were. As he did obviously  not belong to the loquacious kind, it took me ages to unravel the complex, but in any case enthralling as captivating personality of our “big chief”. Almost “six” years, I would say.

Chapter nine : phone fighting

Can you imagine my astonishment during those early days, almost six years ago? I did not know what to think first.

I had questions. Many questions. But I did have also a salary. I had money. And I did live nearby the office. May be it was better for me to just shut the f*ck up. And to let every thing be. As it is. As it was. Who am I to question everything in this new firm? I did have quite some executive experience in big companies, but no one said to me that this version of management would be the wrong one. It only felt that way. To me at least. And it was hard for me not to act against this.  Would you attack the hand that feeds you?

It depends. It depends on how serious the strange and eccentric signals are that you receive from your surrounding variables.

Furthermore was it so that mr Dujournot did not reveal himself all at once. Only bit by bit, day by day, visit by visit at the Belgian office, he exposed slight parts of his personality. Never directly, always in some kind of context where the way he responded or reacted on a certain situation, gave away another part of him. Secrecy has always been  part of him. He never gave himself way, just like that. No dictator would do so. Mr Dujournot by no means was an open book. To no one. Rather a heavily guarded fortress, a national bank. Fort Knox. The pentagon.

There was no company spirit at Matrix Systems. Total freedom was granted by mr Dujournot, if you handled his own set of personal principles :

*do as much as you possibly can in as little possible time

*leave me alone – do not bother me with office chitchat

*certainly do not bother me with any real problems

*it is your responsibility to clear all problems

*do not make any expenses

*make sure all of your clients are happy, so they will not bother me

*be in the office form 8 till 1800 hrs

*do not contact the usa

Quite cool, huh? I felt quite hilarious with this “from-a-distance” governance of mr Dujournot. I underestimated and miscalculated the effect of those rules on the weaker components of the chain though, as there were quite obvious Anissa and also Tanja.

Tanja never got over the sudden departure of her close office friend Maria, just a few months ago. She missed her buddy. Her companion in command. Now she had no one to ask questions to. No one to place some responsibility upon so she did not have to bear it herself.

Tanja could not do without a present chief. She was clearly lost. She could not decide from her own. She felt miserable. She felt the same way she looked and believe me : that is not a pretty site, nor an aim to live up to. She got depressed. She got pissed. She started to hate mr Dujournot. For letting Maria go. She started to phone to the US. Frequently. To complain. As only women can. She dug her own grave.

Stupid women. Ugly too.

Yesterday I saw a feel good action movie about honour, friendship, courage and honesty : “stealth”. In one of the scenes the pilot talks to the biggest chief possible, the leader of the ship that carries the planes, after surviving an attack on his life, ordered by his own direct superior, from whom he discovered other severe malfunctioning and says : “ sir, there are a lot of things that you should know about….”

 I now, at this very moment in time and place, after a previous attempt was interrupted by some pc hacker, like to repeat those words to the responsible executives of “Stardor”, the rightful owner of Matrix Systems Inc. : “Sirs, there are a lot of things that you all should know about the former and present leaders of Matrix Systems…”

Please grant me my dignity, my honesty, my pride, the benefit of the doubt to inform you correctly about what is going on and what is going wrong at Matrix systems Inc. in former and next pages of this book.

Of course, in those early days, mr Dujournot seemed the perfect match for me, leaving me all the office playground for myself. Over the years I had cultivated a very strong customer care sensitivity and build up a real strategy about how to gain and keep and treat customers. I had the intention of implementation of this personal  point of view of which I was certain it would work. And it did work. Marvellously, it turned out to be just the way I pictured it. Sales rose, no, they jumped into the sky. Especially my sales rose. The eastern European part gained customers, importance and sales. You bet that our Wolfgang Hanssen, outdoor Eastern sales executive, was in high spirits. He was more than happy. Of course he did a hell of a  job on the field with even more intensity and professional conviction, because he knew he had office back-up. At last. Real back up. He knew that some one in Belgium was taking care of his customers and their little problems. Or their big problems. No longer unanswered phones, unanswered questions, unsolved problems.

We both grew. Wolfgang and I.  We were a heck of a team. The sales figures confirmed our costumer support. In only just a few months sales doubled, tripled and kept growing. It was phenomenal. Even if I have to say so myself.

By the way, aren’t you curious what happened to Inez, after she followed mr Dujournot in his office? I bet you are. Well, it did not take long, this conversation. Of course it took place behind closed doors.

