T to the I to the C

I overheard a very amusing Xiamen anecdote recently:

So, I had this real TIC moment today. I was in the warehouse, [story about a certain brand I shall not name that sent goods and some were damaged and had to be sent back, so our conversationalist and the boss were in the warehouse to determine exactly how many were beyond hope] and the first product out of the ’salvageable’ box was totally unusable. We asked the person in charge how this product ended up in the ’salvageable’ box, and he said [let's call her] Jane had been overseeing the quality check. Now, that’s not right because Jane has no experience in QC, and I know she wouldn’t do something like that. I called Jane and asked her to come to the warehouse. When Jane got there, I told Jane what he’d said and she blew a gasket at him. That’s when he backpedalled with, No, I didn’t say Jane, I said it was [let's call her] Susie. Aside from my hearing him very clearly accusing Jane behind her back, I know for a fact that Susie wasn’t even there when they were doing the quality inspection.

That, my friends, is one big problem with Chinese (Asian?) culture. When something negative happens, what was (for example) a group project is suddenly no one’s responsibility — No, it wasn’t my job, it was their job. No it’s not my job, it’s the other person’s job. Naturally, no one should be taking the fall for something they didn’t do or be doing everything in their office / factory with no focus, but it’s so goddamn frustrating when people pass the buck so frantically. It pisses me off even more when these lazy bastards are confronted with a paper trail that leads right to their desk, they either reflexively deny all knowledge, or they give you this nervous ‘Uh hehe’ and clam up.

I fucking hate that.

(And then there’s the situation when someone messes up and proceeds to do what they can to sort it out, and is rewarded for their honesty by being singled out for public vilification. What the fuck is up with that?)

• 3 Jun 2005