Lanie

Last week all my colleagues and I received an email from our co-worker Jeff. A woman that he met once at an international conference was going to be in Hong Kong for two weeks while she applied for a China visa. Jeff and his wife were unable to host her and was wondering if any of us would be willing to give her a place to stay.

She was scheduled to arrive in four days.

I didn't repsond right away. I figured I'd wait until someone else had stepped up and then I would respond. That way I could get credit for being a generous guy, but we wouldn't have to actually host her.

By the time I finally replied 48 hous later, five of my colleague had already offered Laney a place to stay. She had a whole schedule worked out where she would be staying at each of their places for three days and three nights. I emailed her and said that if any of those offers fell through, she could use us as a back-up.

Man, I'm pretty good guy.

Lanie emailed me less than 24 hour later saying that the Loo's had to retract their offer because the air con in their spare room had just died. Shoot, we were on. Now I had to go tell my wife what I had done.

Man, I'm such an idiot.

It all worked out, though.

Laney was a delight. She's in her mid-twenties, born and raised in the Philippines, trained as a teacher, and had just taken a job at a school in China. She arrived in China on a tourist visa two weeks ago, but had to leave China now to apply for her work visa; thus, her two weeks stay in Hong Kong.