My name is "Mobi"; I'm an alcoholic

Today, I have been sober for 61 days.

MOBI’S STORY – (PART 16)

THE INSURANCE YEARS (CONTINUED)

During my last two to three years at my job as ‘No. 2’ to one of the fastest growing international insurers/re-insurers in the City, we continued to make a number of significant acquisitions, both within the UK, in Western Europe, and in Central and Eastern Europe.

In addition were fast making a name for ourselves in the USA, where our trading encompassed   reinsurance as well as general insurance business, which we were able to transact following all that painstaking work carried out some years back in getting the necessary regulatory approvals as a foreign insurer in a majority of US states.

In fact our reinsurance arm extended truly world wide, and we traded in Japan, South East Asia, Africa, Australasia and the Caribbean, amongst others, and our senior underwriters regularly travelled the world to cement and further develop our trading relationships.

Our reputation in the London Market was of a growing, aggressive, influential and innovative insurance player that was able to compete with the truly big boys of insurance and sometimes come out on top.

But critical to obtaining a larger slice of the best international business was to have a first class credit rating, and without the coveted triple A rating, it was impossible to obtain access to the largest and most lucrative business. I worked tirelessly to this end to convince the rating agencies, principally ‘Standard and Poor’s’, that we justified the top rating, and as with everything else in my insurance career, I ultimately succeeded. This meant that at last we could truly compete, and did not have to rely on the crumbs and the ‘second class’ business that the big players would deign to let us scrap for.

So we went from strength to strength, and finally, we were in a position to go for the “big one”.

We were always in the process of trying to identify potential takeover targets, and in fact I had several staff  dedicated to “Mergers and Acquisitions” on a full time basis. Their work included analyzing company’s balance sheets, financial results, track records etc, to see if there may be any ‘bargains’ out there. We had recently acquired a significant UK general insurer that had branches throughout the UK,with a  Head office in no less a prestige location than Buckingham palace Road, and we were now looking for something significant within the Lloyds Market to “balance” our two trading arms.

We were already active in Lloyds, having earlier acquired a notable marine syndicate, and following this, we started a couple of new syndicates of own, but in the grand scheme of things we were still a relatively small player in that market.

So with our arrogant and aggressive attitude, we dared to suggest to our masters in head office that we should look seriously at a UK company that was not only one of the largest players in the Lloyds market, but was in fact larger in terms of revenue, than our entire current  European operation put together.

We were fortunate in having a very ambitious ally on the main board, but while he was also excited by the possibilities that this acquisition may create, he was far more cautious in his approach to potential acquisitions than we wanted to be. Up to that time, all our acquisitions had been of the ‘friendly’ type. Our policy was not to pursue hostile, public take-overs, and even when some of  the friendly ones subsequently became  acrimonious, they had  ultimately been agreed and sanctioned by the owners and lawyers of both parties, always in private and often with the assistance of  firms of city merchant bankers who brokered the deals.

But this would be very different animal, as for starters the target was a publicly listed company on the London Stock market, and in fact was one of the leading listed shares in the insurance sector.

The fact that it was publicly listed did not necessarily deter us, and after we retained a leading firm of City bankers to advise us, we opted to make an informal approach the company’s CEO to see if they would be interested in entering into preliminary discussions with a view to us making a ‘friendly’ take over offer.

But this company was as British as you can get, and was run by members of the Lloyds’ establishment (which as far as I could see was also a ‘branch’ of the British aristocracy), and there was no way in the world they would even consider talking to foreign ‘upstarts’, such as ourselves.

This became the opening salvo in a prolonged battle. We retreated wounded, but not defeated. Over the coming months, we tracked their share price as it gradually fell in value, due to a  downturn in the insurance cycle, and we carried out extensive research into the target’s businesses and drew up a list of their key institutional shareholders.

Our actuaries and accountants produced detailed spread sheets, re-ran the numbers for  every imaginable scenario and as time passed we  became more and more convinced that the target’s share price represented excellent value, and with the synergies we could expect following a merger of the two businesses, it would constitute an excellent deal for our company.

Detailed representations were made to our board, and following their approval, our company made a formal, public take over offer for the company which immediately became hostile – the first such one in our company’s history.

The board of the target company were livid, and wasted no time in rejecting our offer outright, and did their best to belittle us in the press and accuse us of being naïve ‘boys’ in a man’s market, and dismiss our offer as too paltry to be worthy of serious consideration. The more acrimonious the take over battle became, the more determined we became  to succeed.

It raged back and forth for months, with our officers carefully following the onerous rules of the stock exchange in respect of public take over offers, and after several minor upward adjustments to our original ‘offer” price, we submitted our final and irrevocable offer. At this point, we already knew that a large block of shares, belonging to institutions, were supporting our bid.

In the end, the target’s board realised that they had been out maneuvered and conceded  that the game was up. We had won and the board was humiliated, (they knew they would all lose their jobs), and somewhat reluctantly recommended to their shareholders that they accept our final offer.

On the day that they admitted defeat, our name was in the headlines throughout the British press, not only in the financial pages, but even on the front pages of the Broadsheets such as the “Times”, “Guardian” and “Daily Telegraph”. This was a significant financial acquisition, by any standards. In one fell swoop, we had doubled the size of our European operations, and had  added something approaching another 30% to the size of our overall group.

Our celebrations knew no bounds, and I couldn’t even begin to tell you how many dozens of bottles of Bollinger were drunk in the wine bars of London over the next few days. We relished our famous victory over the entrenched insurance ‘establishment’ and we spent many drunken hours planning how we would merge and manage our new ‘empire.

But my dreams and celebrations were relatively short lived.

During the past year my drinking had steadily increased, and my health had steadily deteriorated – probably in direct  proportion to the increasing amount of alcohol I was consuming.

I had been diagnosed as a ‘type two’ diabetic back in the early eighties, which within a few years had degenerated to the point where I had to take regular insulin shots. For years now, I had been injecting myself four times a day.

Then I started to have regular pains in my chest and my left arm, and the heart specialists told me I had angina and very high blood pressure. I underwent a series of angiograms (whereby they ran a micro camera inside my artery to assess any artery hardening and blockages.) The results were that my artery had a 40% blockage but was not bad enough to justify surgery – yet.  I was given a host of drugs to take: beta blockers to slow down my heart rate, statins to reduce my cholesterol level, aspirin to thin my blood and others to reduce my blood pressure.

Then I was diagnosed with glaucoma which had to be controlled with daily eye drops, and finally I was told I had an enlarged prostate which is also had to be controlled by yet more drugs.

On top of that I had a problem at the neck of my bladder which would require surgery.

I was fast becoming a ‘drug junkie’ and a potential walking heart attack.

At around the time we were finalizing our major take over plans for the Lloyd’s company, I had a ‘heart to heart’ (no pun intended) with my cardiologist and my endocrinologist to discuss my various ailments and their prognosis for my future well being. They both told me the same thing. If I carried on with my present high pressure life style – stress, alcohol, insufficient sleep, unhealthy meals, extensive travelling, etc – then I may well be dead within 5 years.

