Reach the top of the bridge
Black and Gray Motor Scooter With Black and White Star Print Half Face Helmet Photo by Lum3n Source:
The English version is tranlate by ChatGPT, I will fix it later.
“You really slow, you know?”
“Well, my bike is old, and it’s a bit of issue…”
“Why didn’t you say so?”
“Well…”
This happened during a certain occasion when I was working outside the store with my former manager. I can’t recall the specifics of the job or whether we were assisting in delivering board games to customers. What I do remember is that my motorcycle was moving at a snail’s pace. It was an old hand-me-down from my grandmother, and pushing it to exceed 50 kilometers per hour was a real challenge. On regular city bridges and steep slopes, it emitted a rumbling and sputtering noise from the exhaust pipe, trying its hardest to ascend the hill with its gas-guzzling effort, laboring on until it crossed the peak of the bridge.
At that moment, the former manager and I embarked on our journey back to the store. His motorcycle swiftly made its way, while mine sluggishly kept pace beside it on the road. I speculated that he might have presumed I had vanished, clueless about my whereabouts. Upon my arrival at the store, he suddenly inquired about what had happened earlier, with a slightly stern tone but an underlying concern in his voice.
The former manager, affectionately known as “Hou Hou,” was a somewhat plump individual, approximately a year or two older than me. He sported an unconventional youthful white hue of hair that didn’t match his age. His hairstyle featured elevated sides, with streaks of silver intertwined amid the black strands atop his head. His typical facial expression tended to be more serious, lacking a smile, which initially made me a tad apprehensive and unsure of how to interact with him. However, this demeanor didn’t extend to our board game sessions. When he smiled during those moments, it resonated deeply within.
I vividly recall that during that time, I was playing “One Night Werewolf” with Jingyu, a fellow part-time worker who was still with us. The two of us employed a medley of deceitful and bewildering facial expressions. I fell prey to their antics, not only receiving a valuable lesson but also acquiring a solid foundation in board games.
Hou Hou had a penchant for forthright speech, which contrasted considerably with my slightly scholarly and reserved disposition at the time. To be honest, I found it challenging to adapt. Nonetheless, his personality was better suited for engaging with customers. He consistently infused the store with an air of liveliness, a quality I admired but struggled to emulate at the time. I could only watch from the sidelines.
Having extolled his virtues at length, it’s only fair to delve into some less favorable aspects, which served as a mirror reflecting my own shortcomings. I had a proclivity for indecisiveness, often entangling myself in excessive rumination. The most vexing part was my difficulty in letting go of matters, leading me to expend copious amounts of time post facto incessantly pondering the correctness of my decisions. The surplus of contemplation gave rise to heightened anxiety, further exacerbating my sense of directionlessness.
Of course, such a personality trait wasn’t without its merits. When circumstances demanded correction due to unsatisfactory outcomes, the extensive premeditation often rendered me more efficient. In such instances, overthinking acted as the crucible, stoking the flames and providing me with the impetus to advance. Nevertheless, there were always endeavors that, due to their sheer scale, couldn’t be concluded within a short timeframe or left me without immediate results. During such periods, without the support of others, my most common recourse was surrender.
From my vantage point, Hou Hou’s decision to resign undoubtedly wasn’t precipitated by the undue stress of the job. It could have stemmed from dissatisfaction with the current milieu or a yearning to explore uncharted horizons to uncover additional possibilities. As for me, the freshly appointed successor, the dissonance between our respective personalities and Hou Hou’s formidable practical store management acumen led me to suspect that the job might be more intricate than initially presumed.
At that juncture, in an endeavor to bridge the perceived gap between me and the former manager, I channeled my efforts into a realm in which I held expertise—game studies. Naturally, this was one of the cornerstones of being a board game store employee: mastering the rules of board games, comprehending and internalizing the intricacies of their regulations, and ultimately shouldering the responsibility of elucidating these rules to others. Subsequently, through interaction with others, especially customers, I could identify inadequacies in my communication skills and strive to enhance the quality of my explanations. Ultimately, my aim was to succinctly articulate concepts, requiring only a few sentences or even a handful of words to ensure precise comprehension.
However, compared to my nascent days at the store, I was leagues away from attaining such an elevated level of proficiency. At that juncture, I was conversant with merely two board games. Confronted with the vast expanse of over a hundred games adorning the store’s shelves, achieving the benchmark I mentioned earlier seemed nigh impossible. For an entire month, Hou Hou provided me with rough guidance, during which I had to immerse myself entirely in the intricacies of game rules. During this period, Hou Hou seemingly recognized my progress in grasping game dynamics. However, he also perceived my interactions with others as somewhat awkward, if not outright inappropriate.
This awkwardness culminated in an incident that left a profound impression on me. At the time, during an internal store meeting, while I had already logged seven hours of work and still had to partake in the meeting until midnight, Hou Hou offered a suggestion to the shareholders. He proposed an earlier conclusion to the meeting, allowing us to return home sooner. To me, who was akin to a moon shining in the night sky, defiantly challenging the status quo, this was a display of heroism. This incident imparted a couple of valuable lessons. First, it underscored the importance of open communication within a team. Second, in the event that I would be tasked with guiding other part-time workers in the future, I aspired to
possess shoulders as broad as Hou Hou’s, capable of bearing the weight of social pressures.
And so, in light of our differing personalities, Hou Hou diligently delegated store responsibilities to me, ranging from warehousing and customer relationships to customer demographics and the goals of the shareholders, one task at a time. A month later, he entrusted me with the store’s keys, and as the winter break drew to a close, he bid adieu to the store. I, on the other hand, resembled the motorcycle gifted to me by my grandmother, gradually ascending the bridge, gazing upon Hou Hou as he ventured beyond the current horizon and toward the next.
To be continued…
Note 1: “One Night Werewolf” is a party and social deduction game where players accuse one another. The game is quick and lightweight, typically lasting only 2 to 3 minutes. For more details, you can refer to BGG.