Beauty is only skin deep

In early July, when she came for an interview and I saw her in passing only, I thought they are about hire another manager. Having looked at her legs I said to myself I could work under her (in case anybody wondered what that post was inspired by).

She joined my team (i.e. the one I work in, not the one I am in charge of, for avoidance of doubt) in August as a junior analyst. As a next year’s graduate, she has some way to go before she becomes a self-supporting team member. By that time the workload she takes off other workmates is offset by more experienced employees’ time sacrificed to teach her. No wonder, this is called an investment in human capital. Nearly a decade ago some people, whom I am grateful today, have invested in me.

She had had an internship last year in another department, then had a break and returned to my team. She can boast to be in the first decile of best students of the same university I have graduated from, so the managers thought she is a very promising candidate.

In terms of background, I believe she is OK. Her energy and positive attitude resemble me at such age (i.e. in 2010) will keep her company for a while, then the ruthless corporation will suck it out of her. In terms of behaviour, from the first hours, she has been extremely bold, including asking people personal questions and openly flirting with me (after two weeks of attempts and being confronted with my humorous, yet firm retorts she has not completely given up on, yet reduced frequency of ambiguous chats).

What she is like? Tall, skinny, figure of a model, dyed blonde hear, tonnes of make-up on face (a thick layer of powder and vivid-red lipstick). Her behaviour is anything but natural not straightforward. She plays out roles all the time, every her word, movement, smile, look seems carefully planned.

Whether she’s beautiful? Either I can’t tell, because I have never seen her without make-up (somehow I don’t long for it) or just she does not square with my definition of a beautiful woman who is beautiful without make-up.

My female colleagues dislike her. Not because they envy her a model’s look, but since they see her duplicity and mistrust her. She is anything but trustworthy, so we all watch our words while she is around.

Male workmates at first salivated at her sight, after a month they make laugh of her. Quick change of mind boys in the office have exhibited lifts my spirit. We have all realised she is looking out for a new cash machine. She met her current boyfriend while having the aforementioned internship, therefore she could not return to her previous workplace. My capacity to become a cash machine are decent, yet my motivation is close to zero (I am considering the “money in exchange for sex” arrangement).

One evening I thought about printing out the motto of the fellow blogger: UNDERSTAND YOUR BIOLOGY. THEN RISE ABOVE. But on second thoughts I concluded this would be too provocative, through bright.

In the meantime our manager is committed to be her mentor and coach and spends lots of time teaching her (taking that undesired load off backs of team members). Sadly, folks around the floor have noticed it and his engrossment in taking care of the new employee is a topic of gossips and jokes in nooks and crannies of the office… To make it clear, I do not think he would go beyond professional framework of this relationship, but the very fact an attractive young girl sees him as seasoned manager boosts his ego.

Life’s a whore…

After one turns 30, when the ticking of the clock is more audible people tend to go into two extremes. Either they raise the bar too high and no potential partner can meet their exorbitant requirements or they lower their expectations overly and get involved into middling relationships. This reminds me of one sink-or-swim decision I should take…

I swear, I swear

As pointed up recently in the local media, common usage of foul language has become a plague in Poland. Presence of swear words used in abundance in workplaces, in public areas takes nobody aback. It is no longer a domain of blue-collar-worker males. These days people from all walks of life swear and this no longer is a reason to be ashamed. I cannot deny I am an exception, I do use foul language, at times a lot or even too much, yet I my (lame) excuse is that I have rules.

Much depends on circumstances in which one curses. In a casual conversation, unless in a specific circle of males and the talk is not heard by no one else I see no reason to use foul language. I also detest using it too frequently instead of a comma. When women (with some exceptions of those which also swear and I have palled up with) are around or when I talk to people I am not familiar with I also hold back from swearing. My major principle is to throw curses at a specific situations or behaviours, not against a person, therefore I refrain from insulting people personally.

In which situation do I find swearing acceptable? In anger or impatience to let off steam. For me, in terms of getting irritation off my chest it works perfectly and immediately. To a moderate extent, foul language is tolerable to emphasise some phenomena or describe some events. Funnily enough, I seldom swear behind the wheel (which does not mean I do not get infuriating by other traffic participants), although Poles excel at aggression in their cars which could be a topic for a different post.

