I should have written the full story, but wrote Flete Culture instead, and couldn't be bothered... Here it is, as much so I have a record as your entertainment, if you have a spare 15 minutes.
LA MUDANZA, HISTORIA COMPLETA.
The school, namely Julio, the admin guy, insisted on organised the flete for our moving day, I don't know why, and they booked it for a Saturday, the day before we flew to New Zealand.
Flete arrived at 7, the usual crowd. The peon broke 3 of the first 4 things he picked up, including a plant pot, picking the plant up by the leaves. Chauffeur stayed in the car. Maestro elected himself Lift Master, supervising the pressing of buttons '8' and 'PB' (ground floor). Tough job.
After 5 hours of carrying boxes and packing the van (me doing everything...), we arrived at our new flat.
As I arrived by bike, and the flete pulled up, were greeted by Hugo, the guy in charge of the building, wagging his finger 'no, no, no' style.
- What do you guys think you're doing? he asked.
- Moving, obviously, what's it to you? I said.
- Two things to me, he replied. 1. This building requires 24 hours notice for any furniture moving. 2. This building has a policy that no mudanza is done on a Saturday or Sunday in order not to disturb residents at the weekend.
- Right. Shit. What sensible policies. The school didn't call you? Julio?
- Who's Julio?
- An unemployed dead person. Never mind. So, what do you suggest we do?
- Pack up, come back on Monday.
I called the school, and the idiot who insisted we moved on a Saturday had indeed never called the building. Sorry, is that inconvenient? Apparently it's standard policy, no mudanza at the weekend... Tool.
So, I explained that by Monday we would be in New Zealand, and the flete guys said they had another job that afternoon.
I eventually talked Hugo into letting us 'quickly' get cracking and get moving. Angry, as his shift ended at 1pm, and it was now 1245, he said, reluctanctly: Alright, quickly. I didn't mention that we were awaiting another flete from San Isidro, where we were inheriting for the year Emma and Ollie's beautiful furniture (Em's a designer) for the year. They're in India while Ollie writes his second book, storage is expensive, we get their groovy stuff: win win.
So we started moving boxes. Even the maestro actually carried a couple of things. The driver stood around doing fuck all, and, from what I could hear, slagging off me with Hugo.
After about an hour, we'd maybe only moved 10% of the stuff! Man you can fit a lot of crap into a flete. At this point, Hugo threw his toys again, realising that his weekend was going to start at about 6pm. Fair enough, he was fuming, and said enough's enough, pack up the flete, you're coming back on Monday, I've got a family to see, you're disturbing the guests...
So, after Katie, pregnant and smiling, talked him round, I called the school and made Julio agree to pay his overtime. Which Julio agreed to. I think he correctly registered my tone, and that if he didn't agree, I would kill him.
So, back to world's most stressful situation. I re-started carrying boxes and furniture past and increasingly angry and aggressive Hugo, who was standing in the foyer glaring at me as I walked passed, bitching with the driver.
About 5 minutes later, with Hugo calmed to the point of being only extremely angry, the unalmost forgotten and previously unmentioned San Telmo flete arrived with Emma's furniture.
It is hard to describe quite how mental our man Hugo went at this point.
Added to the mix was the San Telmo chauffeur, who was one of the biggest pricks I have ever met, and the worst type of greasy, untrustworthy Argentine 'pelotudo' you could ever meet.
We'd spoken to Emma, and the price agreed was $180 for the job. All in, stairs, carrying, waiting time, whatever... He got out the flete, saw a bit of tension, spoke to Hugo, walked up to me and said:
- Te explico... I got $180 for picking this stuff up... on a Saturday... I want another $180 before one thing leaves that van. And for anything that needs to go up the stairs, I want $10 per floor per piece of furniture.
There were 8 large pieces of furniture, and we are on the 12th floor. 120 x 8!! Just to move the furniture! The whole job was meant to be $200 inc tip.
At this point, the other chauffeur finally shows his face. He was in on this cut. Si, señor, that's the standard charge, You're not from here, that's the deal... $12/floor/piece... Nice of you to join us, I said.
Anyway, I figured: Agree to everything, promise whatever they come up with, get the furniture in, then negotiate.
Which is what we did. I sent the San Telmo guy away fuming, playing the dumb foreigner and saying - Oh, sorry, I thought your said $12/piece to my floor, not per floor... I would never have agreed to per floor... etc etc He didn't like his own game!
Outsourced all other bills to Julio, which as far as I know is where they still are, went upstairs, it was about 630pm, opened a litre bottle of Stella and drank myself into an early night.
Que dia...
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