Letters From Omar

Good morrow to thee! Seems to be a bizarre week as I'm scheduled to work the day shift. While I typically enjoy the night shift because I'll often not have a single customer, there is something to be said about the 10-4 work day that benefits me. For one, when I get off of work there are shops that remain open. The other benefit, and truly the most important one, is the opportunity to write letters for my bosses while at work. Yes, brilliance. If you've been keeping up with my writings or myself since August 19th, 2006, you'll know that the camera store has been my primary source of income and at this job I have a particularly eccentric employer. I say this because while he's a great guy who'll help you out if you need it, he's also sort of like a mob boss. In other words, don't cross him. If he does you a favor, he eats your soul. But while he may own your (my) soul there are ways to maintain some semblance of humanity after enslavement. I take advantage of the language barrier. My boss comes from Kuwait and learned English as a second (possibly third, fourth or fifth) language. Because his grasp on the English language is not up to par with a Comparative Literature soon-to-be graduate like myself, he comes to me for the processing and production of memos, letters to friends, letters to other businesses, letters to news programs looking for publicity, angry letters to his enemies, etc. Phone calls are sometimes involved, which prove to be quite annoying, but seldom enter the picture. My boss chooses to dictate his letters telling me to "make it sound nice." Yesterday I had the opportunity to write not one, not two, but three letters, one of which was an angry letter to an enemy, and one was a letter to themselves from someone else. Yes friends, yours truly is opening up a new segment in order to dive into the mind of a Kuwaiti businessman with an English scribe. I don't want to overdo it, so I'll try not to post more than one letter when doing this whole thing, but know that there are better ones than today's selection. Today's letter is the angry letter to the enemy regarding a leak in my boss's restaurant's roof. Friends, welcome to "Letters From Omar."

22 December 2008

To: ________
From: Omar _______
RE: Leaking Roof

Dear Mr. ________,

Over the past two months I have been contacting you concerning a leak in my restaurant’s roof. At the time of original contact, the leak was small and not much of an issue. You informed me that you would send a roofer to fix the leak and assess the situation. I was notified that at the beginning the process would be simple, cheap, and fast, but because you and your employees have sat on their hands, the devastation to our establishment has gotten worse, especially with the frequency of the rain in these winter months. Since the time your employees first inspected the roof, neither you nor your employees have fixed the problem and it has gotten much worse. It has become a fire hazard, one of my employees has slipped and broken a bone due to the water that has collected from the leak and am now paying workers comp. The water has also leaked into the freezer, causing a build-up of frozen spillage in our freezer. The conditions are getting worse and we have seen no effort from your people to fix the problem that began two months ago. Not only I, but also my employees are fed up and the leak has forced us to shut down operations in the kitchen, and if it spreads, the entire restaurant will have to close. If you are not willing to do your job and fix the problem correctly, I will do it myself or call a roofing company and send you the bill including all of the damages amassed since you chose to sign on to this frightful display of a repair job. We’ve had to close the restaurant due to safety issues and are losing money every day we are closed. Please, let me know what your plan is to solve this problem. The rain has been damaging enough and your cooperation would be greatly appreciated. You may reach me on my cell-phone at _________.

Sincerely,

Omar _______

I've obviously left out some names and numbers in order to protect some folks' privacy, but as you can see, while Omar wanted the letter to come out as a bold statement of his anger and frustration with this roofing company that has most certainly swindled him, it comes off as a desperate attempt to gain sympathy from this swindler of restaurants. I attempted to make the letter somewhat coherent, but also somewhat juvenile with the redundant sentences and the overuse of the same phrases, nouns and verbs. But don't get me wrong, while I certainly emphasized the redundancies and the desperation, it was not me, but Omar who demanded I entered some of these things and I will not disappoint. To be honest, some of the things he wants me to write need no editing at all. Example: I'm watching you ALL THE TIME. I'll leave it at that. Look forward to more editions of "Letters From Omar."