Life Lesson #20: In the name of the Mambo, the Rumba, and the Cha cha cha!

Fifteen or so years ago, if you were in a hotel in Taiwan, you could be pretty sure of two things:

One - the light bulbs were going to be no more than thirty watts;

Two - after about midnight, you could hear the systematic ringing of the telephones down the halls.

The reason for number one? The rooms were filthy. Even if the Taiwanese Board of Tourism awarded the hotel three stars, it would be no more than the equivalent of half of a star here. Apparently, the standards over there are not so high. Therefore, the rooms were gross. Dirty enough that the hotels wanted the lowest bulb wattage possible without making it impossible to see.

The explanation for number two? Hookers. The ladies of the street would gather in the hotel lobbies and call each room, one by one, until someone would invite them up for a quickie.

I learned these two intriguing Taiwanese bits of information from Mambo King (as in one of his favorite movies, a soundtrack he always plays at work, and a movie he let me borrow, vhs style), my sixty-five-or-so-year-old coworker who runs our shipping and logistics department, on our business trip to Southern California.

When I first learned I had to go on this four-day expedition to set up some product audit procedures at our warehouses, you could say I was nowhere near enthusiastic. But the moment I learned I would be going on this excursion with Mambo King, I was ecstatic. It’s hard to simply say why. I feel it is much easier to explain through a montage of Mambo-licious trivia.

MK sits next to me at work. Every morning, I come in to hear music blasting through his computer speakers (he has the crappiest hearing, second only to my dear Grandpa Al). Such musical gems: The Fame soundtrack; Alicia Keys’s debut album, Songs in A Minor, as well as her follow-up, The Diary of Alicia Keys; a Bette Midler compilation, I’m assuming her greatest hits (if you have the balls to call them that); The Phantom of the Opera soundtrack. On a good day, I’ll hear Fleetwood Mac’s The Dance (the live version from their 1997 reunion). Basically, you never know what you’re going to walk into. The only thing you can guarantee is that it will be painfully loud and played on repeat way beyond lunch time.

Mr. Mambo brings his wife of some twenty-plus years, Barb, to Chili’s Grill and Bar almost every weekend. He loves going there, particularly to liquor Barb up on giant frozen margaritas. I love that the Chili’s motto is “It's more than just the food that sets Chili's apart. It's the fun. The energy. The dining experience that lifts your spirits and leaves you thinking, ‘Let's do this again - soon!’” He met Barb at his card club (I’m guessing the bridge kind) when we was young and had a twenty-eight inch waste. I’m guessing its forty inches now.

The King always drinks Rusty Nails. They are made with four parts scotch whiskey and two parts Drambuie, with a twist. He always orders his with Chivas. He gets irate if they forget either the twist or the Chivas. He also gets loaded off of about two of these. I can usually tell exactly when he reaches the point of intoxication. He folds his arms over his forty inch waist, shakes his head when people are talking to him and says things like “How am I supposed to know that? No one tells me anything!” and “What can I say? I mother people to death.”

Which leads me to the next Mambo King bit of info. He mothers me to death (his phrase, not mine). At work, he always buys me coffee and when he thinks I’m not eating enough, he also will get me one of those disgustingly large and freakishly hard chocolate chip cookies that delis always keep next to the cash registers. He wouldn’t let me drive the rental car at any point during our trip, partly because I have a vagina and partly because of my age. He also couldn’t let me eat any meals by myself and refused to not order us dessert: ice cream, one scoop vanilla, one scoop chocolate, two spoons. I believe this is why the man has a forty inch waist.

Mambo Man wears those horrible water shoes. To the pool. Along with hideous flowered swim trunks and a white t-shirt with the Tasmanian Devil, aka Taz, and strewn papers coming out of the breast pocket, the phrase Whatta Ya Mean It’s Only Monday?! embroidered on it. He wears this regardless if it’s Monday or not.

His favorite television shows are Gilmore Girls, Bones and House. I have never watched an episode of any one of these programs, so I can’t really comment on them. I did, however, go to college with the Gilmore Girls chick, and this makes Mambo King very happy every time I tell him. So I do. Like, every day.

I used to think the Mambo Meister worked in the bell business. I didn’t really understand, but I thought, well, someone’s got to make bells. And there are all types of bells – the Christmas kind, the ones for your front door, the type so you can ring for your butler. I just learned he’s actually been saying the belt business all along. This is why he traveled to Asia at least two dozen times (I guess to visit factories and such). Hence he always has a story about international hookers.

Perry Cuomo and Frank Sinatra give the Mambinator much inner turmoil. He loves them both but has never been able to come to decision as to the better performer. He loves Perry’s cool, laid-back style. But Frank was a great entertainer, even on the days his voice was off. I really pissed Mambo King off when I said I like Dean Martin.

His Highness is a self-proclaimed movie junkie. He’s got movies in every form: DVD, VHS, Beta and some other crazy term he always throws around that means nothing to me (Maybe 8-Tracks? Although, I could have sworn that was music, but hey, what do I know.) He gives me one to watch every few days. I found one in particular most disturbing, for a few reasons. Because he’s my coworker, because he’s old and because of what it might imply in terms of what he thinks of me. The movie is Half Moon Street, a 1986 flick in which Sigourney Weaver plays a professor by day, prostitute by night. The back cover reads: When erotic fantasies become deadly nightmares. Where sex will make her rich…and love could get her killed. Throughout the picture, her character says some form of “girls like uncomplicated sex.” Amen, sister.

So, I got to spend four days with Mambo King. And overall, I was pleasantly amused the entire time. Even when I was stuck going out to dinner with his friends and must have looked like some trophy girlfriend to anyone else in the hotel restaurant, or when we almost died when he made a turn and got us stuck between a giant truck and those smaller pick-ups that drive behind them with the words WIDE LOAD written on the back (to prevent people from driving behind the wide load trucks).

Life Lesson #20: I can get along with the most bizarre people out there. Mambo King most certainly included. I actually enjoy all his idiosyncrasies (as well as most people that I come across).

Sure, at some points I want to kill the man. Like when I’m on a business call at work and Wind Beneath My Wings is blasting in the background. Or when we get lost in Chino, California, searching for a Dunkin Donuts that doesn’t exist. Or when I have to sit next to him poolside as if best friends, his swimmies securely on his feet and cup of decaf coffee resting on his forty inch waist.

But who else is going to teach me that it costs the equivalent of fifty bucks for some monkey business from a gorgeous Taiwanese woman who knows barely more than “Hi, my name is Swan, what can I get you tonight”? Not anyone I can think of.

And so here’s to you, Mambo King, and every little moment of joy you bring me. I hope you get your wife nice and toasted this weekend and are rewarded accordingly.

Free of charge, of course.