Same boat, same boat

An old friend of mine working at a foreign establishment in Yangon, came visiting the other day. He always has strange stories in the manner of Ripley’s Believe It or Not to tell whenever he comes to my humble abode of a residence.

As soon as we have exchanged the usual civilities, he said: “You know, all the workers at our office had to sign a piece of paper the other day”. He opened the conversation. Actually whenever we two meet he has always been the talker with me butting in now and then so that it won’t become a monologue.

“A piece of paper? What’s that?”, I had to butt in. His usage ‘piece of paper’ pointed to the degree of pent up emotions inside his small frame.

“Well, a sort of patch work of one-sided promises on the part of the signatory , so-called rules and regulations from nowhere , things like that”, my friend replied.

” You mean a work contract, right?”, I responded quickly.

“You can call it whatever you like, but I call it a piece of paper, and that’s putting it mildly”, his pent-up anger was resurfacing and showing the tip of the ice berg. ” Actually I don’t mind signing the paper, but I do mind about one point in the paper. It says that we can’t complain to the company on any matter whatsoever. That’s the point I’ve never heard of in any company”, my friend said.”Have you, and does that make sense?” he asked expecting an answer from me.

“Yes, it makes sense, to the company, not to you”, I replied.

“And have you come across such a rule? Have you ever signed such a paper?”, he asked.

“Same boat, same boat”, was my reply.

.”Hallelujah !” my dear friend exclaimed.