92. Working hard and dreaming

Dear Jan

There are moments when I would love to be a 3^rd generation child. Doing nothing and having a relaxed life with the money from mom and dad. But only rarely. Hard work is good. I learned that during my first job as an office (and toilet) cleaner when I was sixteen. During my first week, I was trained by an experienced cleaner who told me I should work slowly and showed me which rooms and toilets I could hide in if I finished my work so that the team leader would not see me doing nothing. The first few weeks, I listened to my colleague and so I sat every evening from half past seven on a toilet bored to death and waiting for eight o’clock to go home. I was quite disturbed by my slow work and doing nothing. I also found the team leader a nice guy and I felt I was being very unfair to him. On a Monday, I told my colleague that I was going to do my work normally and when I had finished I would ask for more work.

From that time on the work was fun. I made it a game to clean the many toilets faster and still get through the team leader’s inspection. Soon I got the best and most difficult jobs and I was often allowed to work overtime. Often time passed so quickly that I sometimes felt sorry the shift was over. I often continued working as I had to finish a certain job. Many of my fellow cleaners did not understand me and thought I was crazy. I did not understand them. After all, my time passed quickly, I earned more and I had fun. I was proud of my work. The only problem was when the office staff were doing overtime. They were quite annoying, dropping ashtrays on purpose when I was vacuuming and other bullying – at that time people were still smoking in offices.

I did that cleaning job for a year and a half. It was at the headquarters of the ABN AMRO bank (before the merger) and it taught me a lot and it shaped me. Not only the cleaning job, but also because I read everything I saw on the desks – contracts, letters, notes. At that time, they still had telex machines and they were working all evening. There were messages that Heineken needed an overnight loan of several hundred million guilders, that a bank needed twenty million guilders refunded or a trading company had asked for a letter of credit for a large amount. I eagerly took in all that information and I dreamed of being part of that world one day. Yes, I dreamed a lot in those days.
I also had to clean the office of the top boss of the bank. What a beautiful office he had, with a huge glass front, a large balcony with plants overlooking Vijzel Street and the Herengracht. There were huge leather sofas and a massive desk with an awesome office chair. I sat there sometimes with my feet on his desk, fantasizing and dreaming about having such an office when I was older.

I now have that office in Bucharest, but I prefer to be with my laptop in one of our open offices together with all my colleagues.

Regards,

Gerard