I first discussed this with my wife, who had been urging me to slow down for years, and then my boss. The result of all this was that my boss approached the main board with a proposal that the company should offer me early retirement with a generous retirement package. My boss contended that the company was certainly culpable in the alarming deterioration of my health, and after all I had done for them, the very least they could do was look after me in my current state of ill health.

However, the subject conveniently  disappeared from the agenda, and as ever I became immersed in my work,  particularly  with this latest and greatest city take-over on the agenda.

But my wife hadn’t forgotten, and about the time that I was planning my new and exciting role in the soon to be enlarged London entity, I was asked by my boss to undertake a series of medicals with company appointed doctors, which resulted in their concurrence with my own specialists’ earlier conclusions – that if I don’t stop work, I wouldn’t live to enjoy my retirement.

The retirement offer was finally on the table, and it was a good, very fair offer.

I didn’t want to take it. I had no idea what I would do if I stopped working. One way or another I had been working since I was barely sixteen years old, and in spite of my alcoholism, I was an undoubted workaholic. I was addicted to alcohol, and I was addicted to work – my two, life threatening cravings.

In spite of my misgivings, I was ‘between rock and a hard place’, and following some discussion with my young boss, it was agreed that I would take early retirement on 1^st July, 2000, just a few weeks after my 54^th birthday, and barely a few weeks following the successful completion of my biggest and most ambitious work project: the take over of the Lloyd’s operation.

Sadly, I would no longer be there to manage the bedding in of our latest acquisition, to determine who would stay and who would go, what offices would be close or merged and all the other myriad tasks that I reveled in, following a major take over.

What would I do? Where would I go? I would never have any money problems, but for me, at that moment in time, I didn’t care about money. I cared about my future life, and I especially feared for my life of idleness with my wife of over 20 years, who I knew would make things very difficult, now she finally had me to herself.

They put on a farewell party to top all farewell parties. It was an incredible ‘do’ and my wife and daughters were also invited. There was an incredible turn out of staff from all over the UK, many from our overseas offices, and even a number of friends, business colleagues, and other people who I had known (or had known me), in the insurance market. Even the Company lawyers and audit partners came along to wish me well.

As you can imagine, I got very drunk.

That night wasn’t intended to be a total conclusion to my associations with the company or the London insurance market. I was to be retained on the boards of the various companies as a non- executive Director, and in a general way, it was expected that I would make regular visits to the city to have ‘liquid lunches’ with my former boss and other former business colleagues, ‘shoot the shit’ and generally remain in the background as an informal adviser. This would be therapeutic for me, as it would ease my transition into retirement, and also should provide some benefit for the company, as after all my years there, I should have at least a small amount of valued advice to impart.

Unfortunately, it didn’t work out that way.

In the next and final installment of the “Insurance years” I will tell you what happened, as in a way, it had a much greater emotional effect on me than the retirement itself.

Today I have been sober for 60 days.

Yes, I know – yet another unplanned “blog break”.

I am truly sorry, and apologise to all those who have been concerned about my welfare,

First and foremost, I have not been attacked by my wife, my health is as good as can be expected, and I have not taken a drink.

By way of explanation, let me say that when I first moved into my new home, I was, without doubt, “Happy, Joyous and Free”. However, as the days went by, I struggled to get the place properly sorted, and in general terms, reality set in and I started to realise the enormity of what I had done.

As a result, I became very lethargic and depressed. I didn’t take a drink, and I continued to attend the morning AA meetings, but I had great difficulty in sleeping for long periods (which I still do), and found it quite difficult to become motivated and get through the day and do all the things that needed to be done.

That was five days ago. Slowly, my mental state has improved and today, for the first time in quite a while, I have really wanted to write my blog.  (Even when I blogged five days ago, I had to force myself very hard to write anything.)

I have mentioned several times that this is by no means the first time that I have attempted to leave my wife, and on the last occasion I was away for almost three months, so in that context this is still very early days. However, on the previous occasions, I hadn’t planned properly; I had nowhere to live and ended up getting very depressed in hotel rooms across South East Asia, which also led me to start drinking again. And once I started drinking, it was really all over – just a matter of time before I returned to the unhappy family fold.

So in spite of the slight depressive set back, I am hanging in and I know that this time in my heart of hearts that I will never go back, no matter what may happen, no matter what she may do or say or promise. It is truly over and I am merely adjusting to my new life and going through the withdrawal symptoms of a sad, broken marriage that is finally at and end.

I cannot be sure that I will not sink into further and worse depressions, and if that happens, it is probable that my blog will dry up again, but within reason I will renew my efforts to keep it going. Even if I cannot write a decent day’s narrative, I will at least write a few lines so that you know I am still alive and kicking.

I have not been completely idle during the past 5 days, and my new home is now about 95% sorted. It could probably have all been done days ago, but better late than never – and in any case – what’s the hurry?

All my personal stuff is unpacked and put away, and although the place is very tastefully furnished, I have had to buy a couple of extra pieces of furniture for my bedroom to put everything in. I think I will still need to buy a small filing cabinet, as at the moment all my files have been stuffed in the wardrobe. I have also purchased a number of other things for the home, and I think I am now pretty much there.

I finally had my ADSL connected by TOT, and while it leaves something to be desired (I ordered a 2 Mpbs connection – the maximum they said I could have where I lived –  but am only getting speeds of around 0.650 Mpbs), it is better than my sim ‘air card’ connection that I had been previously using.

I have resolved to do my own housekeeping, as I hate the thought of a maid invading my private space. This is the first time for years that I have done anything like this, but as the place is small, and I am the only one in it, the task is not too arduous. I have found a good, inexpensive laundry that washes and irons my clothes, and I have even started to do a bit of home cooking.

On the spiritual front, I have recently shared at AA meetings,  that since I left my wife, my ‘Higher Power’, or God, seems to have ‘gone out the window’. I have stopped thinking about spiritual matters, have stopped praying and some of my worst character defects, like anger, have started to reappear. This is bad, but at least I am aware of it, and as things start to settle, I will renew my efforts to get back to where I was. I still haven’t started the fourth step work in the AA programme, and must do so very soon.

I don’t believe I have mentioned that I now have a new AA sponsor – my third in as many months. This man, I shall call him Jack, is a very dear, elderly American, who has lived in Pattaya for many years, is one of the founder members of the Pattaya morning group, and is the most “Happy, Joyous and Free” alcoholic that I have so far had the pleasure of meeting. I hesitated to ask him if he would consider being my sponsor, as who would take on an ornery person such as myself with such a dubious track record? Fortunately, he solved the problem by volunteering. I don’t think he knows what he’s getting into. Anyway, Jack has a much more ‘laid back’ approach to sponsorship than my previous sponsor, and he has made it clear that I can work the programme at my own pace, and he is not about to try and control my life.