In practice 90% of foul language flows from my mouth in the office… This prompts me to smoothly move on to another topic, namely #metoo, but let me leave it off for a separate posting. Not having a good weekend for work-related reasons (fretting rather than toiling away and to avoid confusion, nothing to do with #metoo), I will catch up some time later. Keep on hoping karma always returns.

Recordings for the record

SLD government in the first half of 2000s was sent under by the Rywin scandal. First PiS government was sent under by the arable-land corruption scandal leakage. The PO-PSL government began to fall apart after conversations of prominent politicians of the party, eavesdropped in a restaurant were published.

The joy of anti-PiSites that the unfolding KNF scandal with help overthrow the current PiS government is premature. Firstly, we still know too little about the story. Secondly, the government acts firmly and calmly (with some ludicrous exceptions) tackling the scandal (i.e. those who have no chance to be defended stand down, others where nothing can be proven at this stage, refute accusations). Thirdly, the circumstances of revealing  the scandal (why have they waited for more than half a year) and persons behind it (Leszek Czarnecki, not being crystal-clear businessman, nor his businesses and Roman Giertych, formerly a prime minister in first PiS government, since some five years, the chief barrister of the prominent no-PiS politicians) have all makings of a straightforward political game (this is it).

To assess political impact, find out what an average citizen who knows little about finance understands of it. An average Pole his little grasp of how banks are supervised, what the mechanism of bank bail-out is, why banks go to the wall, etc. They understand two basis threads: “fix up my crony with a job and pay 40 million and we’ll get off your back”. Voters have allergy with bribery and nepotism, the former being combatted by PiS, the latter being nurtured.

Commentators get outraged or excited by the notion of a bank being taken over for a single zloty. The world of finances has seen such transactions, such as Barings bank being taken over by ING for one pound, or Banco Popular being taken over by Banco Santander for one euro. Such deals were co-ordinated by central banks and regulators for the sake of financial stability. The difference is must be underlined is that all aforementioned banks bought for a single currency unit had gone insolvent on their own. In KNF scandal, PiS wanted to use financial supervision authorities to drive Czarnecki’s banks (not actually heathly, but not yet under water) to bankruptcy and nationalise them (in other instances private capital had to aid).

The very outbreak of the scandal has already taken its toll at Getin Bank and Idea Bank. Both institutions raised the pricing of deposits offered to clients, to around 200 basis points above interbank market rates. This indicates the banks struggle to stem the outflows of deposits (and remind on their webpages with capital letters that deposits are insured under Bank Guarantee Fund) and I would to be surprised to see a run on Getin and Idea. If this happens, deposit withdrawals can be suspended and Czarnecki might be forced to file for insolvency of his banking businesses. If he goes under water, the question is who else he drags down.

Easter break musings

A peculiar jumble of random thoughts that have haunted me over the last days… (and my 300th post)

Good Friday. One of those days in the office when everyone is counting down minutes till the shop closes. An unwritten rule states everyone is free to knock off at two p.m. The head of my department is the first to give a cue to go home at ten past two. He’s been puzzlingly laid-back over the past weeks, coming to work late, leaving home early. His light-heartedness gets more and more disturbing, chiefly in the light of my ex-manager’s promotion to a position in the international structures of our corporation. His devil-may-care attitude has two-fold implications: the pressure under which I am is not formally strong (I have to keep self-supervising myself), but one day this will lead to serious business failure and guess who’ll be to blame for it…

I decided to sit longer than others to catch up with some overdue work. Being one of few workers in the open plan gives the opportunity to overhear what can’t be loudly said when everyone’s around. And so I learn this year’s bonus and pay rise funds will be kind of meagre. Well, it’s best to save on human capital that keeps this boat afloat, but if the remuneration policy is carried on like this, best employees will seek better paid positions outside (provided the market doesn’t slump, which is conceivable) and the boat will sink. This would be a well-deserved end… Additionally after over a year I clearly notice those who spend the most time in the office to don’t work the hardest, or the most efficiently. Often when I observe some people I conclude they could easily do the job which takes them eleven hours a day within eight hours, if only they could better organise their duties. Sometimes I think sitting from dawn to dusk in the office is a sort of lifestyle or a way of filling in emptiness. But hang on, some of those people have families, but quite probably their wives and children prefer when they’re away from home. Stop, it’s getting too bitter. I strive to perform my tasks possibly efficiently and not keep late hours in the office to be appreciated by superiors. Wise managers mind the outcome, not the effort.