So about the content I cannot inform you, since this happened between the two leading players of that moment in time. And Inez surely did not say anything either to me. Nor to anyone else for that matter. After just a few minutes, she came bursting out of his office, totally shook up and her gorgeous face shredded with tears. She tried to cover up her face but could not disguise her crying. “I can't believe this....he just throws me out…”was the only understandable sentence Inez could produce before taking her coat and left the door of Matrix Systems Inc. Gone, just like that. From one second to another.  

Only a few seconds later mr Dujournot came out of his office, with a big smile draping around his face.

He came straight towards our island. “If you decide to leave Matrix Systems, its for the best of everyone that you leave immediately.”, he tried to explain. “its no use hanging around any longer.” He added.

“So I ‘ve sent her away. End of story. She did not longer want to work here, so…finally it was her decision.”, he said. In a victorious way.

By sending Inez away on the spot, he, the alleged abandoned victim of the previous situation, regained his dignity and control of the situation. That’s what he thought. Sore looser.

Those days were strange to me. It all happened during those first days of my work at Matrix Systems Inc.

But if you think that this was the end of bizarre things happening at this spooky company, you are dead wrong, it was only the beginning. One of those striking peculiar things was the way Anissa used to handle her phone calls. As you can deduct from the title of this chapter, it weren’t really phone calls actually, it were ordinary heavy phone fights. Now it was quite clear to me from the beginning that Anissa came straight from school to her first job ever at Matrix Systems Inc. Other than  Inez and Maria guiding her, she could not have had much of professional backing up till now. And since Maria was fired and Inez just left the building, it did seem indeed that she had a severe lack of professionalism to cope with.

As for the contribution Inez delivered on behalf of the professional augmentation of her blabbering mate Anissa, this could be estimated as extreme meagre. The worst conversations she tuned into real horrendous battle fields of words, spoken as true full automatic non-stop gun fire, were those with a transport company, called “Smeulders”. They were responsible for all our transport from Antwerp to France.

We had a delivery date of one, two and maximum three days, depending on the location in France. Quite natural. Of course it happened a lot that goods were not delivered on time. “Smeulders” was about specialized in this kind of failure or late deliveries.  One of the reasons of this systematic deficiency of prime time service, was the fact that “Smeulders”’ had already gained a huge reputation on the market as the cheapest transport company for France. They were so cheap they had to cut on something. And in the case of “Smeulders” it was service. They were always late. Always. They gathered goods till the last minute. To cut on the costs. Now I have learned in my years on the field that the cheapest solution in business mostly turns out to be the  most expensive one on the long run. Cheap never is good. So proved our cooperation with “Smeulders”. The way Anissa handled this transport company was not exactly a way to find improvement in the service they offered.

   Chapter 10 The original Matrix Sales techniques  of mr Dujournot chapter 10

Belgian newspaper Friday 30 December 2005

Quotation : “the German State Baden-Wuerttemberg is going to sharpen the rules for the foreign Muslims who want to become German citizens.  From 2006 onwards they have to pass through an oral exam about values and  moral standards. These values and moral standards are being deposited in a series of law articles of the official German constitution, the “FDGO (die Freiheitliche Demokratische Grundordnung). Since 2000 all new german citizens are obliged  to swear total faith to the FDGO.  The state of Baden Wuerttemberg fears that many Muslims are not serious when they take this oath. That is the reason why they have to perform an loyalty assessment, including a long conversation and an examination. The questions concerned are about “equality between man and woman”, "freedom of religion", "revenge out of honour",   and the 11 November attacks in the US.”

As I still an a weak-hearted person, I could not stand this up roaring attitude of Anissa and I felt flabbergasted. Every time again. Especially when she used the word "hate". Which she did all the time.

Besides her verbal violence, Anissa had some other tools she used to intimidate her “equals” or in her eyes possibly “minors” at the Matrix office.

You will find out about them as time passes by.

Can you imagine we are still in the year of 1999? Still five full years ahead of me. In this chapter I had the intention of telling you all about the remarkable sales methods used by those in charge of Matrix Systems Inc. Before I can do that, I do need to follow the chronological development of things. As Inez was kicked out as quick as she came in,  she needed to be replaced because it was unthinkable that customer service would be able to cope with its clients with one person less. That is why I came as an enforcement, at the first place. So she needed to be replaced at once. Even if Anissa had a very hard time with the sudden disappearance of her friend.

