Journals of a Hotel Manager

Today we said farewell to Hans, our Swiss pastry chef, at the end of his contract. Sadly, an expatriate pastry chef at a difficult time such as now is an overt luxury in the eyes of the owner. Daily operation will not suffer, as his main objective has been to train the local staff. Professionally he has been doing an OK job but I wouldn’t lose sleep over having to let him go.

In addition, Hans is quite a burden on our budget. Nearly all of us are on a single status. It is easier and cheaper to transfer singles in and out in terms of air tickets, visa, shipment of belongings, and the write-off of living expenses in the hotel. Hans was at the level of a department head and he had arrived with a wife and a baby girl. Apart from the money we had spent on him just to get him and his dependents into the country legally, he didn’t know that his health insurance premium was also the highest at our hotel. Not to mention that we have been paying three tickets for him and his family to return to Switzerland on their annual vacation.

Without doubt being expensive on the books is not Hans’ fault. He was hired to do a job and at the time he seemed to be the right man.

Hans lived with us in one of the apartments designated for expatriates near the parking lot. His wife, an Indian woman, did not socialize with us. She did not work or join any volunteer work as many other expat wives did. She was mainly taking care of the little daughter. Besides all the services that the hotel provided for live-in expats, she had a maid, a cook, and a driver on staff in her apartment. One of the reasons that Hans did not fight to extend his contract was that his wife found life here “too difficult” therefore they were willing to leave and return to Switzerland.

I sincerely wish Hans and his wife well back in the real world, where they will have to pay for accommodation and utility bills. When a fuse burns or a light bulb goes out, they can no longer just pick up the phone and summon Engineering to come and fix it. They will no longer be able to draft a list of groceries then march into the cold kitchen where everything is counted, weighed and packed for pick up - at no charge. There will be no housekeeper everyday at the door with fresh sheets and towels and to scrub their home clean. Gone will be the days when they stuff dirty laundry into a pillow case and fresh laundry appears miraculously the day after all starched, folded, and scented with lavender water.

Above all, I hope Hans’ wife will get used to a life without a maid, a cook and a driver at her disposal as I am pretty sure any of these jobs in Switzerland commands a salary as much as her husband can bring home. If life as an expat is “too difficult”, I dare not imagine what real life will be for her.

As for me, I know life as an expat is unreal. That’s why I look at this period as an adventure in Wonderland, because someday I will wake up and find myself having to make my own bed again.