On most days, Jack invites everyone to  join him for a coffee at a local Starbucks after the meeting and a few of the regulars invariably accept his offer. I had studiously avoided this gathering, as I am loath to take on new friends, and it all seemed a tad too ‘American’, for this limey to take on board. But I started to realise that most of these guys were really the ‘good guys’ and they genuinely wanted to help, so I have belatedly fallen in line, and have slipped into the habit of adjourning to Starbucks for the obligatory “Americano -Tall” and ‘shooting the shit’ for half an hour or so, at the close of the morning meeting.

Also since I moved, I have had to take care of my sick friend, Dave, from Bangkok who asked me to help him renew his retirement visa. I will not go into details, but for one reason or another he couldn’t get this done at Bangkok immigration, and all his  close, Bangkok friends,  failed to come up with the goods. So the only alternative was to bring him down to Pattaya.

You may recall that Dave has recently been very ill, in fact at the point of death, due to a ruptured liver, brought on by his chronic alcoholism. Well since he was discharged from hospital, he has made steady progress, but is still quite weak, still in a lot of pain and has chronic diarrhea, the cause of which the doctors have so far failed to identify. (Although I strongly suspect it is due to his damaged liver and maybe they don’t want to tell him).

So last Wednesday I drove to Bangkok and picked him up and brought him down to Pattaya and put him in a room. He was scheduled to stay for two nights, but the following morning I found him in a lot of  pain and his general condition seemed to have deteriorated. It was therefor decided that I should  take him straight back to Bangkok. Fortunately, I  had made all the essential arrangements for his visa, and I was able to pick his passport up later when it was finally issued.

Dave was deposited back home and took a couple of days to ‘recover’ from the trauma of his journey, and then he went back to hospital for a check up, and was told that they wanted to carry out a colonoscopy as they feared he had cancer.

Today Dave had the colonoscopy, and the initial results indicate that although they removed three polyps (which will be checked to see if they are benign), there is no evidence of cancer. That’s the good news, but the bad news is that the cause of his diarrhea remains undiagnosed, and as I said above, I suspect it may be his liver. But I shouldn’t jump the gun on this.

Having Dave down here, and having a lot of time to talk to him, made me realise that his life is now starting to wind down, and I wondered whether either of us would need to worry about his visa this time next year. I think Dave’s situation, on top of my own, contributed to my depression. He has been my friend for 36 years, and in spite of many ups and downs, he has been a good and dear mate. I would miss him horrendously if something were to happen to him.

Dave is just one of life’s unfortunates. – a truly gifted and artistic person who couldn’t come to terms with the modern world, and ultimately never really succeeded at anything.

I will try to offer a prayer for his recovery today.

I am aware that I have been rambling a bit  – trying to explain, up date and get a few things off my chest all in one fell swoop.

I don’t know if I have succeeded on any of the counts, but I’ll shut up for now.

I know many of you wish to follow Mobi’s Story, and I will do my utmost to get back to that subject tomorrow  – provided the world doesn’t fall in, or the wife doesn’t find me and ‘take out a contract’…..

Today I have been sober for 55 days.

Once again I have to apologise for my prolonged absence, but as I you can probably imagine, I have been a mite preoccupied with “affairs of the heart”, and other nonsense.

You will recall that my wife had advised me she was planning to take her family home on Friday, 16^th.  I asked her how long she planned to be away, and she replied: “Two to three nights”.

Although I was delighted at this piece of good news, I also “smelt a rat” as it was totally unnecessary for her to stay at her mother’s in the village for 2 – 3 days. As a rule, she never stayed there for more than one night, except for a week ago when she ‘allegedly’ stayed for one week!

I ‘innocently’ asked her, if she was really planning to stay there for 3 days?  She thought for moment, and realised that I might call her mother to see if she was there (as I had done on the previous occasion), so she changed her story slightly by telling me that she would stay with her elder half sister who lives in a shack in Sa Kaeo town.

“You know,” she said, “the one who you don’t like who is rude, gets drunk and talks too much!”

Well, after all this time, I think I know when she is being economical with the truth, and I can say with certainty that there is no way she would dream of staying with that sister in her place for one hour, let alone 2 – 3 nights.

Anyway it was academic. She was doing exactly what I had expected and what I had hoped she would do – go away for a few days after spending a week at home; no doubt going  back to whatever she is up to in Bangkok, with whoever she is up to it with.

So Friday morning I started to pack surreptitiously. It was important that the houseboy didn’t twig what I was up to, and as my office is open to the rest of the house, I had to be very careful. I also couldn’t do any packing in my bedroom as the maid would go there every day to clean up and make the beds etc.

In the afternoon I gave the houseboy some money to buy some whisky. By 11 p.m. he was drunk and fell asleep, and I was able to continue my packing without interruption.

However I soon realised that I was getting too tired to finish everything that night, and in any event there wouldn’t be enough room in the car for all the stuff I planned to take and as the wife would be away for several days there was no real rush.

So I packed half a car load, carefully loaded it up when no one was around, and delivered it to my condo that night.

The next day (Saturday) was the big day, and I started to pack in earnest. Once the maid had finished in the bedroom, I went upstairs, locked the door and packed all my stuff except the clothes on hangers that I wanted to take from there. I kept the door locked, and went back down to my office and packed as much as I could without making it too obvious what I was up to. But there was a limit to what I could do without anyone seeing me, especially as I wanted to take a few things from the kitchen and store room to my new home.

So when I had done as much as I could before the son and houseboy retired for the night, I went out to have some food, and returned after 11.pm. The house boy was ready to go to bed, but to my horror, I found the wife’s son with 3 friends playing video games. He told me his friends were staying the night.

I was dumbfounded.  I knew kids, and I knew they would be playing those games half the night. Even when they finally decided to call it a night and go to sleep, I would have to avoid waking up four people instead of just one. So I made an ‘executive’ decision to send them home. I told my wife’s son that no one had told me about this plan for his friends to sleep over when his mother was away, and very authoritatively told him that “I was in charge”!  The house boy also protested that he had no knowledge of this plan (but I’m sure he was lying).

The son was very upset, but I insisted. However, the next thing I knew my wife was on the phone!! By this time it was past midnight. She was drunk and had just spoken with the houseboy, who I assume had called her. Anyway, to my relief, she agreed with me, and told everyone to go home, which they did, somewhat sullenly.

That was the last conversation I have had with her.

As soon as the boy went to bed, I pulled out all the stops and continued packing in earnest. I was putting my things into huge plastic bags that I had bought in the local market. They are absolutely ideal for this purpose, and much better than boxes. They also fit easier into cars. I used them last time I packed up and left, which turned out to be something of a ‘dress rehearsal’, but gave me invaluable experience for the real thing, which was now happening.