In such drastic situations, where people were fired and hired, mr Dujournot was around the office, of course. I did not say he was physically  in the office, no, he was around the office. In the mornings, not one of them he came in earlier as 10 o clock. Often it was almost noon. He phoned on his way to the office for his lunch sandwiches, which he ordered always late, so several phone calls had to correct the amount previously ordered for all Matrix staff.  Those sandwiches were paid for out of everyone’s own pocket, what do you think?  Nothing on the account of Matrix Systems. More than often we prepaid mr Dujournots sandwiches and had to insist on getting the money back from him because he tended to forget in his advantage.

The week following the resignation of Inez, mr Dujournot was present. In Belgium, that is. Do not ask me how he did it, but he managed to replace beautiful Inez by an even more beautiful species of the female breed. No one knew where he saw these girls, nor where he found them. They just appeared at the office. And so did Siglunde.

What a name for what a girl. She indeed was still a girl. 21 Years old, fresh from school. The beauty of the innocent. The purity of the unspoiled youth. She was tall, even taller than Inez ever has been. At least  72,83 in. Thin, short hair, lagune-blue eyes, extremely long fine shaped legs, no  table legs. What a catch! Congrats mr Dujournot, you did it again!

In no time Siglunde was able to make forget that Inez ever worked at the office. One could suspect Anissa of severe lesbian behaviour. The way she initially flirted with Siglunde was out of this world.

It made me feel uncomfortable, because I had to witness this grotesque interaction between two childlike women, searching for their mutual weaker spot to be touched. It all ended in a fight. Why? I do not know. Possibly because Anissa concluded  after days of deeper personal investigation that Siglunde could not really contribute to her private benefit and thus needed to be crushed by her spiteful words.

This beautiful but sad story however ended quicker than any one ever could have expected. Siglunde had been a model and was even now still trying to achieve a breakthrough in the world of fashion and catwalks.

Furthermore she had no endurance whatsoever to work with our computer system Navision. If you add the crummy way Anissa was training me before to the fact that Siglunde suffered a nervous brakedown and consequently  crashed every time she had to make an invoice, you could feel from here to Tokyo that she was not born for this kind of work. After only one week, Siglunde announced her departure from Matrix Systems, because she had found a better alternative. It was a governmental position, she found, where she had more time to focus on her modelling career, besides this computer programme did not seem to match to her anyway. Bye Bye  Siglunde. Lucky Siglunde.

Lucky Siglunde.

This was, of course another setback in the planning of mr Dujournot who saw his obligatory stay in Belgium being prolonged to unknown duration since his initial attempt to replace Inez failed almost instantly.

As bizarre and obscure he acted by the first attempt to replace Inez, the more open he seemed this time, since he asked us, at customer service (only Anissa and me left, actually) to participate in the search. He told us he had placed an announcement in the weekend edition of the most important Belgian newspapers of the upcoming weekend and he asked us to be in the office the whole of next week, when he would screen the first candidates. He’d send them over to us and then, we could ventilate our opinion on them. In reality he was fed up with this failure of his own endeavour and was now counting on us, so he could lay the responsibility on us when things would get wrong a second time. Two beautiful species of the female gender had left him in less than a week time and he clearly was not up to a third personal disappointment. Of course, Siglunde left the minute she pronounced her finding another job to mr Dujournot. Seldom seen someone leave the office that quick.

 I wonder what he actually said to her. Probably he had insulted her.

It was quite easy, actually, the choice we had to make. In what came bye that week, no one seemed appropriate, nor had the right credentials…  there was only one woman though, and she looked good, so….In fact , even if she might have been elder than the others, she was the better selection. It concerned an enthralling woman in her mid forties, with exquisite raven black long hair,  however an elderly type, still looking younger than her actual age though, with the general looks of a true Spanish gipsy, if dressed that way.

She was pretty small, had a appealing face, a positive attitude,  and she was divorced. This new piece of information was quite interesting for mr Dujounrot. Now he had finally  found someone who was in an absolute economical underdog position, who needed the job and its cash as bad as I did.

 She would not run as fast as the others did before!  Those stupid ignorant and for all ungrateful adolescents!  Besides her looks, she had to offer indeed the  right maturity combined with the necessary qualifications of a true customer care supportive person we were all looking for. We all agreed pretty fast on this female candidate. Her name was Veronique.

Veronique Claessens.

Welcome Veronique.

