Into the Wild

I know I have not updated in the last week. It was not for lack of trying - I just happened to be in one of the few places on Earth where there was no wireless internet. And it was kind of refreshing - it was nice not to be a slave to my inbox. I remember a couple of years back I was vacationing with my family in Canada. (Like 10 years back, now that I think about it. Scary.) Anyways, we spent two weeks on an island in the middle of a lake and did not even have phones, let alone the internet. I remember struggling to find a newspaper every day so that I could read the French Open scores. How far away that seems now. Every second, we're reachable in about 15 different ways. And if you can't get a hold of someone in a couple of hours, God forbid, well they must (a) be ignoring you, (b) hate you, or (c) be dead.

Well, if you can't reach me, I don't hate you and hopefully I'm not dead. I've just never been a fan of instant accessibility. Many of my friends know that I refuse to listen to voicemails. I have a phobia against one-way conversation. I think it is because I'm extremely sensitive, but I freak out when someone has the ability to say whatever they want to me without fear of response. This is especially odd because I can't think of a single person I'm in conflict with - but who said fears were rational?

Okay - enough of that babbling. The reason I was out of touch this week was because I finally made it out of the city of Johannesburg and into the South African countryside. I can't share details of the conference, but I can certainly talk about myself and my personal experiences. I rode down to the conference in a borrowed Audi with my boss and his brother/business partner, John. We were supposed to be in a party bus with the rest of our office's management team but the bus company got the order wrong and sent a bus more suited to a Junior prom. Since Graham (my boss), John, and I technically work for the holding company and not Jupiter-Johannesburg, we separated ourselves and took a car down.

The first thing I noticed when heading out of the city were the giant golden plateaus to the side of the N1 highway, on which we were traveling south. Graham explained to me that these were deposits left over from when Johannesburg was colonized and mined. It gives the environment a desolate, alien feeling - seeing nothing for miles aside from these huge man-made plateaus.

I'd been concerned when I found out that I'd have to ride with my boss and his brother. It is one thing to put your best foot forward in the office - I can show up bathed, polished, caffeinated and smiling day after day. My usual car behavior consists of leaning my head back and snoring Homer Simpson style. I also love to eat while in the car, and I need to stop once an hour to pee. Roadside distractions attract me like a fly on a sugar cube and I hate it when the radio is too loud. I always bring several magazines, books, and Nintendo DS games so I can accommodate my finicky taste in entertainment. None of these personality traits were things I wanted to show off to the boss man. And what if, God forbid, I fell asleep and passed gas or something horrifying like that? I'd fire anyone that farted in a car with me.

Well, about 20 minutes in John pulled into a petrol station and Graham ran in to get some coffee. On one hand, I love that the man already knows I'm addicted to coffee - he even knows how I take it. On the other hand, I was hoping to dehydrate myself so the bladder didn't act up. The last thing I wanted to do was to have to stop and pee on a cactus because we were miles from civilization. We continued down the road and I was boggled by the size of the sky. It was like Montana - it just stretched for miles over the hot South African land. It would have been easy to imagine us bandits in the old west, if I hadn't been in an Audi with two men in business suits drinking a mocha. Not exactly John Wayne material.

About halfway down things started to get exciting. I looked up from my laptop (I was working on a presentation) and saw a field of ostriches! Like the bird! I'm kind of terrified of ostriches, what with their big people eyes and strange, hyper-active way of walking around. I yelped out - "are those ostriches??!!" Graham didn't even look up. And John, focused on driving and on the car's strange radio - which was in the habit of turning itself on to tell us about traffic updates - simply said - "probably" and shrugged. I made a note to myself to keep my excitement over the wildlife to a minimum. Unfortunately, I forgot to heed this note. Not five minutes later I wanted to scream "MEERKAT!" when one of the furry critters trundled across the road in front of us. In my heart of hearts I wanted to stop and beg them to let me out of the car so I could follow the little guy to Meerkat Manor, but I managed to hold back.

I'd like to say that my enjoyment of the wildlife stopped there. However, over the next three days, I further embarrassed myself with my antics. I've done a good job of being Business Mike so far in my job at Jupiter, but something about seeing exotic animals and plant-life pierced my armor. I can't imagine how I'll embarrass myself when I actually manage to see elephants and lions and tigers.

Overall, the conference was a large success. I bonded with a lot of the work people I didn't get to know yet and I learned a ton about how the company is run. It also taught me that as much as a try to act like a serious guy in the work environment, it would be just plain dumb for me to think that is who I really am. Why not be someone who is responsible in the office but will also dress up a stranger's pets and sing to their cows? My biggest problem with my job last year was that I tried to be so serious that I ended up losing what makes me me. Better for me to get all my work done and to be a little exciting on the side.

Speaking of exciting - I can't believe another Halloween has passed. Halloween is unfortunately not as big in South Africa as it is in the States. I really miss American Halloweens. For our work party, I dressed up as a marathon runner - basically because it was my gym outfit and I could go there right after the party. Haha. It made me miss the olden days of renting scary movies and dressing up at a friend's house. I went out to a bar following the work party, this time as a cowboy. I very nearly had a Bridget Jones-in-the-slut-suit moment because no one at the bar was dressed up. Luckily, every man in South Africa dresses like a cowboy so I actually just blended in. My hope is that next year (or as soon as possible) I can come home and have a real American Halloween.

I had better get out and run some errands - everything closes so early on Sunday. I'll write again soon - there are some really funny things going on in Johannesburg that I can't wait to share with people.

xoxoxoxoxo
Mike