I have a reputation for being a difficult
I have this reputation for being a difficult person to understand and to work with/for. I used to worry about that when I was 20 and I was at the university studying for my first degree. Even then I chose not to be popular but truthful. I used to worry about that when I was 25 setting up a national newspaper branch office in Abuja, Nigeria and colleagues were missing simple deadlines. This meant I had to work overtime to meet deadlines I set for myself as the branch manager. I used to worry about that when I moved to Germany and in the first months I couldn’t speak German and I had to rely on others to show me around. The same was the case when I moved to Holland. I used to worry about me being a difficult person to understand and to work with/for when I got my first production line job at a frozen cake-baking factory in Tilburg, Holland. Mostly I used to worry when colleagues were taking advantage of my lack of Dutch language skills to make racially offensive jokes at my expense. I used to worry when I became a youth worker in the then volatile city of Gouda and chose to confront the trouble-making youths instead of containing and indulging them like my colleagues did. My colleagues found me difficult because to them I was throwing stones in calm waters. I used to worry about me being a difficult person to understand and to work with/for when at 35 I set up Africa Night and one of the first deejays arrived at 12 midnight twice for a show that started at 10 pm! I used to worry about me being a difficult person to understand and to work with/for when he demanded I […]