Welcome to the team.

Because she really did look at least as nice as both vanished youngsters, despite of her age, mr Dujournot enjoyed this late triumph of  human selection. When you are in your mid forties and you do look good, you do have  only one problem in life : you recognize that you have great looks and you abuse them. Veronique surely used hers to get what she wanted. I bet she immediately sensed the exuberant weakness of mr Dujournot for female splendour. He fell for her in less than one minute, that is certain. I could live with that, since Veronique not only brought her looks into the office, she seemed to be an intelligent creature as well.

She would truly be a authentic support on our island and make things work for the better. That I was sure of. For the first time since my arrival at Matrix systems, I had a feeling of gratitude and contentment. May be all would turn out the right way.

Just may be.

At that time, it seemed right and good. And I felt good. As did mr Dujournot. Between his legs.

Veronique spoke three languages in such a faultless way Anissa only could dream of and she had the intention of picking up a fourth one through evening classes. She was absolutely  fluent in Dutch, English, had a supreme French control over her Roman brain particles, and wanted to tackle the Italian idiom also. I had a slight inkling she used this multiple language control as a enticement for mr Dujournot since he, being a real Frenchman, did not master any other foreign language, beside the English one. Now, I do know that in general, all Frenchmen do not ever in their entire lives speak any other language but their own, surely not the English one, and this is an historically grown major fact you cannot refute. So the fact that our genuine Frenchman mr Dujournot spoke English, was at least that much of an achievement of higher international  linguistic intellect, that he made it to the position of “general manager” of Matrix Systems Inc.

 You can easily compare a Frenchman with the Germans for that matter. Neither do they speak any other language than their own strong German idiom. Wolfgang Hanssen, our German sales, did not only speak German, but handled the English as well as if it was his own invention. That is why he worked at matrix Systems Inc. He was one of the very few Germans who were able to combine two leading languages of this world in one brain.

Both French and Germans strongly believe that their own language is the only possible way to really make it in this hard international business world. They consequently deny the strength of any other language for that matter. Would you believe that, when we arrived at Sudan, one of the poorest northern African countries in the world, where I had to guide the overweight German cruise customers towards dirty open rebuild trucks with only bare benches to sit upon in the heat of about 53 ° noon temperature, they expected the locals to speak German? No kidding. Swear to God. Even if I do not believe in him.

Every time a cruise ship enters a foreign port, it is in most cases  welcomed by local dancers or other artistic local citizens to make the cruise participants feel welcome and at home. You can’t expect them to speak the language of every visiting cruise liner. No, you cannot. Only the Germans do so. Till today. Yes sir, indeed. This is no joke.

Where was I?

Right!

I was on the verge of telling you about the scheming way the Matrix Systems general manager acts to promote his sales activities. Due to the demanding occurrence of multiple events and frequent personnel alteration  during those early days of my presence at this utmost peculiar and questionable company , I will be forced to tell you about this next and again uncommon component of the European part of matrix Systems Inc. in the next chapter.

Chapter eleven : sales promotion techniques part 2 – second attempt

Chapter 13   : Next, please!

Who do you think was the next one to leave Matrix Systems Inc?

Because it did not stop with Rick Vijvers, as I told you before.

Tanja hadn’t felt well since Maria had left the Matrix family.

Ugly Tanja leading as a sole employer  our account department, considered herself quite lost and alone, since Maria left.  Tanja had been best mates with Maria.  Since Maria was the previous office manager, it seemed very clearly that Tanja used her as a back up for all her accountable decisions to be made. Tanja could not function alone. She could not make any decisions from her own. She needed this feedback from a superior as her oxygen to breathe. To be reassured that everything would be ok. Tanja was quite uncertain. With those looks of her, any one would feel uncertain.  Tanja was now one of the elder almost totally vanished team. Now Rick was gone too. Tanja was the only one to keep the fortress standing. But she felt she could not do so. Tanja felt abandoned.  She kept on wining about this all the time. We, the  new crew however, were kind of happy that there was no supervisor around the house. We all had our little private reasons. Because of my past and my experience I did not really need someone to hold my hand performing my job. It was for me a new challenge to  hit with Wolfgang those new markets. I had a very specific goal set in those beginning days. I had my own private motivation and my own reasons of how to tackle this new assessment. I did not need a nany to guide me. I new exactly what I was doing, where I was heading at. Obviously Tanja did not. Not any longer.

