13 April 2008
It was still dark when we left from home at 4:30 AM. It was an unfair fight against sleep until we were halfway on our trip, to take our coffee break in a kind of truckers canteen. It was the only place open at that time of the day.
At that same moment, somewhere further up in the country, a certain customs officer decided to go to work really early this day, to open those suspicious boxes well before office hours.
Two hours later after we arrived at that same custom’s office at 8:30 AM, I could explode in anger again. Because … WHY did we drive to Auckland then???
But the customs officer was gone fishing (or whatever) and has assigned us with a shy young assistant. Arguing with the wrong person doesn’t make sense, isn’t it?
Instead of inspect in person if the paintings were repacked conscientiously (I was too demotivated to bear more surprises), we tugged the boxes on the roof rack of the car as quickly as possible and left to the centre of Auckland.
We took this chance to visit some showrooms of kitchen and bathrooms. Just before our trip to South-Africa we bought the house of our neighbour and since our return we are renovating that house, while we still living in our rental.
Late at night we were back home. Too tired to get those extremely heavy boxes off of the car roof. We saved that job for the next morning, so we could see the possible misery in the unrelenting sunlight.
Well, only 1 painting was irreparably ruined. What did I expect? Right over the middle of the canvas, where the back slat is running along the canvas, the paint seemed to be chipped off. Like if someone had sat on it.
Really, every day my job is more ‘inspiring’ …
