Narratio

Another spring rolls around and I'm still squat in my construction office like a poisonous toad in an old tree. I'm at 4.5 years on this project with maybe another 2 years in sight. Which is weird considering we were supposed to have 'oil in' back in 2005, two years before I started. And that the majority of oil & gas projects are rolled up and done in 3 years. So the Kashagan project continues. We've entered commissioning so people are wandering around poking buttons and wondering where all the electricity is going because it's certainly not going to the pump / compressor / light fixtures... What can I say? Now all the little power politics (Preservation? Not my budget!) and doing things without getting approvals (I did it like this on my last project) are coming home to roost.
I must say that working for an Italian company has been an eye opener. Most of my working life has been with American outfits- Fluor, with a couple of stints with Bechtel & Kellogg/Brown & Root. So I'm used to a quieter more considered life. Here however everybody shouts, waves arms and screams "Catzo!", "Vafanculo!" "Che Catzo vuoi?" in loud voices. Very emotional, the Italians. But then they go and have dinner together. This, as a Brit', goes right up my spine. I can do nothing but take the screaming insults and accusations of stupidity personally. I can't even look at a person who's been denigrating me and my work, even when he signs my performance appraisals, initials off on a pay rise the next day and uses what I do to slam his managerial colleagues.
As a Brit married (24 years now) to a Thai and a world traveler, I thought I understood cultural differences. I've worked in dozens of countries, spent over a decade in the middle east, mixed with pretty much every nationality under the sun, learned and thought I understood most of the do's and don'ts of dealing with 'Others'. That was until I got on a job where another European culture outnumbered or overpowered everybody else. I've now realized that I was expecting my understanding and experiences to date, to insulate me. There was something inside me which said "Hey, the Italians are European, they're right next door, they play football, they have to be the same as me!" And it's here that I went wrong. Culturally, the inhabitants of the country virtually next door are just as different as the ones on the other side of the planet.
Of course the annoyance works the other way too. They get tetched at my lack of emotion in meetings as much as their screaming matches annoy the heck out of me. And so we get on in life. I like to think I spend my time solving problems they create. They like to think I’m just a stumbling block trying to slow them down. Both view points have equal validity I’m sure. It's a strange world, let nobody tell you different.