I was all packed by around 2.00 a.m. but now I had to take everything out to my car. This was quite a task by myself, especially as I am no longer a ‘spring chicken’, and my health and fitness levels are sadly not what they once were.  I knew the only way I could successfully move everything out to the car that night was to take it very slowly, and to ease my burden, I dragged as much as I could along the floor of the house.

But even so, it was a huge undertaking, and well before everything was out there I was breathless, pouring with sweat and started to get pains in my chest and arm – all the signs of an angina attack. I rested for a while, had some water, and continued. There was no way I was going to give up with half the stuff in the car and the other half packed but scattered all over the house.

By this time I was either going to make it, or die in the attempt.

Slowly but surely, I got everything out to the car, where I then had the horrendous job of loading it into the boot and onto the seats. I wasn’t sure if it would all go in, and had to plan very carefully if I was to succeed. I just couldn’t face the prospect of having to come all the way back to pick up a second load.

By now it was past 3.30 a.m. and eventually everything was in the car except for all my clothes from the racks in the dressing room. The final part was the worst – as I had to go up and downstairs about half a dozen times to carry the clothes out to the car on their hangers and squash them all up on top of the other bags on the back seats.

Finally, at around 4 a.m., more dead than alive, I was done. I took one last look around the house to make sure I hadn’t left anything behind and I was gone. I drove down the road, and parked up and rested for a while. My pulse was racing, my heart was hammering and I had a splitting headache. But I was free at last. After 6 long years of misery, I was finally free.

For the first time in weeks I felt like a drink. I really wanted to have that drink to calm my pounding nerves and to celebrate my successful departure.

My God! Did I want that drink!

But I sat there and resisted. The urge slowly passed.

I drove to my new condo block in Pattaya with the intention of parking up and unloading everything the following morning. I drove up to the entrance to offload a few things I would need for overnight – or what was left of the night – when before I knew it, the porter was taking everything out of the car and piling it onto a trolley to transport to my room. I was so exhausted that I let him do a “lion’s share” of the work, but I did my bit, which further exacerbated my precarious physical state.

In fact, I have just a vague memory of the final stages of getting everything onto the trolley, into the lift and up to my room on the 8^th floor. I have no idea how many trolley loads there were and have no recollection of falling asleep, which I later discovered had occurred without me taking my pills or my overnight insulin shot.

Thanks to my ‘Higher Power’, I am still here to tell the tale. But I was not at all well for several days and my muscles ached from head to foot from all the unfamiliar physical exertion made on that night.

Since then I have been settling into my new home by the sea, and I have also been helping my friend, Dave, from Bangkok to get his visa renewed.

More about this tomorrow, and then I will go back to Mobi’s story, as I know you are all dying to read the next installment  with bated breath………

Today I have been sober for 45 days.

I am still a bit of a skeptic as far as my “Higher Power “ is concerned, but I must admit that I am coming round to the notion rapidly.

Yesterday I recounted my little “contretemps” with my sponsor over whether or not I should attend the next morning’s AA meeting and then meet with him later, which subsequently resulted in him ceasing to be my sponsor.

I also told you about a new member of our group who came back for his second meeting, and it made me happy because it looked as though he might stick.

Well yesterday morning, I was driving down Second Road toward the meeting venue, (on my way to the meeting which my ex-sponsor had told me to skip), and who should I see standing on the side of the road, looking totally bemused? – None other than the new man who I had written about yesterday.

I parked up, and asked him where he was going. He told me he was lost as the Baht Bus had dropped him in the wrong place and wasn’t sure where he was going. I asked him if he wanted to go to the meeting, and when he answered in the affirmative, he got in the car and we drove the rest of the way to the meeting together.

If I hadn’t had the row with my sponsor and defied his “order”, I would never have come across the bewildered fellow, and he may have been lost forever to AA and recovery. Believe me, this guy is in a very bad way, and by his own admittance he will soon be dead if he can’t stop drinking.

Coincidence?

A Higher Power at work?

Who knows?

I will leave it to you, my dear readers, to ponder.

I was out most of yesterday, visiting with my friend who has a beautiful house next to Phoenix Golf Course. He has been a great friend to me, and has been one of the few who is always ready to offer a helping hand, give sensible advice and is never too busy to listen sympathetically to my never ending domestic problems.

And the wonderful bonus is that he neither smokes nor drinks, and has never done so. He is not a member of AA as he has never been an alcoholic, but he is certainly a very good person to be with, and when we are together, the thought of having a drink never crosses my mind – even when we are in places where all and sundry are getting drunk.

Anyway the errant wife had the temerity to call and accuse me of being with a lady all day – and this from someone who went away for one night and returned after one week. She insisted on me putting my friend on the phone to prove I was telling her the truth, and after I complied, I let fly at her, and asked her how dare she doubt my word after the way she had behaved during the past 6 years. To my amazement she actually apologized.

I will try to keep myself calm and serene for a few more days, as the time for me to leave is fast approaching, and I don’t want anything to blow up and affect my departure plans.

Today she informed me that she will be taking the kids and other family back to her village on Friday. So it looks as though my time to go is almost nigh.

Now back to Mobi’s story

MOBI’S STORY – (PART 15)

THE INSURANCE YEARS (CONTINUED)

Once we had established a good presence in Western Europe by opening a large branch office in Paris, and a number of representative offices in other western European countries, we then turned our attention to Central and Eastern Europe.

It hadn’t been long since many Eastern European countries had thrown off the Soviet yoke, and at that time were desperately trying to open up their fragile economies and attract western investment.

If there is any part of my career that I would look back on with pride, it would be the period of time that I devoted to developing and building the company’s business “empire” in Eastern Europe. I was instrumental in sowing the seeds that will undoubtedly grow over the coming decades.

In the early days, I was fortunate to obtain the services of a Croatian National, who we ‘poached’ from a London reinsurance broker who specialized in Eastern Europe, and who brought to us a wide network of contacts throughout the eastern continent.

His task was to use his network of friends and acquaintances to identify companies and businesses across the continent that may be potential targets for a take over.

Lists were made, published accounts and research information on companies was obtained, and where necessary, translated, and a short list was produced for further action.

The next step was to arrange a preliminary ‘field’ reconnoiter and meetings with the management of the target company. Before I undertook these trips, two factors had to be established. The first was that we were not getting involved in a hostile take over, and secondly that we had to have whatever it took in that particular country to have complete day to day MANAGEMENT control of the company, and to be able to control the Board of Directors and to approve all corporate decisions. We were not interested in a minority investment, where locals still held ultimate control, but 51%, or whatever it took to empower us in the manner as stated above, would be fine.

So began my travelling career. I travelled all over eastern Europe; from Russia, to Poland, to Belgrade, to Hungary, to Bulgaria, to the Czech Republic, to Slovakia, to  Moldova, to Croatia, to Macedonia, to Latvia, to Romania, Serbia, Ukraine and many more places that I cannot recall due to so many years of alcohol abuse.