Chapter 14 : Tessy  Jolane and Malvine Jumpers

I am sure mr Dujournot wasn’t really aware of the major problems he was bringing us all into. You can say things in the heat of a fight but afterwards you can correct them. Or deny them. Or ignore them. Not mr Dujournot. His argument with the chief of MIXO had turned into a regular clash of the titans and not one of both  participants would ever take back even a syllable of what had been said to one another. This was managerial honour we were talking about. I guess this meant “doggy style” tonight for Anissa. At least her honour was saved.

I had just accepted my job at Matrix Systems, partly on location grounds, since the office was only a quarter mile from home, so during summer I could easily go to work with my bike. Goodbye bike.

Anissa had some good news. Good news for mr Dujournot.  Her girlfriend was eagerly  looking for a job and she thought that “customer care” was something that corresponded  perfectly with her. I just wondered how a person like Anissa, who had no clue at all what real customer care really is all about, could be able to judge upon the capacities of another person, whether it might be her girlfriend or not. But strangely enough mr Dujournot immediately agreed upon  this constructive proposal of Anissa and he instantaneously wanted to meet  this girl, especially when he got to know her age. Anissa was as clever as to bring a picture of her as well.

Malvine Jumpers was a very beautiful creature. This, mr Dujournot had noticed at once, the moment he had laid eyes on the picture Anissa had shown to him. Anissa was quite eager to get Malvine into the Matrix team.

chapter fifteen

The weeks of the introduction of Anissa into the secrets of our account department, it became evident for all of us that she was leaving Customer care behind with no feelings of regret whatsoever. At the  contrary. She had not for once participated in the new office hours arrangement, she visibly turned against those and made clear that this was no longer her cup of tea. Ok, so what?  Only the fact that she drag Malvine along in her daily little theft programme,  messing up our format, did not seem to bother her one single bit.

I think Anissa had known all the time that Customer care never had been her preferred activity. I recall a scene from those days where Anissa had to hand over  a part of her  customers to Veronique. She handed over a map filled with documents.

 “What are those?”, Veronique politely requested?

“-This is the whole file from our Italian Customer “Tia Tipolinni”, a very complicated customer,” Anissa added, a bit strange.

Veronique looked into the file and found but faxes, sent from Tia Tipollinni to Matrix Systems. Veronique started to look into them, one by one and got more flabbergasted by each page she turned aside.

“But these are all complaints!”, Veronique tried to utter her disbelief in what she just encountered and received from Anissa.

Anissa looked up and barked : “I told you it was a complicated customer…”

“He is never satisfied and has always remarks on his shipments…”, she added and thus completed her first belling towards Veronique.

“And where are the answers?”, Veronique asked?

“What answers?”, Anissa replied, clearly not willing to go any further in this throbbing conversation.

“You are not telling me that you never wrote any answer back, do you?”, Veronique uttered quite beyond belief of what occurred .

“There are faxes in the file that are more than six months old!”, Veronique tried to poke Anissa’s guilt feel.

“They must have been from my predecessor then…”,Anissa answered, thinking she had found a way out of this mess. “ I am only just half a year with Matrix Systems…, now leave me alone, will you…this is your client now, not mine!”, she started to snarl again.

“But…., But…”, Veronique stumbled against such grotesque performance of Anissa, “most of the faxes are more recent than that, they date from only a few months ago; I even found one from yesterday!”, Veronique tried to hold on.

“I did not know what to tell them…, they are soo thorny…, oooh, I hate them”, Anissa concluded her defence.

“If I would not get any answer on my faxes for over six months, I would be pissed too!”, Veronique said in vain, because Anissa clearly was not listening any more and had gone up to join the account department for further introduction. She could not care less.

Only later it became very clear for us, Veronique and myself, that Anissa had not been able to answer those faxes at all, because of her significant  related lack of knowledge of the English language. Now our Italian customer Tia Tipollini wasn’t much of an English student neither, because their faxes were filled with common mistakes, but nevertheless, Anissa did not dare to answer them as she never had any training, nor guidance in answering complaints, nor in mastering the English language for such purposes. And she obviously surely never did ask Maria about this, when she had the opportunity or when she still was in the office, since it would immediately demonstrated her total inability to function at Customer Care at the first place. Talking and writing English is still quite different. Anissa knew this.

I think she was even relieved to be able to pass on to the account department. In any normal company you would have been sacked for such a heap of apparent failure and mistakes as a result of lack of proper education. Not at matrix Systems. Here they get you promoted.This, at least, was how Anissa saw the changes ahead of her.

