This happened ages ago, but apparently I forgot to blog about this, despite it teaching me a very valuable lesson. I guess I was too embarrassed. But hey, I’ve been reprimanded for not updating my blog (by both my readers), so I thought I’d share it after all. I’m much wiser now, obviously.
When I moved house a while ago, I did it with help of several friends, who assisted in going through my wardrobe and sorting clothes into piles of why-do-I-never-wear-this and why-did-I-ever-wear-this, who helped to pack things into boxes and who made the new house a home. The only thing I needed to call a professional for was the transport of my belongings from my old to my new abode. As a moving company seemed a little unnessecary for my three suitcases and two boxes, I settled on a minicab.
This is a long introduction to how I met D., my friendly minicab driver. We chatted on the way across north-east London, and as the drive took nearly an hour, we had plenty of time to get quite well-aquainted, despite our limiting language abilities (his English was creative, my Turkish is pretty much nonexistant). We talked about the weather in London (not good), the weather in Cyprus (much better!), his wife and family (two grown sons, who come home with their girlfriends all the time, because they’re good sons), his nephew (very cute and marriagable) , my fiancé (imaginary) and so forth. It was all perfectly superficial and amicable. I was excited about leaving my old house behind once and for all, and didn’t pay much attention to any subtext – I actually patted myself on the back for catching on to the nephew thing. He told me he’d be off work after bringing me to my destination, and would go home to a beautiful Sunday lunch of homemade kebabs surrounded by his amazing family.
After my expression of approval of kebabs and family life, D. invited me to join him and his family in (stereo?) typical turkish hospitality. I found this a bit weird, and just laughed it off politely and said I’d be quite busy unpacking all my boxes. He seemed to understand that (I mentioned the language troubles), but quickly suggested that I could come by any other time. Again, I took this as an overwhelming display of somehow misplaced hospitality, and tried to shrug it off.
We dropped the subject, arrived at my new place, and he helped carrying all my boxes inside. In the end, he firmly said “Vee do kebab next sunday, yes yes?”, and I might have laughed and said “Haha, so generous, haha, we’ll see.”
Any attentive reader who can now tell me where this is going totally wrong: congratulations- you possess more common sense than me.
I said goodbye completely obliviously to the fact that a guy who had my full address and phone number just invited himself round for a date, happy to have gotten a good deal on my taxi and having found the one friendly cabdriver in London who’ll help to carry boxes. Obviously this sort of naiveté doesn’t go unpunished.
I thus woke up the next Sunday around noon to a phone call from an unknown number.
“Yehs, yehs, is D. – going to be a bit later, but be there with kebab and vie-yun in half hour. yehs?”
Oh, holy fuck.
Half an hour later, I opened the door to my minicab driver, who had truly brought lamb kebabs, salad and a bottle of red. My manners dictated that I ask him in, and I set the table. More, slightly less amicable, slightly more awkward, smalltalk about his family, my family and the weather ensued. We ate the kebab, but didn’t drink the wine cause it was only 12.30 and he still needed to drive his cab. We quickly ran out of things to talk about. I started learning how to count in turkish. D. tried to kiss me.
Oh, holy fuck.
I asked him to leave, he asked for “Jus won keess”. I got him out of the door, double-locked it and put the chain in. My housemate came out of her room and asked what on earth had just happened.
I felt like an utter idiot. I always assume the very best in people, and really try to give everyone a chance. A lot of times this leads to great experiences and making new friends very easily. When opening the door, I genuinely thought “Hey, how nice is this guy for bringing by kebabs! This is so friendly.” Somehow I think that might not be the best strategy in London, where people have a hidden (or not so hidden) agenda. I got off rather lightly this time, but more caution might be advised in the future.
I Wish There Were A Manual For Life 