My trips involved high level, highly stressful meetings with local management, sometimes with translators present, followed by inspections of the accounts and insurance records, meetings with local lawyers and auditors, and generally trying  to assess a “feel” for the place the target business and the local business environment.

Initial visits would be invariably be made alone, but in follow up trips (if the target passed the first hurdle) I would take along IT experts, senior underwriters, and other specialists who would look closer at the operation and try to assess its long term potential.

At each stage of the process, I would have to prepare a detailed report to our masters in Head Office, who would signify their approval (or not) to proceed to the next stage.

As you can imagine, this involved a great deal of time, and a lot of travelling. I might have to visit one particular target up to six times before the deal was consummated, or as often happened we reluctantly concluded that the deal would not work and reluctantly broke off negotiations.

The ultimate decision on these acquisitions had to be made by the main board at our Head office, and once the final go ahead was given, we once more had to undergo an in depth round of due diligence, before consummating the deal.

Once the business had been acquired, my boss and I were invariably appointed to the local Boards, and we then had the task of bedding in the new business, instilling our own corporate culture. Then there would invariably be the task of ‘rationalising’ and restructuring local management and staff. This became intense and stressful as it involved dealing with, and sometimes dispensing with, long serving management and staff who we had identified as being incapable of change, or being counter productive to the future success of our revamped business strategies.

Within a few years, we had an impressive group of insurance and reinsurance subsidiaries and branches across eastern Europe from Kiev to Budapest, and from Prague to Warsaw. In all we had a substantial presence in over 10 countries; all acquired for relatively little capital outlay and all primed and ready to take off as and when the businesses in these newly freed ex-Communist states started to develop and expand their insurance products.

And all this had to be achieved in conjunction with carrying out my existing duties, which still included running many of the key departments of the company at our European Head Office in London.

Somewhere during this period I was promoted to Deputy General Manger, European Operations, and as a consequence,  I promoted my Chief Financial Manager as F.D. in my place and he started to relieve me of my day to day financial duties. But my overall responsibilities remained wide and arduous.

The UK acquisitions also continued apace, and as before I became caught up in countless hours of negotiations and due diligence work on some major companies that we were targeting in the London market, and in the UK provinces.

It was literally one after the other, sometimes two or three simultaneously, and at the same time we were continuing to build up our East European network and to bed in the recent additions.

And if that wasn’t enough, we became increasingly interested in making an entry into the Lloyd’s of London syndicate insurance market, and after what seemed like never ending and extremely arduous and tedious negotiations; we acquired a major marine insurance syndicate at Lloyd’s.

Lloyd’s of London was a whole new ball game for the likes of us, traditional “company market” players, and a huge learning curve had to be undertaken and excessive bureaucratic procedures had to be overcome before we were able to take our place as proud directors of our new Lloyd’s syndicate.

Also at this time the “executive European management” moved into new, prestige, luxury offices on the top floor of a major new City office building.

You could say that I had finally made it.

I had a huge, luxuriously furnished office, complete with sofas, armchairs, cocktail cabinet, wide screen TV, and to top it all, a magnificent, panoramic view of the City of London.

My young, pretty, mini-skirted secretary had her own adjacent office, and no one could get near me, or even call me, without being vetted and given the ‘once over’ by ‘her highness’.

At that time I was 53 years old, earning a great deal of money, and with my annual bonuses also racking up, there was no doubt that within a few years I would be a multi-millionaire. I was becoming one of the infamous, City “fat Cats”, but I can assure you that this “fat Cat” was earning his fat the hard way.

Yet, barely a  year later, at the grand old age of 54 I was permanently retired, and within another year I was jetting my way to Thailand, alone and very alcoholic.

What happened?

We shall see very soon….

Today I have been sober for 43 days.

Last night I drove into Pattaya to attend the 7.30 p.m. meeting. For those of you who may know the area, I drive South down Beach road, and then turn left up one of the small connecting Sois and then turn left again into Second Road (which runs parallel to beach Road), and about a kilometer back down on the right is the small Soi where the meetings are held. In case you are wondering, Beach and Second Roads are one way: Beach; north/south, and Second; south/north.

I had previously met a couple of friends up by the lake near my house for a quick chat, during which period we experienced severe thunderstorms and torrential rain. Unbeknown to me, the rain in Central Pattaya had been even worse.

As I drove down Beach road I encountered some flooding on the road, and as I progressed further south, the flooding became somewhat worse. But I have encountered flooded roads before and I knew that my diesel powered BMW could handle ‘normal’ flooding – i.e. a few inches of water. I thought to myself that as soon as I get off Beach road, the flooding will disappear as surely all the rain water will have flowed down to the beach and thence into the sea.

So I took my left turn up the Soi towards second road, and half way up, came to a halt. There was a knot of semi-stationary traffic in front of me in this little Soi, and after inching along for about 5 minutes, I began to see the cause. The top end of the Soi was flooded badly, and as I got ever closer to Second road I realised that my theory about the water flowing into the sea was a complete load of rubbish. The flooding in Second Road was even deeper than that in the Soi and Beach Road, and the vehicles which hadn’t conked out and/or been abandoned, were crawling forward, creating what can only be described as a chaotic “sea of vehicles”.

I was committed. I could not go back – there were cars behind me – and I could not stop in the middle of a flooded road. So I joined the band of happy drivers and edged into the ever deepening floods of Second Road. Motorcycles and other vehicles were breaking down all over the place, and to my alarm I saw that the exhaust pipe of a Baht bus (Songtaew) right in front of me was completely submerged, and a few moments later, the water was so deep that it was washing the feet of the passengers ensconced in the back. I was terrified that my own car may stall at any moment. The BMW is a very low slung car, and I knew for sure that my exhaust was well below the water line.

After an eternity, I approached the Soi where the AA meetings were held but could see it was deep in water. On the opposite side was the Siam Bay View Hotel and I suddenly hit upon the brilliant idea of turning left into the hotel and parking in the hotel car park.  Yet another piece of bad thinking. At first, I thought I was very clever, for as I drove up the ramp past the security gate, I was briefly in much shallower water, but once past the hotel entrance, to my horror, the flooding was deeper than ever and I feared for my car.

There was well over two feet of water in the hotel grounds and I have no idea how I managed to traverse the long driveway and eventually find ‘sanctuary’ at the top of the elevated driveway in front of the hotel reception. One of the bus boys directed me to park up in the high, dry area, and I gratefully alighted from my car, rolled up my jeans and started to wade back out into the flooded grounds. The water was lapping my knees when the aforementioned bus boy ran up behind me and called out for me to return to my car.

“Oh no”, thought I, “he’s going to tell me I can’t park there”.

But he just wanted me to put my car into neutral so that he could push it if necessary. I told him that you can’t park “Beamers” in neutral, but I drove it forward a few feet so that other cars could get out. I then tried to tip the boy, but he refused any offers of money. Sometimes your faith in human nature is unexpectedly rewarded.

