Ambiorix
I was in the historic town of Tongeren in Belgium for two and a half days of meetings. I was the first one to check into the hotel reserved for the participants. I went up to my third floor room, deposited my bags. I freshened up and explored the room. The main purpose of the exploration was to find the kettle and coffee things for the next morning. I looked everywhere but, no kettle. Hmmm. Things were not looking good.
I had to explore because many of these hotel rooms are designed artistically and many things, for example, the coffee things, are not easily visible. I found an iron, ironing board and what not. But, there were no kettle and coffee packets. In any case, I decided to explore the town – having explored it on Wikipedia already.
I came down to the reception and asked the young lady at the reception where the coffee things were, still certain that they were there and I had not found them. I was told that for the group booking the company had done, the coffee things were not included. I resigned myself to starting the day without coffee and was about to go out. I thought, “what do I lose if I ask for it? If I get it, it would be great. If not, status quo!”.
I went to the young lady and said. “Hi, I am an Indian. I am a south Indian. For us, the day does not even start without a cup of coffee. Is there any way I can have coffee, first thing in the morning?”
She laughed and said, “Let me see if I can give you one from another room!” We went to the third floor. She opened a few rooms and, hey presto! She gave me a tray with the kettle, coffee pouches, tea bags… the whole enchilada! I was set for the few days at the hotel!
I had a spring in my step when I explored the town.
Here is something for Asterix fans like me. This is the place that commemorates a Asterix-like character from history – Ambiorix!
The picture of Ambiorix is the copyright of ArtMechanic and is used here under the https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:GNU_Free_Documentation_License,_version_1.2GNU Free Documentation License Version 1.2
