Nothing a Little Bribe Can’t Fix

I have a roommate now. His name is Daniel and he’s a delightful English teacher from Cyprus. We met kind of randomly as I was signing the lease for this apartment. He walked in asking if there was anyone looking to share. I told him I was, and he eventually decided to move in. I think we are going to get along fabulously, but, more on him later, this is not the point.

On Friday night he was out with his girlfriend, and called me at 12:15 saying the security guard wouldn’t let him in our building. We figured the guard just didn’t realize that he lived here, so I went downstairs to try to tell him. The first problem is that the guard speaks no English and I (still) speak basically no Vietnamese. He kept pointing at his watch, like it was too late for Daniel to be coming home. Daniel was never allowed in, and ended up sleeping at his girl’s place.

I called the landlord yesterday to find out that there is essentially an 11:00 curfew at this building (THANKS FOR TELLING ME THAT AFTER I SIGNED THE CONTRACT) but that we could probably “work something out” with the security guard (who is there 24/7 anyway, apparently only to refuse to open the door and say “no, no, no” to anyone who tries to enter . . .  this is the function of a deadbolt, not a human security guard).

So last night, I got home and assumed that Mr. Deadbolt would at least be willing to consider letting me in since we had started discussing this. Did he let me in? No. Did he even open the door to see who I was? No. Did I have to find another place to sleep at 2AM? YES. For those readers who don’t believe I can get angry . . . man you should have seen me. No more Mr. Nice Guy (why isn’t there a female equivalent to this phrase?) My ears can actually steam. You didn’t know that, did you? Well, some of you did, I guess.

[Sidenote: the reason I was so late returning home is b/c I was busy dancing to a remix of Country Roads in a Saigon bar. You know it - "Country roads, take me home, to the place I belong. West Virginia, mountain mama, take me home, country roads." Somehow I didn't anticipate hearing this song here.]

So this morning I promptly called the landlord and we met with the security guard to work this out. The solution - bribe the heck out of him on a monthly basis. If we do that, we can come and go in our own home as we wish. This better work.

I currently dislike Mr. Deadbolt very much. As cousin Ella has informed us, we don’t say hate, or stupid, or @#$%.

The good news is that we know no one sketchy will be allowed in our building in the middle of the night. This is good.