Back in the hotel grounds, the water was well above my knees as I slowly made my way out to the road, where it was a little shallower (lapping my knees, rather than above them), and I gingerly crossed over to the Soi where the meetings are held. I should have saved myself the effort. All the bars, shops, café’s, restaurants, guest houses and other establishments were flooded out and business everywhere had ground to a halt. The AA meeting place was no exception; they were busy trying to bale water off the flooded floor, and there was no sign of any alcoholics – sober or otherwise – except muggings Mobi.

I waded further up the Soi and found a bar that was trying to stay open – albeit still flooded – and gratefully sat down and ordered a Diet Coke from the friendly girls. There were some Swedish guests there who were returning to Sweden, and I felt very sorry for them as they soaked themselves trying to climb on the back of flooded motorcycle taxis, weighed down with bags, and navigated their way out of the floods of Central Pattaya.

We all have our trials, tribulations and frustrations when we come to live in Thailand, and even more so when we try to live with Thais and understand and accept some of the more ‘difficult’ aspects of their alien culture.

But yesterday evening, in the midst of so much chaotic disruption to their daily lives, the good, (dare I say endearing?) parts of the Thai nature came to the fore. Most businesses in this area were forced to close; many places had been badly damaged by the floods. All staff had to stop work, which for many of them meant no salary, no tips, no money for ladies’ drinks, and no high rolling customers. Yet I did not encounter a single frown, let alone anyone complaining about the fates which had conspired against them, or any desire to wreak vengeance on the city council which had miserably failed to provide adequate flood prevention measures.

On the contrary, there was almost a party atmosphere. Everyone was smiling and joking and making do the best they were able to. Many were perched atop of tables, chairs and various make shift objects sticking out of the water to escape the swirling currents, but they all had a grin on their faces and there was plenty of  laughter to ease the unpleasantness of their grim situation.

I can’t even begin to imagine what the folk back home would say and do in a similar situation.

Three hours later, the water had receded sufficiently for me to make my way home.

But for the pimps, prostitutes, waitresses, thieves, scam artists, street sellers, hairdressers, masseurs and all the other ‘flotsam and jetsam’ of Second road, they had to start the big clean up and try to make a few Baht before the evening was over.

Today, I made the morning meeting, and it was very interesting for me because there is a new member, clearly in a lot of pain as he withdraws from his self inflicted alcohol poisoning, and who today attended his second meeting.

Since I have been attending AA, we often get a new person arrive at our meetings and tell us that they wish to get sober. Many of the senior members try to give them good advice, the main one being to come back to meetings every day so that we may continue to provide help and advice. As a rule, we never see them again.

So I was pleasantly surprised that we finally found one who has ‘stuck’ and I hope sincerely that he keeps returning, for he looks in so much pain – mentally and physically, and I believe he is ready for help.

This afternoon I had a major problem.

I called my sponsor and told him that I was ready to meet him to go through the fourth step.  He told me to miss tomorrow morning’s meeting and meet him instead. So I asked him why did I have  to do this, as I derived so much benefit from  attending the daily meetings, and why could I not meet him when the meeting was over?  He told me that my step work with him was more important than the meeting, but couldn’t explain to me why it was necessary to miss the meeting. I asked him what was the reason that I could not do both? He lived near the meeting venue, he was not working and he did not try to claim that he wouldn’t be free later, only that he wanted me to miss the meeting and see him instead.

By this time things were getting a little tetchy, so I said I would think about it and call him back.

I then called a good AA friend of mine, asked him if I he thought I was wrong about all this. He told me to tell my sponsor to “get lost” (or words to that affect!). Well I had no intention of doing that, as my sponsor has been very kind to me and spent a lot of time with me, but I could not understand his attitude on this point. One of the requirements in working the 12 step programme is that the member “must be willing to go to any lengths to achieve this purpose”. My sponsor seemed to be implying that if I did not meet him when he wanted me to, then I was not fulfilling this undertaking.

Well I sent him a long SMS. I told him that I was indeed willing to go to any lengths, but that I wasn’t a door mat, and that I would only do things if I understood the reason behind them, or least I was given some kind of explanation that made sense.  This he had failed to do, and I could only conclude that he was a bit of a control freak, and a control freak is the last person I need at this point in my life.

So I am without a sponsor again.

One day I will find the right one. Meanwhile, onwards and upwards.

Today I have been sober for 42 days.

My apologies for the break in transmission.

I have been kind of busy doing this and that. I’m sure you know how it is for us people of leisure, never enough time in the day to get through our daily tasks.

Then, before you know it, two days have passed and I haven’t blogged.

So let me try to recall what has been happening in the exciting life of Mobi.

My suspicions about my wife coming home on Friday proved to be correct. I knew that her attempts to get me to talk to her nephew on the phone, together with all the noises in the background when she called, established beyond doubt that she was finally at her Mum’s house.

That meant she wouldn’t be staying too long.

So she duly arrived late Friday evening with a car load of relations, older half sisters, and several kids of various ages. It is the Thai equivalent of “half term” and all the kids are off school for a few days.

I actually don’t mind these family “invasions”. I have a huge house, with loads of large bedrooms, and as long as they keep out of my office, and my favourite area on the terrace where I sometimes watch TV in the evenings, then they are welcome to come and enjoy the swimming pool, play on my pool table and generally relax. It’s kinda nice to see them all so happy and contented and playing happily together, and I will certainly miss that part of my life when I move out.

I am hoping that my wife will drop them all back home to the village in a week or so, as  that will almost certainly be my best opportunity in the near future to leave for good. But I will play it by ear, and be patient for the right time to occur.

On Friday evening I was a bit screwed up. I had all the time in the world to attend the evening AA meeting, and duly turned up at around 7.15 p.m., only to realise when I arrived there that the Friday meetings started at 5 p.m. not 7.30. Doh! But I had attended the morning meeting so it could have been worse.

Yesterday, (Saturday), following the morning meeting I drove to the BMW dealer at Chonburi, as my on board computer was telling me that the rear brake pads needed changing along with the engine oil. BMW Thailand provide the owners with a free, three – year warranty for all repairs and service, with the exception of tyres and batteries, so I wasn’t expecting to have to fork out any money, as my car is only 15 months old.

Unfortunately, the charming service manager called me into the service bay, where my car was perched up on a “hoist”, and showed me that my front, “run flat” tyres were completely devoid of tread, and in addition, one tyre had a nasty tear in the side. I asked the manager who many kilometers is normal before tyres need replacing, and he replied that BMW state 60,000. But I had only driven 30,000 kilometers. I looked quizzically at the man. He looked quizzically back at me. After an awkward silence I said: “So I suppose it’s down to the way I drive?” He nodded back, sagely.

“How much?”

“16,000 Baht per tyre.”

