‘Facebook’

For a few days, a week, really, I have been away from the ‘Blog’ because of work.

There are times when our working life tends to take over from recreational pastimes and this was one of them.

I have two areas of work.

One is that I write stories that are for sale on ‘Amazon’ as e-books.

The other is that I wander around the country teaching people various things that I am instructed to do by my boss. My boss is a really nice guy – no, no! I am not saying that because he might read this. I am saying that because it is true.

I have no shame; if he was less than a nice fellow I should either say so or just not mention it.

The thing here is that I enjoy what I do. Sometimes it is excruciatingly exhausting because I am extremely old but it is, overall, enjoyable.

Why?

Because, as the old saying goes, if you enjoy what you do then you will never have to work another day in your life.

I like to write stories. There is much pleasure to be had in writing fiction. It is an area where you can let your mind stroll around the universe and fantasise about all manner of things large and small, probable and improbable.

Of course, there is labour involved. Grammar, punctuation, syntax and comprehension all have to be studied and ordered. Repetitive use of words has to be avoided and alliteration, as well as other grammatical foibles has to be minimised and only used, as appropriately, for effect.

Recently a young gentleman tried to tell me that both ‘effect’ and ‘affect’ might be used as a noun or a verb. Such is the power of suggestion and the Internet coupled with a poor education and a failure to use ‘Google’!

Writing is called ‘work’ but is, usually, a pleasure.

Teaching is the same. Writing courses requires greater precision than writing fiction by a very long chalk but it is still pleasure. While writing courses on various subjects it is an opportunity to learn. Every time I write a new course I find out something that I did not know beforehand.

Then there are the classes.

My job requires me to go to different places to teach different people. Some of those people I have known for many years, some are ex-students of mine from a long time ago.

Many participants in my courses are new to me and they mix in with people I have met, briefly, before and my long-term friends.

Thus these trips are a chance to meet up with good people. They are all good people.

I have yet to meet someone on these visits that is not a good person—whether they are participants in the classes or whether they are support staff or just going about their routine.

Some are local people, some are local people who are attached to a base away from home. A great many are expatriates from all over the World.

We have workers from France, Sweden, Australia, America, Canada, UK and other places that make our task here so much more interesting and brighter.

What does this have to do with ‘Facebook’, I hear you ask?

Ah, well.

I have a ‘Facebook’ page, as do so many other people. ‘Facebook’ is ubiquitous, is it not?

It is addictive. It is, therefore, time consuming. I like to set the timer on my telephone (one of these peculiar, small, hand-held devices that is named after a fruit!) to twenty minutes. When it ‘ping-pings’ I switch off ‘Facebook’ and do something else.

We have many friends on ‘Facebook’. Some time ago I wrote one of these ‘Blogs’ about one such person called Stephan Curry. A gifted young man whose path I observe with great interest.

Some of these friends engage in intelligent conversation. They come from all creeds, races and colours—not to mention Nationality.

They are interesting people. They have interesting ideas. Some of them I shamelessly feed from to write these ‘Blogs’!

Some are just figures in the mists. They appear from time to time but, mostly, they are in the background. They are there but not actively engaged.

Each to his or her own. Everybody enjoys the contacts in their own way.

Last week I was in Sabah. At Kota Kinabalu.

I have never been there before so this was an interesting experience.

Before leaving from my home base, it occurred to me that I know a couple of ‘Facebook’ people that live there, this could be an opportunity to actually meet!

No sooner said than done, a personal message winged its way across the sea to Insular Malaysia to the ‘Facebook’ friend. The message was received and a meeting was agreed.

What a wonderful surprise to meet these fellows. Both were bright, intelligent and enthusiastic. We had (I had, at least!) a great evening’s company with terrific food; we had barbecued fish, huge prawns and calamari.

These were people that I should never have known, much less met, were it not for this modern contrivance of the computer/’Facebook’ combination.

Such a huge pleasure.

So it is that my ‘work’ is more enjoyment than it is labour.

As a postscript to this story. When I reported for duty with my class the next morning they asked me how I had got on in their strange, to me, city? Did I eat anything last night? Where and what did I eat?

I told them about the two chaps I had met and with whom I had partaken dinner. There was, for a moment, a stunned silence and then there was uproar.

At first I was a little nonplussed and then it dawned on me that every one of the local people there knew the two that I had been with. It seems they are local celebrities!

Of course, they all wanted to know how it had come about that I knew these great men.

That’s easy, I said.

‘Facebook’.