I was in Dubai, representing my company in a multimillion-dollar pitch for certain technical services in an offshore development. We were subcontracting to a Jordanian company—more than ten times the size of the company I work for, but lacking the specialist expertise that has earned us our reputation. A Romanian business relation in my network, whom I’d had good sex with some years back, had recommended me to the Jordanian company. Good sex is not just good for the sex.
The potential client is a Saudi investor, with an office in Dubai. The project is off the Somalian Gulf of Aden coastline. The people from the Jordanian company I’m doing this with are from Lebanon, Egypt, and Morocco.
In the weeks leading up to the pitch, we had been preparing the content of a joint presentation in three online meetings. The partner would bring manpower and the civil grunt work; we, the specialist basic design, project engineering, and project delivery management.
Preparing the pitch had left me worried. The partner lacked a fundamental grasp of the technical complexities of the project.
“We’re clinching this!” I said at the end of our third video call—faking enthusiasm but showing what I thought was leadership.
On the flight to Dubai (Emirates, business) I watched an in-flight instruction video on customs and etiquette in Dubai, relying—as was repeated in a mantra-like fashion after each chapter—on “what our forefathers taught us.” Halfway into the video, I conked out. Revived shortly after by the sound of the next round of food being trolleyed down the aisle, I decided to watch a romantic movie instead.
While “edited for content,” it had many scenes and depicted all sorts of costume (or absence of) and technology (including for intimate care) that I supposed the forebears of living UAE people would have frowned upon—had they believed their eyes.
After the 9-hour flight, which saw time fast-forwarded by 4 hours, and two hours in a huge company car inching forward in Manhattan-style gridlocked traffic, I arrived at my hotel in the evening—the day before the day of the pitch.
Having had too much food on the plane, I didn’t sleep well. Shortly after midnight, local time, I played Wordle, sent the key of the win (TENOR, SOBER, HOVER) to my friend in New York five minutes later, then started Diffle, which I could not solve in the ensuing 15 minutes or so, and finally took up Squardle (the daily), which I didn’t finish because I fell asleep—with the first word found and (including bonus) seven guesses left.
The next morning, I sat down with the men from the Jordanian company on the executive floor of the hotel for a dry run of the pitch to the would-be client later that day. As they were struggling to set up the presentation on one of their laptops, I was wracking my brain for the solution to the Diffle game I’d abandoned the night before. I had used three guesses and 17 letters already, and I needed to minimize the damage to my average score (3.2 words, 23 letters, at a streak of 167 wins since I’d started playing).
I answered absentmindedly to their questions regarding my part of the slide deck, trusting I would just wing it—as is my habitus in business and private life alike—and then left the room to avoid being interrupted any worse while trying to solve the far more important open Diffle game.
“Urgent business back at the office,” I said.
I excel under pressure.
Damn—PLASMID! On third, 24 letters.
I hurried back to the room where I’d left my partners getting the presentation in working order. They appeared to be wrapping up.
“We merged your slides into the general format,” the Egyptian said (he was their PPT wizard), probably meaning they had thrown out every reference to my company, as if we were no more than a specialist department of theirs.
“We’ve sent the presentation to your mail.”
“Fine,” I said. “Let’s do this.”
After all, the worst-case scenario was not being awarded a contract. One gets used to that. I had already mentally gone over my in-flight entertainment and need-to shopping for the return flight the next day. A girl has to have her eyes out for what’s next. Being in the moment is not for our sex. It’s a breakdown waiting to happen.
The same company car that had taken me to the hotel the day before showed up to transport us to the office of the prospective client. Even with four passengers—one fat (the Lebanese guy)—it felt oversized.
We were welcomed by yet more nationalities, all male: Canadian, Norwegian, Yemenite. The men in the room started chitchatting in alternating couples or threesomes, like they were an all-male harem. After 15 minutes or so, we were seated, formal introductions were exchanged, and the Lebanese man (the fat guy), who was running point on the whole thing, started presenting.
He talked for about three-quarters of an hour. I tried to stay focused, but, having a hard time not to sink into a stupor, failed miserably.
“Dingenom, this is where I’d like to hand over to you.”
On hearing my name, I looked up at the central screen where our presentation was being shared.
—THE FUCK???
“Uh, can we stop sharing this on the big screen for just a minute?”
I opened the file that was in my mail and quickly flipped through the five slides at the end of the 51-slide deck. Texts I had inputted seemed to have been redistributed randomly over fancy oval and rectangular shapes, mysteriously interconnected with arrows and solid and dotted lines in multiple sizes and colours. Two slides had Photoshopped mock-ups of equipment and infrastructure I didn’t recognise as having any relation to the project—or, for that matter, anything I was aware existed in the real world.
Had I actually fallen asleep? Was I having a nightmare?
This was worse than Wordle, Diffle, and all game modes of Squardle combined. It was as if an AI had been meticulously prompted to go full rogue on my part of the presentation.
Okay,” I said. “Let’s get this back up on the big screen.
—I noticed there’s been a mix-up. The slide you’re looking at, and the next four or five or so, are from a different project—Gabon, offshore wind. Feasibility. Very early-stage. Very confidential.” (They might do some research on Gabon offshore wind development, of which I had personally no knowledge.)
Three nationalities of faces lit up across the room.
“We take a break,” the Norwegian said. They walked out of the room.
I feigned being engrossed in some urgent external communication to avoid interacting with the Jordanian partner.
The Saudi investor delegation returned less than five minutes later.
“We’ve decided not to give you the Somalia contract,” the Norwegian said. “But you must inform us about the Gabon project once you’ve cleared confidentiality.”
I stifled a sigh of relief.
“I can do that. I’ll circle back in a couple of weeks’ time.”
Ask Sales to look into the 30-year or so perspective for offshore wind off the Gabonese Atlantic coast. Use AI. There was bound to be something. Drop a line to the Saudis. Vague reference to Gabon government long-term offshore wind scenarios. A possible role for my company—analysis, feasibility. Nothing that the Saudi investor would be interested in being involved in at this point in time. Etc.
Don’t linger. Do not reflect. Inform the Romanian. Look him up. Revive the good times.
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Hard Nosed Women 