Saturday, March 12, 2005

"Sweet Little Things"

During my line of work, I get to meet and liase with the bosses of car exporting companies and mix around with many Ah Bengs.. Old Ah Bengs to be exact.. Its to be expected since I am working in a logistic cum automotive line.. Basically, we are helping automotive companies export 2nd hand cars to their customers overseas, all over the world, including South Africa and Jamaica. But I digressed, this was not what I wanted to talk about in this post.

There was this Mr Khan whom I have been conversing with frequently. Initially, I thought he was like me, a lowly worker belonging to one of our customer. He had this very strong Indian accent and I imagined him to be an Indian man wearing a beard and a turban.. (Its only my imagination, Indians don't really wear turbans, Sikhs do.) He sounded like a nice and sweet guy and over the phone, he was very courteous and very nice to talk with, albeit his strong accent that I sometimes had difficulties making out what he was actually saying..! Then just yesterday, he started to say that I have a nice voice and I sound very sweet. He also said that he was talking to me with a smile on his face.. (By the way, this was not the first time someone praised me for my voice. But thats another story though..!) Of course I was flattered of course. Which girl won't..!

Then I found out from my boss that this Mr Khan is actually a Pakistanian. Kaoz! i did not even know that I was talking to a Pakistanian all along! No wonder he has a very strong accent!

Anyway, Mr Khan decided to come down to the office unannounced to meet me and Ah Beng (will tallk about Ah Beng in another post..) today. Fine then, so I went out in my three quarter cutoff jeans and super lok-kok sweatshirt to meet Mr Khan. Figured that since he was no big shot, its ok whatever I wear..!

Turned out, Mr Khan is actually the general manager of his company!! F**k! And there I was, stupidly standing there, in my lok-kok attire and shook his hands.. And he was no cheesy turban-wearing Indian looking man either..! He was actually quite good looking, facial and body-wise, although he had thinning natural brown hair. I had forgotten that Middle-Eastern nationals tend to be quite good looking. He actually reminded me of my Iranian Financial Economics prof in NTU, Prof Ramasamy.

Ok, enough of his look, back to my topic..

I think Mr Khan was also visibly surprised when he saw me, in a pleasant way. I think he must have imagined me to be an ugly looking girl with a nice voice.. (Take note here, I am not implying that I and good looking or anything like that!) He shook our hands and we sat down to talk shop. During the whole conversation with him, Mr Khan kept emphasizing that he liked, and I quote him word for word, "SWEET LITTLE THINGS". And when he said that, he ignored Ah Beng and was staring at me directly right into my eyes!! Eeks!! Don't even know what the hell he meant but I guess its not exactly a good thing when a man said he like sweet little things and looked at you right in the eyes!! Kinda creepy actually..

Then there was a moment when Ah Beng had to excuse himself and I was left alone with Mr Khan and his assistant. There was an awkward moment and so I started to make conversation. It went like this:

Me: "So Mr Khan, you've been to many places? Where have you been?"

Mr Khan: Oh, I have been to many places. South African, Japan, Eastern Europe, Russia and Cuba. I like Cuba the best. Its a small country. Just like Singapore. The people there are very good looking.

Me: Wow! Exotic place! Yeah, Singapore is very small. Even have difficulty finding us on the map!

Mr Khan: Haha! Yeah, I like Cuba a lot. They have very good looking people there and there are a lot of SWEET LITTLE THINGS there too.! (He was staring at me in my eyes when he said that again.) And I like Sweet Little Things. (stare again).

ME: (uneasy laugh) haha.. sweet little things.. yeah, who doesn't like sweet little things..! (uneasy laugh)

At that point, Ah Beng came back. For once, I was so glad to see him!!

Phew.. what an experience..! I don't know if I am being too sensitive but you don't get to see clients who like to tell you that he like SWEET LITTLE THINGS during a business meeting!

Am I being overly sensitive??!!

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