“Christ – that’s expensive. I only paid around 10,000 when I replaced one in Pattaya, soon after I bought the car, due to a puncture”

(Run flat tyres cannot be repaired)

Then he told me that he didn’t have any in stock and it would be a week before he could replace them. After a short while, he had obviously decided that I would almost certainly have them replaced in Pattaya so he came back to tell me that he did have some brand new, unused tyres in stock, but that they had been removed from a new car, and were dated 2005. He said I could have them at half price, so the deal was struck. They were still bloody expensive – even at 8,000 Baht a pop.

I used the 3 hours I was stuck in the showroom waiting for my car to do some AA “step work”. I am now on Step Four, which reads as follows:

4. “Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.”

My sponsor has told me to list all the people in my life to whom I bear resentment. The format for making this list is:

Name of person I resent

The cause of my resentment

How this resentment has affected me.

He has told me also to include all those who have hurt me in any way, even though I may no longer feel any resentment.

I have been working on this list for a few days now, and my long wait in the showroom enabled me to all but finish it.

When I returned to Pattaya, I had a brief meeting with an old friend up by the lake and then drove into town to attend the evening AA meeting. For the past few days, both morning and evening meetings have been getting more crowded. Most of the newcomers are visitors to Pattaya, and many of these are Americans, some of whom return every year.

After the meeting I went for a meal, and my wife phoned me (also from somewhere downtown) and started an argument with me about what I was doing. I lost my temper for the first time in weeks and told her that I knew her tactics were just a ploy to start a fight so that she could justify going out and getting drunk with her sisters. I must have hit a raw nerve, because she hung up, and then called back about ten minutes later and told me she was on her way back home. I will never know what her real intentions were, but as she never denied it, I think we can assume that I was probably correct. After six years of putting up with her lies, deceit and bullshit, I am starting to read her like a book.

Now back to “Mobi’s Story.

MOBI’S STORY – (PART 14)

THE INSURANCE YEARS (CONTINUED)

Some of our senior reinsurance underwriters were already travelling to Western and Eastern Europe, North and South America and Asia in order to service and expand our worldwide reinsurance business, but all this business was transacted out of our London office and effectively was UK (worldwide) business.

The next step was to obtain approval form the US authorities to transact “direct” insurance business within the United States, and due to the mountain of insurance regulation in that country, not only did we have to obtain authorisation from the “central” authorities, but before we could transact any business, we had to obtain approval from State Insurance Commissioners on a state by state basis. Each state had its own specific regulations and requirements, and each application had to be accompanied by a mountain of legal documents. So we started with the most profitable Sates, like California, and slowly worked our way through. It took years before we had the authorities to write insurance in all the states on our ‘wish list’.

Europe was a different state of affairs. Thanks to the then recently enacted EU treaties, all authorised insurance companies in the EU were entitled to write insurance business in each others territories. However, it wasn’t quite that simple, as every country had its own little idiosyncrasies, and each one required a formal application for local approval before the companies could go ahead and do business in that country. So, like the USA, we had to take each country in turn, and get the appropriate approvals, but in general these were not as onerous as they were in the US.

What all this meant for me was that in had to have a whole new department to deal with all these applications and follow up, but at then end of the day, once approval was obtained, it provided us with new and expanding market for the London based insurer.

While this was all going on, we opened some representative offices in a number of European territories, including France, Belgium and Italy, and then the big one – we set in motions plans to open a large office in Paris.

We recruited a prestigious and very experienced French Senior Underwriter/Manager and together we prepared a business plan for the transaction of insurance and reinsurance business in the French Market. The “direct” insurance business would be mainly French, but some would also emanate from other European States, and the reinsurance business would be both French, and world wide, with the bulk of it drawn from French speaking territories.

It was an ambitious plan, but such was London’s growing “stock and reputation” in our company, that we received the go ahead, with barely a murmur. The French operation was to be a branch of the London Company, so there would be no need to commit more capital to finance the new French operations. It was now possible to do this, following the aforementioned, recently enacted EU insurance “freedom of trade” regulations, but of course, France being France, even though we, as British, were allowed under the EU laws to set up a branch in Paris, there was still a mountain of French bureaucratic crap and red tape to wade our way through, before we could open our doors for business.

Such was our growing confidence, (some were daring to suggest arrogance!), that we opted to lease prestige offices in the heart of Paris in the Place Vendome, right opposite the prestigious Ritz Hotel. These were grand offices indeed, having been converted from private apartments for the wealthy into beautiful, ornate offices. The high ceilings contained carvings and paintings, and the walls were adorned with ornately carved, gold – edged columns. Murals and original works of art adorned the walls. In fact our new Paris offices had all the trappings of extravagant opulence.

Working in conjunction with our new French GM, we recruited a number of French staff, many of them known personally to the French GM, and others with good market reputations, who we had poached from other French insurers.

As you can imagine, Paris became a regular item on my itinerary, and as with Ireland before, I was now spending half my week in Paris helping to set up the office and get the business off on the right foot. First Class travel on Euro Star was the order of the day, as it proved more convenient and quicker than flying, as well as giving me better conditions to continue my work.

I had previously visited Paris a few times as a tourist, and had even attended a few conferences there, but when we opened the Paris office, for a while it became my second home. We relocated a number of our London based (and Irish based) staff to Paris to help with the setting up process and instill our colleagues with our Anglo Saxon culture, which included a much harder work ethic than our new staff had been previously accustomed to.

In retrospect, it is a toss up between Ireland (where you may recall they wanted to kill me and I was damned from the Sunday pulpits), and France, as to which was the biggest nightmare, and which presented my biggest challenge.

For sure both nationalities presented us with extraordinary personnel and cultural issues, and my boss and I spent many sleepless nights trying to resolve the myriad problems and grow the business profitably.

Also in retrospect, it is hardy surprising, that an admitted alcoholic such as me would continue to seek solace in booze at every occasion. My French colleagues were all heavy drinkers, and they introduced me to a whole new world of French wine, and we even had our own “company” champagne bottled which was always flowing in the Paris offices on a daily basis.

And the French night clubs were something else again. Thank God my boss never queried my expenses, or I would have gone bankrupt.

Today I have been sober for 39 days.

The saga of my absent wife continues. You may recall that she was originally scheduled to return home on Sunday night, but as of Wednesday, she still has failed to show. However, the houseboy has returned, and in my life he is more important than her, as he sometimes cooks for me and generally takes care of the house and garden and dogs.

Anyway, at around 4 p.m. she called me to tell me she was at her mum’s house waiting for her nephew to come home from school as she wanted to bring him to Pattaya with her for a few days. She said she would be driving home as soon as the kid got back from school. I mentioned that her houseboy had already returned in the morning, and she was momentarily confused, as she had no idea he had already gone back to Pattaya with her brother. This is in spite of the fact that he lives in the same compound as her mother and is in and out of her house all day long.

Of course she wasn’t there!

The houseboy had probably got tired of waiting for her to turn up to take him back to Pattaya.

