21. The Life of Treble, the Life of Three

Hidden local customs that can take a lifetime to recognise, or a sentence to know.

I have been fortunate enough to enjoy a very interesting two hours.

A meeting.
On a Sunday.
At a local cafe.

The cafe is extremely well established. One could almost call it iconic, an institution, in the area in which I live., and of some global repute, within certain communities.

I arrived for the meeting half an hour early.

I had chosen the cafe because although it has a very, very popular terrace area, it also has a ginormous interior area.

And as popular as the terrace may be, you can almost always find a table free within the interior.

So I arrived and I walked in and looked at the interior … which looked closed.

I spoke with the owner. He confirmed the interior was closed.

I turned and looked back out to the terrace area. There wasn’t a table free; families and friends gathered on the lazy sun drenched Sunday morning, drinking coffee, chatting.

I looked back at him and said with some concern that I needed a table for four people; that I had a meeting within the next 30 minutes.

The owner smiled and responded that there was no time limit, that I had the rest of my life.

It is very much the local way of thinking.

I stood there, nervous, watching, but sure enough, a good 15 minutes ahead of the meeting starting, ahead of my guests arriving, a table for four became available.

I took a seat, ordered a coffee and relaxed.

My industry colleague arrived perfectly on time with his wife and two children. We added an extra chair to the table.
Introductions were made.
The children played on mobile phones.
My colleague, his wife and I sat and chatted.

Conversations are almost invariably interesting, have an additional layer of quality and entertainment to them, when you sit and speak with people who are perhaps not necessarily trained, but practised, in listening to understand rather than listening just to reply.

It is a skill all of us had.

Finally after a very pleasant two hours I made comment that it really was time for me to depart.

At that point, my industry colleague tentatively suggested that I might want to do some work with him and his team.

Might I be interested?

I said yes.

Let us look to discuss the details going forward.

In this area of the world there is a standard, that causes amusement amongst the locals and fury amongst the foreigners:

If you are looking to build something, take whatever the quote is, both of time and of cost, and triple it and if ever you are trying to work with somebody anticipate at least three meetings before anything is signed.
It looks like we shall be honouring that local custom.