Lisa From (French) Hell

"I hate office politics!" Star complained over coffee yesterday.

"You're sleeping with your boss. You're basically monopolizing the ruling power. So what politics are you talking about?" Melanie replied.

"Mel, you're a hairdresser. Politics to you is if someone ate the cheesecake you put in the fridge at the pantry without your permission," Star snapped.

"I see Starsky is amongst us today," Steven smiled.

Two months ago, we came up with Star's alter ego name when she is suffering from an incurable bitchy streak caused by this thing called The PMS. So whenever the time of the month is about to come and she starts taking this thrash-talking, absolutely sensitive persona, we call her Starsky.

"What actually happened?" I asked.

"Well my company just employed this new HR executive called Lisa. She is not exactly new. She was based in France where my company HQ is at. When they said someone from the French office was going to be in the Singapore branch, I imagined it to be a French girl but it turns out that this Lisa is of the "asian persuasion" species who actually grew up in Bedok. The reason why she couldn't continue working in France was because there was something wrong with her work permit or visa or something so she had to relocate here again after two years. This Lisa is one of the most pretentious person I have ever met in my entire life, and that is putting it mildly," Star said, swallowing her saliva, appalled.

"I knew that was coming, continue!" Melanie said, munching on her banana walnut muffin.

"As a daily routine, she goes around the cubicles and babble away about Paris and France for hours and hours no end. For two whole weeks, every single day and it is so fucking annoying. I couldn't take it anymore so three weeks ago, my colleague Diane bought youtiao and beancurd for breakfast at work and offered her some and you know what she said? "My stomach has been conditioned for the past two years to eat something that is very little on fats, haha. Only butter croissants for me dear." So I said, "Butter has trans fat. Lots of it!" from across the partition," Star regaled.

Melanie and Steve grunted in amusement.

"So me being me, I bought for the entire office butter croissants from Starbucks the very next day and I offered her some. You know what this little fucker said? 'The croissants in Singapore are not half as good as the ones in France, so I'll give this a pass."" Star continued.

"Oh. My. God. The butter croissants in Starbucks are handmade in France!" Steven said, eyes wide open in disbelief.

"Exactly, so I said to her, "That's funny. The butter croissants from Starbucks are hand made in France, using French butter...that has French trans fat." You should have seen her face," Star said.

Steven raised his palms and Star gave him a high five.

"So from that day onwards, she basically and naturally hated my guts and tried to find faultss with me, passing unnecessary comments to whatever I do, with a smile of course. The last straw came last week when I was reading the final book from the Fifty Shades Of Grey trilogy and she saw it and said, verbatim, "I don't know why you're reading that thrash. Honestly, I find it desperate and cheap!"

Melanie gasped.

"So I said, "Well people buy desperate and cheap. This desperate and cheap thing sells, by the millions. That is a. And b, who asked for your opinion, honest or not and since when are you the benchmark for class?""

I raised my palm and Star gave me a high five.

"So you guys know what she did? She bought three thousand dollars worth of stationeries for "office supplies" according to her when we already have enough to last us for an entire year. The best part is, she went straight to the finance officer in our company with the reimbursement form claiming that she has given it to the accounts executive but she hasn't gotten back to her for one whole week, so she had to do it herself. guess who is the accounts executive?" Star asked, shaking her head.

"Bitch!" Melanie exclaimed.

"I so feel like I want to kick her pseudo French ass all the way back to Bedok. And you know what is the worst thing? This morning I received a company memo regarding the Christmas gift exchange programme for next month and guess who I am paired with for the gift exchange?" Star fumed.

"Get her a toilet bowl cleaner with a message, "You need this, for your mouth" or better, buy for her entire Fifty Shades of Grey Trilogy. That'll put her in her place," I recommended.

Star squinted her eyes at me and gave me a smile that said, "I'll buy both." I winked and sipped my coffee.