No, I did not get up early this morning. But I did manage to get up just on time to catch the train to work.
This morning it was raining. Trains were delayed due to the loss of signal closer to the city - that's where I work. That's where many many people work. So you can imagine the traffic disaster.
This morning , too, was our scheduled team breakfast - which turned out to be a quick 15-minute catch-up. But I did appreciate my team members for making the effort to hang around and chat before going into the office.
Today was hectic - I had piling up work from the day before - so much forctaking one day off! Also hectic partly because I had forecasted my whole week to be hectic. Lots to do. Lots to work on. Lots scheduled.
Towards the afternoon I got a sudden meeting invitation. It was the presentation meeting with the CEO which I missed yesterday. I was glad they waited for me.
When I stepped into the room and said hello, the CEO commented,
"Do you call that hijab?"
He was referring to my flowery head scarf.
That's a bit random, I thought.
Apparently he just learnt that word recently. I felt strange, I guess because I took it for granted that everybody in the office got used to my hijab that it was no longer worth commenting on.
A part of me was concerned that I had become some unknown employee who had hijab on, and that was it. Another part of me remembered how I wanted to be a Muslim agent in this "Western world"; so this was a good start, I guess.
People have their stereotypes and he clearly showed how he stereotyped me: Muslim; maybe shy; maybe straight forward instead of throwing (Aussie) jokes; maybe prepared instead of spontaneous - just like a typical Asian.
I tried to speak up more during this meeting, but I was still amazed at how my presentation buddy just made good solid statements on the spot!
Very....diplomatic.
I tell you the background story:
We were given this task to do a company presentation a month ago and since then I would mostly be chasing him to catch-up to discuss how we would plan to do it; if not waiting for him to be available. And just yesterday he sent out this survey - which was supposed to be rewived by me first! And now he talked as if we had worked it all out, together!
"We decided to do this... we planned to do that... we have done this..."
Wait a minute.
WE?!?
When we had not been able to discuss or plan anything since he had been superbusy and not responding to me!??
I wasn't sure how to react. I didn't nodd but didn't complain either. I also didn't want to give the CEO the impression that we hadn't made a start on this task until yesterday!
What an uncomfortable situation that was.
The CEO - being his energetic and optimistic self - listened seriously to my project buddy's bluffing. He wanted us to sort of role play rather than present. I had no idea what it looked like in his mind. My mind was busy planning to catch my buddy straight after to really discuss our plans.
And I did! He was happy to show me the survey results and let me come up with some interview suggestions to be discussed tomorrow.
He didn't confirm any follow-up meeting details. Typical.
Ahhh....this Diplomatic World drives me mad sometimes.
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