(I am about seven or eight and fighting with my mum over something. She’s telling me to do something, but has no better reason than, “because I say so.” I don’t know the word for “child abuse” in Vietnamese, but I have been reading a lot of books, including a Vietnamese translation of “Romance of the Three Kingdoms,” a quasi-historical account of one of the bloodiest civil wars in Chinese history.)

Mum: “You’re getting a beating if you don’t behave! You are being rude and disrespectful!”

Me: *using terminology that is more suitable for a military setting* “Well, you are abusing your position as my superior!”

Mum: *stunned*

(Never one to waste an opportunity, I took advantage of my mum’s shocked silence and skipped away to another part of the house before she could say anything. Somehow, I successfully weaseled my way out of a beating that day. Sadly, it didn’t work the second time I tried it.)

(A customer wants to buy a couple of pieces of fabric she’s found in our remnant bin. Remnants are supposed to half the price, but seeing as there’s a half-price sale on, I give her a further discount.)

Me: “You can have that piece for $3.”

Customer: “How much?”

Me: “$3.”

Customer: *questioning* “$3?”

Me: “Yes, $3.”

Customer: “How much?”

Me: “Three. Dollars.”

Customer: “That fabric’s usually $6.”

Me: “No, it’s $12.99 usually.”

Customer: “How much?”

Me: “Full price is $12.99.”

Customer: “No, how much do I get it for?”

Me: “$3, which is less than you should be paying for this length.”

Customer: “$3?”

Me: “Yes, $3.”

Customer: “How much was it?”

Next Customer: “$12.99; she’s already told you.”

Customer: “Oh… So, how much for that piece?”

(She hands me another fabric that is over-sized to be a remnant. I haven’t seen this fabric before; it’s a new one.)

Me: *after looking at the fabric* “This is soiled; you can have it for $3, as well.”

Customer: “Soiled?”

Me: “It’s got dirty marks on it.”

(She then stands for a couple of minutes, looking at the mark over and over.)

Customer: “Okay, I’ll take it. How much?”

Me: “$3; $6 for both”

Customer: “$6?”

Me: “YES, SIX!”

(She finally paid. She does this every time, trying to get extra discounts.)

(For weeks, a woman that I work with has been excitedly telling me that her little niece from another state is coming to stay with her for a few days. For the record, this coworker is in her mid-thirties, married but childless, and she is always talking about her little niece.)

Coworker: “You’ll meet my little niece today; [Husband] is dropping her off on his way to work so she won’t be at home alone.”

Me: “Oh, that’ll be nice”

Coworker: “Yes, it’ll be so cute! She’s going to help out here, but I am a bit worried about what I am going to tell [Husband’s Sister] about what she did last night.”

Me: “Oh?”

Coworker: “Yes. She decided she wanted to see [Major City], so we took her there, but she also wanted to go and see [Notorious Part of the City].”

(That area used to be well-known for having brothels, but has cleaned up over the last ten years and become a respectable location.)

Me: “Oh, that area’s not so bad now.”

Coworker: “But I still have to tell her mother, and I know she wouldn’t be allowed to do that sort of thing at home. It’s her first time away from home.”

(About half an hour later, I see my coworker talking to a woman.)

Coworker: “Oh, [My Name], my little niece is here. Come and meet her.”

(I look around for a child.)

Woman: *looking embarrassed* “Oh, come on, [Coworker]. When are you ever going to stop calling me that? I’m five years younger than you!”

Coworker: “But you were little when I first met you!”

Woman: “No, I wasn’t; I was fifteen.”

(It’s around the end of my shift when a customer approaches my coworker with his books. I’m not part of the conversation, but I overhear everything.)

Customer: “Discount.”

Coworker: *blinks, but scans books silently*

Customer: “Discount.”

Coworker: “Um…”

Customer: “Discount!”

Coworker: “I’m sorry, I don’t know—”

Customer: “Discount! For buying so many books. I should get a discount.”

(Everyone looks at his purchase. He only has three books.)

Coworker: “Sadly, no.”

Related:
Don’t Discount The Customer’s Ability To Discount, Part 8
Don’t Discount The Customer’s Ability To Discount, Part 7
Don’t Discount The Customer’s Ability To Discount, Part 6

(My mother and I are staying at a hotel. It’s around three am and I am woken by an alarm in the room. It sounds like a clock alarm. It’s not my phone, so I go over to my mother’s bed and look for her phone.)

Mum: *wakes to me trying to locate her phone in the dark* “Wha… What’s that noise?”

Me: “I think it’s a phone alarm. Is it yours?”

Mum: “I don’t use the alarm. What is it? Turn it off; it’s annoying.”

(She rolls back over to go to sleep. I unplug the hotel alarm clock, but the noise continues. I move towards the window and I hear another sound coming from outside, this one sounds like a fire alarm a little way off. Opening our door, I notice a fire door has closed across the hallway.)

Me: “S***! Mum, get up! It’s a fire alarm!”

(We head out into the hall to find [Friend #1] standing there, looking dazed. Other friends are still in their room. We knock on one of their doors, and they answer right away.)

Friend #2: “Hey, what’s up? Hey, [Friend #3], the noise is out here, too. What’s going on?”

Me: “It’s a fire alarm.”

Friend #2: “What? We thought it was an alarm clock. We’ve been searching the room trying to find it for the last five minutes.”

(Another group of friends had slept through it and only woke to our banging on their door. We made it down the fire escape. Thankfully, it was a false alarm — some kids had set off a fire extinguisher on another floor — but it would have been nice to have something more defined as a fire alarm, rather than something that sounded like an annoying alarm clock. I wonder how many people wouldn’t have made it out of that hotel if there really had been a fire.)