Friday, October 24, 2003

Today was a busy and productive day, ending with me talking with my general manager, who went to Yerevan the day I returned to Martuni and she got back tonight.

She briefed me on the latest news in terms of our bulldozer being rented out to cultivate a field for a new plantation and details on the chickens my dog ate in the last month.

The bulldozer story was quite simple and the only complication it had was the person renting it and they trying to lower the already low rental fee. In the end, the guy agreed to the standard terms and will not be shorting us 30,000 dram as he wished.

As for the chickens, I had instructed my general manager to replace all the stolen chickens with the owners choice of money or a replacement chicken. Sounds simple and for the most part, people opted for a chicken, all but one woman. That woman wanted frozen chickens and told my general manager that her chickens were quite large. My general manager took the woman's word and replaced 6 chickens. Later on she learned that this woman had not lost chickens to us and the only chicken she did loose, was a sick chicken, who died.

My general manager was very upset that this woman who I will call Annie (since that's really her name). Annie is a schoolteacher and now a also known in our neighborhood as being dishonest.

The whole neighborhood is upset about this woman taking advantage of me and confronted her about this act of dishonesty. Annie told her that I (Ara) help out many people, so she figures that I'm helping her out too and added that she will ask me for more chickens when I get back.

I'm not sure what to do, as now I have one of my Ara Manoogian moral dilemmas, as this woman is a schoolteacher and if she is a dishonest schoolteacher, what message does she send out to our children? Do we want such people teaching our children?

So now I have to decide what I will do. Do I ask this woman for the chickens back? Do I just drop the subject and let the community take care of her? As it is, she had ruined her name with the children of our neighborhood, who the minute I pulled up to my house the other day, they came running out to tell me that if Annie comes to tell me my dog killed her chicken, don't believe her. I don't yet know what to do, but I guess I will have to decide something soon.

Not that it means anything, but there is an interesting tie to the bulldozer and the chickens. The guy renting the bulldozer has a manager working for named Arthur, who owes me $150 from a couple of years ago and is the brother of Annie. I guess I should collect not only for the 6 chickens, but should also collect from her brother my $150.

Well I better get going, I cooked up a chicken to night and I want to eat some if it myself before my dog beats me to it.

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