It took Veronique more than a year of extremely hard work and very intense care to regain trust and re-establish a “normal” customer relationship with Tia Tipollini. But she did it!

 Bravo Veronique!

Chapter 16 : the new  technical manager, our technician, our dearest engineer

Excuse me! I had a mission to accomplish. In fact, I had not much time to get involved in all those personal chitchats  between those who at times surrounded me in my work.

Of course it is quite comforting to realize that you have your troops who are  willing to fight every  battle for you whilst you lie on some Italian beach, having your back scratched by some exotic Sicilian bobo.

Now we had a major battle coming up and our technical support unit wasn’t even replaced yet.  All technical questions and issuers were directly forwarded to our American unit who took care of this service part with the utmost precision and speed, even if there was a timeline difference of about 10 hours between the two working places. We took care of this internal discrepancy  with the best of our abilities. Nevertheless mr Dujournot was convinced that we should have our own European sized technical support unit. According to him we should not ever be dependable upon the united States and he thought of this as a very hard to bear but necessary temporary solution. He hated everything that ever could be connected to the USA. Sometimes I wondered why he had such obvious aversion against those who had put him up this comfortable luxurious position of general manager in the first place. Anyway, he considered Matrix Systems USA as our enemy and we could not do else but silently let him believe it was true. 

Gerard  Moipatron was French. The same nationality as mr Dujournot.

He came from the failed competition. Bankruptcy, or something like that. Not quite promising. Matrix Systems had worked together with them in the early days, but only for France.  Gerard Moipatron was a small guy. Again not a woman. Those were hard days for mr Dujournot. I guess the minute mr Dujournot wanted some brainy quality in his employees, he immediately ruled out womanhood, the sexist. I don’t think he matches those two up. Knowledge and being a woman. But he estimates the other womanhood qualities to the utmost. Boobies scored very high. The bigger they were, the more credibility he awarded you with. Upstanding nipples were  cause for a raise in pay. A nice slim lined figure stood also high in his ranking. A pretty face was the ultimate selection criteria and the compliance to go along with his in-depth flirting made him finally decide to take you on board or not. So the woman working next to me knew all something about the art of seduction. That I can tell you. Wolgang Hanssen knew this as well. When he was in the office, once every three months, he gladly joined in. Why should he not? He is still a healthy man, is he not? Can you deny a man such fragile and breathtaking pleasures at work? Not mr Dujournot. But he thus did not find a female engineer to take care of our European technical department. It was a department, even if it only consisted out of one person. Mr Dujournot clearly played it big. Big to the outside. That made his personal prominence rise and shine. It radiated as the finest enriched plutonium  and was inflated by each new employee who was added to the new team. Because you cannot any longer speak of the old team. Practically every one was replaced in a few weeks time. Really odd, is it not? I did not ask myself many questions, back then, I just observed. Now I know why I did this. So now I can note everything down to make it part of the chronicle I am telling you folks.

The many changes in personnel  proved one thing to me : mr Dujournot had all power and confidence from the USA and trust to do so.  He had a Blanco cheque. He was the ultimate dictator. No one would ever stop him. Not even the USA. They must have had questions as well when they heard that all staff had been replaced. I do not believe it is part of an sales nor marketing education that says you have to replace all of your staff at once on a regular basis to improve your business. There had to be some hidden reason, to us totally unknown, why these replacements were made. The only person left who knew some scummy details about mr Dujouirnot, about his whereabouts, about his private life and about his history at the company, was Tanja. But now she was gone  too.

We knew nothing about him. We had heard a few stories that Tanja told us, but they were never ever confirmed by the master himself. Only the way he conducted, we could indeed conclude that the truth in what had been proclaimed was pretty to the point. It was not a very happy truth. Some of the stories you have already heard.

In the total picture, it would confirm the way he acted on his daily scene and nothing had been denied up till today.

Lets go back to mr Gerard Moipatron. A small French fellow with restricted English knowledge.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN    A SMELLY FART IN A BOTTLE

 Gerard Moipatron. A name to remember. Even if his English knowledge was to be described as  “rather reduced”. Nevertheless…We had to screen him on his knowledge of English. Orders from mr Dujournot. Gerard  did not seem a dumb person. Not at first sight anyway. Again, he was small. Just like mr Dujournot and mr Van Deuren; I was surrounded by three dwarfs.