Who was the dim-witted one to hatch the idea that public transport should run according to weekend timetable? The journey from work to P&R Stokłosy, normally lasting 35 minutes has taken me a quarter longer. Fortunately enough, the worst traffic on ul. Puławska are over (I deliberately waited it out the office), but traffic remains dense. Just like before each Christmas, Easter, long weekend, many migrants living in Warsaw “go home”. There is a even a term coined to describe people who’ve come from provincial Poland to Warsaw in search for a better life. These are słoiki, literally ‘jars’. This offensive term derives from the fact that every time they travel to their relatives somewhere in Poland, they put empty jars into the boots of their cars and when returning to Warsaw, they bring supplies of food in jars. I’m not sure whether the term applies to rickety cars on provincial number plates, or to their drivers with poor driving skills, for whom traffic in Warsaw is too difficult to handle… Słoiki appear as scapegoats on TVN Warszawa forum, whenever a car on LLU, BHA, LHR, TST or other in-the-sticks plates causes an accident in the capital or, as in the linked article, when such clapped-out vehicle disintegrates on the road...

Saturday, chilly and drizzly, reminds me of weather on Saturday 10 April 2010. That day was also gloomy and ugly. The second anniversary of Smolensk disaster is nearing. Today Mr Kaczynski is about to speak to its followers. I don’t really care, I let things drift…

Sunday. There was no snow for Christmas, so may it be for Easter. 8 a.m., temperature +1C and little snow falling on the ground. Not a pleasant weather to go outside, but it’s time to set off to pick up my grandparents from Konstancin and then to visit the family in Ursus, Warsaw. The streets are almost empty, one can spot only cars on Warsaw number plates, so with my WPI plate I feel like a countryman. Family gathering runs its course as usual. For a good start again disputes whether Russians had planted a bomb in Polish TU-154 that crashed near Smolensk, whether anyone could survive an impact at the speed of 260 kmph, or how come engines were gradually reducing revolutions after the explosion. Not to mention claims who is an expert in physics and aviation. Neither impresses me my cousin, bringing his father on accelerating his car to 180 kmph, touching a birch with a wing mirror to see what happens. Hearing for the tenth time if Mr Tusk was a man of honour he would have shot himself in a head doesn’t make lose my patience. But the mere thought that one day I will have to take my girlfriend for a family round-up fills me with dread. But actually from what I’ve seen in many families such gatherings are not a bed of roses… Just recalled one day Toyah was taken aback when he found out most of my relatives, both on my mother’s and father’s side vote for PiS…

Then my parents and I go for a walk to ul. Piastowska and ul. Regulska to see the progress on S2 construction. Not much has changed here since the previous Easter. The level of pessimism in me has risen since writing last week’s summary on road building programme. We’ll visit the site next year to see the progress of works. I don’t expect it to be finished in April 2013…

Woken up by beautiful sunlight today to see –4C on thermometer. This also happens on Easter Monday. I logged on facebook to get the invitation for my high school friend’s wedding, held on Saturday, yes on 14 April 2012. Great to have the advance notice – I wonder how many of the invited will drop everything, abandon their plans to show up? I will pop over anyway, it’d be a pleasure to participate in such event. Wedding season 2012 kicks off a week earlier. Coming back to the form, have social media impacted etiquette so considerably? Would facebook be the way of informing people of weddings? Would traditional invitation cards become the thing of the past? And if somebody doesn’t sign up, would they be omitted or assigned the status of socially dead? Till now, I haven’t accepted, nor declined the invitation, just watching others’ reactions…