Some Days Are Like This

A few days ago we were walking not far from our apartment when an empty Coke can landed on the street behind us, having been flung from the rooftop of the building at our side. Several months earlier a rock thrown from the same rooftop had also just missed us, so I shot into the building and ran full speed up the stairs, ready to catch the perpetrators before they could flee to the safety their homes. When I arrived at the top I could hear several voices behind the door to the roof, fumbling for keys and excitedly whispering, "hurry, hurry, hurry!" I thought they were on their way out, so I didn't open the door. Instead, though, they locked the door to prevent me from coming onto the roof. So, silently, I waited.

After just a couple minutes, the keys grew active again, the lock clicked, and I readied myself just inches from the door--for full theatrical effect--to startle whoever was behind it when they came out. And when they did come out, they were indeed startled. However, I was startled too, for walking through the door with a young boy and young girl was a woman wearing shorts and a t-shirt--an outfit she would never wear on the street--who appeared to be their mother. "Don't come in! Don't come in!" she said, jumping back behind the door. She may have been a little frightened at seeing a strange man standing there, especially considering the state of her somewhat scandalous attire in front of a man she didn't know.

"I don't want to come in," I said, "but I want to know why a Coke can just came from this roof and nearly hit us on the street" (I couldn't remember the word for "throw"). She played dumb at first, insisting she had no idea what I was talking about. Then, after I persisted, she said that yes, the can had originated from the rooftop, but it was an accident that it had almost hit us. I brought up that this was the second time something originating from that roof had landed near us on the street, with the first projectile being a rock. "Really?" she said, looking surprised while glancing at her son. "Yes, really," I replied. "I wouldn't be so upset if this wasn't now the second time."

She eventually left the safety of the roof and with her children we began walking down the stairs. She apologized for the flying Coke can. She also said such an incident wouldn't happen again. Both apology and promise, though, came without any admittance of guilt on the part of any of the rooftop pranksters. I wasn't entirely satisfied with this, but I decided it was all I was going to get, so I left.

A couple hours later we were at home waiting for a new mattress to be delivered. We had agreed on a price beforehand and paid half at the shop, so when it came we just had to pay the other half, plus the 5 dinar delivery fee we had also agreed on. Things are never this easy here, though, and when it came and it was time to pay the rest, the delivery charge had suddenly jumped to 20. Now, relatively speaking an extra 15 dinars is not a huge sum of money, but a prior accord had been reached, so 5dinars is what I was going to pay.

"I'm not going to pay 20," I said. "We made an agreement."
"But I came from far away," said the driver, who was probably in his late teens or early 20's and was not present when the deal was made.

We continued with these basic arguments for some time in broken record fashion until the driver asked to call Ali, the man at the shop with whom we had made the aforementioned agreement. So, I called Ali's cell phone. No answer. I called it again. No answer. The driver then called the office land line. No answer. He tried it again. No answer. I tried Ali's cell several more times, with still no answer. The driver called the office several more times, until finally someone answered. He gave the phone to me. Ali was not there, though; he had gone home for the day. And after I started explaining the issue to the person who was there, I mysteriously lost the connection. When I called back, there was no answer. Another try, and no answer. It appeared the office would be no help in sorting out the issue.

After some seconds of confusion, the driver and I shared our main arguments a few more times. Then, after several awkward seconds of silence, I finally decided it was over. We had an agreement, and five dinars was all he was getting. I felt bad, since he was not involved in the original bargaining process and could very well have sincerely been expecting 20. This is difficult to gauge, though. It isn't always easy here to tell who is being a cheat and who isn't, so I went with what I had expected from the beginning. Begrudgingly, the driver took his 5 dinars and left.

A few hours after this I left the house to run an errand. By the time I finished it was late in the evening, and I went to a busy section of road to wait for a taxi to take me home. When I got one, though, the driver didn't turn on his meter, even though it is against the law not to. This is not unusual, and many times when this happens I tell the driver politely not to "forget" abut the meter. Sometimes they turn it on, sometimes they don't, sometimes they claim it is broken. This time, though, I let it go, since I travelled the route often and knew basically what the fare would be.

Unfortunately, when we reached our destination and I asked the driver how much he wanted, the price he quoted was at least twice what it would have read on the meter. So, a confrontation ensued yet again. The distance was short, I said, and I wasn't going to pay so much. "And why didn't you turn on your meter?" I asked. He argued back, angry that I was refusing to pay his price and telling me why I should. These arguments can go on for a while, but at this point in the day, after the previous events that had occurred, I was tired. So, I just put the money I owed--the real price, not the fake--on the passenger seat and walked away, not saying another word. Some days are like this here, but on this day, I had had enough.