7. Hospital-Pass
It was one of my last “gigs” working for the large, US supply-chain IT company; an initial sales-cycle meeting with the prospect in Maastricht, one of my favourite cities of the Netherlands situated very near the borders of Belgium and Germany. This part of the world in the 90’s used to be at the centre of the EU population-wise, and so many distribution-centres and business-hubs were being established there, and these were a major component of our target market. As more countries from eastern Europe joined the EU, this centre moved eastwards into Germany, but for then, Maastricht and close-by Liege in Belgium, were the big-hitting cities supply-chain wise.
Just an aside, the first time I visited Liege was a driving nightmare as it kept disappearing from the motorway signs, to be replaced by a city called Luik, then re-appearing. I found-out later these were actually same city, one in French, the other in Flemish. This however was nothing in comparison to the faux-pas I once made when being driven through Germany for the first time by a colleague when I previously worked in a software-consultancy, and observed that the city of Ausgang seemed to go on for ever! He was very nice about it: “a mistake anyone could make!”.
Not the most egregious faux-pax I’ve ever encountered though. That goes to an overheard pub-conversation between the landlord and a regular near Canterbury during our “wilderness-years” of the early 10’s. The landlord was complaining “that friend of yours last-night, Sammy was it, he was well-away; I don’t mind people getting merry, but he could hardly stand-up” to which the regular replied “Sammy’s got MS”. There’s no coming-back after-that.
Anyway, I’d driven down early to Maastricht from Amsterdam and arrived at the hotel where Bill, the sales-manager, and I would be staying. Bill was flying in later from the UK and we had arranged to meet-up and go for an evening-meal before our “pitch” the next morning. It was unusual these days for Bill to perform the role of salesman as he was now in charge of them all and had different responsibilities. However, things were very busy, and I suspect Bill fancied a little time out of the office. By this time, we had perfected the sales process and were quite slick at it; first corporate slides, then positioning by Bill, a demonstration of the software by me, a wrap-up, and agree next step.
It was only mid-afternoon when I checked-in, so I decided to do a little sight-seeing of Maastricht before our meal-out in the evening. I’d been there before, but this was the first time I had significant free-time, so I dropped into one of the coffee-shops in the centre for “supplies” and chose some hash, supposedly from Kashmir, which I hadn’t tried before, and ate a little. There are two big squares in Maastricht, the coffee-shop was on the Markt (the market), but I decided to explore the Basiliek van Sint Servaas cathedral on the Vrijthof (courtyard), a short walk away. I’m not religious, but I figured it probably had some relics from the middle-ages, and the hash would make the whole Gothic experience even more memorable. I was not wrong!
For some reason the hash worked very quickly that sunny afternoon and everything looked sparkly in the autumn sun. I duly joined the tourist throng inside the cathedral which was bathed in that magical, dim light streaming through the stained-glass windows. Christianity is a strange religion, always celebrating its martyrs, all put-to-death in various gruesome ways, with bits of them preserved in pots and caskets for followers to venerate. Occasionally you might encounter a whole dead-body, totally-desiccated over the centuries, staring at you accusingly from a glass case or recess. I discovered Sint Servaas had a different end as he died of a leg-wound and became the patron saint of stubbed-toes! As I said, Christianity is a strange religion!
After “doing” the main concourse (I’m not that “up” on technical terms like naves, apses, sacristies etc.) I saw a sign I most certainly did understand; the crypt! By this time, I had realized I was on a bit of a “whoosher” hash-wise, nowhere near “pulling-a-whitey”, but still enjoying every minute of it. Down the steps I went where it was really dark, and entered into the fourth century. I seemed to be the only person there, and after a few minutes I began to feel slightly paranoid, so decided to leave and rejoin the world of the living. There was a problem. I couldn’t find my way out! Even walking around the perimeter of the crypt, the door seemed to have disappeared. How was that possible? My mild paranoia had now taken a turn for the worse and I became totally “spooked”. Then redemption as one of the panels opened and some tourists entered. In the darkness the door was almost indistinguishable from the panelling! I quickly exited and things returned to normal; panic over!
I continued my sight-seeing before returning to the hotel and freshen-up before meeting-up with Bill in the early evening. At 7.00 pm I joined him in the lobby, and we set-out. Bill wanted to try a little hash again, but instead of going to a coffee-shop, I gave him the remainder of the lump I had bought and he took a small, very sensible amount. All things in moderation, as my grandmother used to say.
By this time, I was suffering from a severe dose of the munchies, so being a “veggie” I insisted we go to an Indian I had passed earlier on the Markt. It was large and looked very posh, as it turned-out to be. We were taken to a table, we sat down, and the waiter suggested we took the English version of the menu. Feeling a little over-confident I insisted the Dutch version would be fine as my Dutch was improving rapidly. This would impress Bill, which it certainly did, but not quite as intended.
I scoured the menu and suggested for us a mixed-platter of food, a bit similar to a rijsttafel (rice-table), the Indonesian equivalent that the Dutch like so much. We started on the lager and waited, and we were well into our second beer before I noticed something strange appearing from the kitchen-doors. A waiter was carrying a huge tray of something, but what made the whole restaurant turn their heads was that it was decorated on the four corners with lit-sparklers. I said to Bill, “I bet whoever ordered that now feels embarrassed”. Inevitably the tray and sparklers got closer-and-closer, until it was landed triumphantly on our table. Bill said nothing as he didn’t need to.
Once the sparklers finished, we enjoyed a very good meal which totally assuaged my munchies. We had more beers, then we switched to cognacs, and on it went. By 10.00 pm we had finished at he Indian, dropped into a bar, and by 11.30 we were back in our hotel, safe, but somewhat wobbly on our feet. The presentation and sales-pitch were being held in one of the hotel’s conference rooms, which was slightly unusual as normally we would go to the prospect’s site, but this meant all the equipment would be there and all we had to do in the morning was fire-up our pc’s, plug-in the projector and pitch.
Bill was late for breakfast, spoke very little, and just had coffee. He was obviously sharing the same hangover I had, but we were true professionals and this wouldn’t hold us back. We transferred to the conference room, set-up, and in a few minutes the four representatives from the prospect arrived and we began. I was quite happy Bill’s half was always conducted first, all that introduction and positioning stuff. This would give me an hour to relax, pick up cues from the discussions I could incorporate into the software demonstration, and let my hangover abate a little.use you forgot about it, is not”.
Bill welcomed them with all the considerable charm he had before he did the unspeakable. He said to them “normally I spend an hour or so going over the industry and trends, but you don’t want to listen to me; you’ve come here to see the software, so I’ll leave you an Andrew’s most capable hands as I need to make a couple of important calls; I’ll see you a couple of hours for the wrap-up”. Then he fucked-off back to his room leaving me on my own with them all. I was speechless, but being an old-pro, I got through it all, even parodying some of Bill’s material. How I managed I don’t know, but I did.
Bill duly returned after his lie-down and did an acceptable wrap-up. Did I forgive him? Yes, eventually I did. Some people like Bill have so much charm and authority they can-and-do get away with almost anything with that little-lost-boy look as defence. Mind you, having survived the biggest hospital-pass of my working life did top-up my moral-bank-account, which did prove critical in finding work when I went-it-alone in business. FYI the prospect was successfully converted into a customer, so no permanent damage was done.