Gerard was not slim either. but note so chubby as mr Van Deuren. His English was poor indeed. But he seemed willing to learn. He was still young, in his early thirties, I guess.

He was even eager to move with all of his family from France to Belgium. Again, mr Dujournot must have been selling this job as an opportunity you could not refuse with appropriate remuneration he only could dream of when he would stay in France.

Even if his knowledge of English was meagre at the time being, we had little choice but to accept Gerard to the team. he spoke English, at least, he tried and what he said was understandable. A Frenchman who speaks English is about one of worlds leading comic situations, utilized in many movies and funny series like “allo,allo” as a guarantee for laughter. Gerard was no exception to this. So why would we be opposed to his accepting such a golden opportunity? We did not. We accepted him as our new colleague. Our “technical” unit was operating again. we, Veronique, Tessy and myself were even committed on helping him enriching his English knowledge, so he would be reaching an acceptable level in a matter of months to come.

Life is nothing more than a fart in a bottle. When you open it, it smells and it is gone in just a few seconds.

What is the bloody point of it all anyway? Can anyone explain this to me? I have tried to understand behaviour of man. I have observed. I have seen incredible things. I could not understand.

Do you know what is going to happen after death? I do not. If I knew I would tell you. Do you realize that, when your body gives up its functioning, you want be able to hear the sea anymore? You will not be able to see the seagulls floating in the wind behind the decks of a cruise liner. You will not be able to touch the soft skin of the one you cherish with all of your heart that has stopped beating. .. You won’t be able to smell the fresh cut grass anymore, nor the cow shit on the fields each spring. When your dead everything around you will be black. Lights out. Only, you will not be aware of it. Since your brain cells stopped functioning. My mom got very sick a few weeks ago. She was already pretty sick with the disease of Parkinson in combination with the disease of, what’s it called, Alzheimer. She got heavy prescript medication. She was partly intoxicated by her pills. .. She took about seventeen of them each morning, noon and evening. New year’s day she hardly noticed her children and grandchildren around her. She barely could speak. She saw as white as a fresh ironed bed sheet. She could not stand up any longer. She could not walk. She just sat there and let the world go by.  Her blood values were  extremely deteriorated by the amount and combination of pills she needed to take from the doctor.  The medicine was fine, individually. In combination with each other they were lethal. That is why she got a stroke. A huge protuberance of blood had blocked her lunges and she was to suffocate. THANK God (even if I do not believe in this guy) she was already taken into the hospital. The doctor at charge saw immediately the problem and gave her the only solution left ; a huge insertion of a special blood lump resolving liquid that could cause other deficiencies such as brain damage but there was no choice left. It was this or die. It took ages, because the fluid went in by a baxter. Her kidneys had already stopped functioning. Both of them. She turned yellow.  The kind of colour one gets just before you die. I had seen this colour before. On patients with terminal cancer.

Her blood pressure was down, way down, seven over five. And it went down even further. Then it stopped. They took her to intensive care. Her eyes were both wide open and gazed in all directions. She did not respond to our calls. Her hands were both wet and cold. She did not move them. She did not pinch back.

Then all of a sudden, slowly her blood values went up again. The liquid was doing his job. The blood bulge was scattered in tiny pieces. Her blood circulated again. Gradually she started to breath normally again. She received new and fresh air into her suffocating lungs. She made it.

She spent one more week at intensive care till all her bodily functions were at an acceptable level again. Her kidneys started to work again.  From their own. The doctors cut heavily on the drugs. Now she needs to take only a handful each morning, noon and evening. Not seventeen anymore. The doses were reduced as well. Now she recognizes her children again. She starts to talk again. She smiles again, she even laughs again. She does not know what actually happened in the hospital. She knows nothing from those moments of transcendence. She almost stepped out of this life into the next. This moment is not existing for her. The Catholics would say that she had been standing before the big gate of heaven. But Saint Peter had to send her back . It wasn’t her time yet. He could not let her in. First of all she was not even noted in the holy book of free entrance. God was not ready to receive her.

I am no Catholic, nor Christian. Nice, when you can believe such childish stories. It may comfort you. The whole rescue of my mother proved to me that death is pretty final. Doctors cannot be God, even if they try so. They even had almost murdered my mother with this lethal combination of tablets. Her body and brain is save now for some weeks, may be months to come. May be she lives another year. Her blood needs to be kept pretty thin. To avoid further lumps.