So when she hung up the phone, I immediately called her mother and asked to speak to my wife. Her mother, who always covers for her, told me she was fast asleep in the bedroom, which if course was a lie as I had just spoken to her. Two minutes later the wife called back, and this time she knew all about her brother and houseboy coming tom Pattaya that morning – as advised to her by her Mum in a quick call, no doubt!

I suspect that the wife had dumped everyone at her village last Saturday evening and had then driven off for a few days in Bangkok with God knows who!

The saga didn’t finished there, as around 11 p.m. last night she called again, this time to tell me that she couldn’t leave as it was pouring with rain and her Mum told her not to drive in the rain. I can’t remember the wife ever doing what her Mum told her to do, and I have never known the rain to deter her from driving anywhere before. She tried to put her nephew on the phone to prove she was really at her Mum’s home (note, I had never challenged her on her whereabouts, but she obviously had a guilty conscience), but I declined to talk to him. So she probably really had arrived at her Mum’s house last night, and I suspect that she will be back today – but who knows?

As of 11.20 this morning, still no sign of her.

Yesterday afternoon I felt very bad. I don’t love her any more, but this web of lies and deceit that have been going on for years now is getting me down, and every time I am confronted with yet another lie, I get a pain in my stomach, and a desire to drink. I went out for a while in an attempt to make the pain for away, and after a few hours I felt much better and returned home at around 10.30., sober. The desire for a drink had faded and when my wife called again at 11.00, the lies no longer bothered me so much.

I went to bed soon after 11.00 and had a deep and refreshing sleep.

Now back to Mobi’s Story.

MOBI’S STORY – (PART 13)

THE INSURANCE YEARS (CONTINUED)

My new boss, the ambitious young reinsurance manager, was now in sole charge since the older man’s retirement and he and I formed a close partnership with the plan of turning this small, sleepy subsidiary into a major player in the London Insurance market.

Things moved agonizingly slowly at first. New, highly paid senior underwriters were employed, and they were charged with developing new lines of business, commensurate with their specialized skills and expertise. I have previously stated that the new insurance entity was now DTI authorised to transact both “direct” insurance and reinsurance business. The only business we could not transact was life insurance business.

This new team of dynamic new underwriters started taking the market by storm and added much new business to our books, often by re-establishing old business relationships that they brought with them to their new company. Additionally, we were now able to take on greater chunks of insurance “risks” as the capital of the company had been increased substantially following the reorganization and re-authorisation. The increased capital gave us access to insurance markets that had hitherto been closed to us, and our gross premium volumes started to steadily increase.

But the very nature of the insurance business means that with the best will in the world it takes years for business to grow. Even with the most basic ‘short tail” insurance business, (Such as private house insurance), it is at least a year after writing the business that a company can start to recognize any profits (or losses) from that business, as it will take a considerable period of time before any realistic assessment can be made on the number of claims that have been made, or may be made in the future, on that business.

And then , if we look at “long tail” business, (such as public liability insurance) it can take many years before it is even possible to assess to amount of claims that may arise on that business, and in the meantime, the results of that business are effectively held in suspense, until a proper assessment can be made.

Reinsurance business is much the same, only worse in terms of releasing “profits and/or losses”. If it takes time to a properly assess the claims on ‘direct’ insurance business, how much longer will it take for companies who reinsure that business to know exactly where they stand on the profitability of that business? They have to rely on reports submitted to them by the insurers they have insured, which will only be submitted months and sometimes years after the event.

So if we wanted to became a major player within five years or so, growing  our business exponentially or organically would not be sufficient. The only way we could really achieve our aims was by acquisition – buying up ‘ready made’ insurance and/or reinsurance businesses.

And this we started to set about with great gusto.

So during the next few years I devoted a great deal of my time and energy to acquisitions, and these ranged from the simple buying of a ‘portfolio of business’ from another insurer who wanted to offload for various reasons, to the buying up of fully fledged insurers and reinsurers. We even took great pride in entering the Lloyds’ market itself by acquiring a number of Lloyd’s syndicates.

Of course it is easy to write in one sentence that we made a number of significant insurance acquisitions over the next few years, but this barely does justice to the amount of midnight oil that was burned in these endeavors, and every single acquisition became a major headache and business challenge from the very first day that we identified it as a potential target. Before we could even become serious about acquiring a target, we had to do a great amount of research on the business to really understand what it was about, it’s weak and strong points, it’s past performance, it’s potential going forward, possible duplications or benefits to our existing business, possible synergies, in depth analysis of the company’s reports, accounts statutory returns, etc .etc.

Much of the above work had to be carried out before we could even get the go ahead from our main board to formally approach the target to negotiate a possible take over. Once internal approval had been given, we then entered the negotiation stage with the target’s Managers, which often involved much due diligence on the target company’s records and business, and always involved long and drawn out discussions with the target’s lawyers. It is a very difficult and complex matter to acquire any business, and trust me when I tell you that insurance acquisition business is amongst the most complex that one could ever become involved in. Sometimes, we would spend weeks or even months negotiating a complex deal, only to have it collapse at the last moment, either due to another aquirer trumping us with a better offer, or simply failure to agree some of the “fine print” in the contract details.

And then, finally, when everything was agreed in principle, we had to trawl along to the FSA and present them with full details of our takeover offer, and also present then with a 3 year financial plan on how we would merge the acquired business with our existing business, and how we proposed to manage it.

For the first few years of our growth phase, we maintained our back up Service Company in Shannon on the West coast of Ireland, and much of the processing was carried out there. I became a frequent visitor to Shannon, and all the reinsurance accounting and back up work (such as claims processing) was carried out there.  Also, our mainframe computers were maintained and operated from there. In addition, some Irish underwriting staff were based there, and they would travel to London and the continental insurance markets from Shannon to meet their customers (insurance companies), and obtain new business and renew existing business.

Under our  new ‘regime’, we determined that the Shannon office was a sleepy backwater, and   that it was was not the right place to base members of our underwriting team, so  we  set up a Dublin office, and moved all the Irish underwriters to the new location.

We then made the momentous decision to close down the entire back office in Shannon, and move some of the key staff to London with others being relocated to Dublin, and the remainder being laid off. The reason for this was the unacceptable inefficiencies of the entire Shannon operation. Many of  the staff  had been there for 10 years or more – long before we acquired the company. During that time there had grown up countless restrictive work practices, massive overstaffing, a very lazy and laid back work ethic, and much ridiculous overspending of the company’s hard earned money.

At first we made a very hard attempt to simply reorganize and streamline the operation in conjunction with the advice of a respected Irish consultancy company – one of their own – who we thought they would accept. But it wasn’t to be and you would have thought that a new Irish rebellion had broken out as we attempted to introduce changes. At the height of this “crisis” and during our subsequent reluctant decision to close down the whole operation and move it to Dublin, I was spending up to half my working week in Ireland, and the other half in London. The London based new business acquisitions were continuing apace , and on top of that I had well over half the company to manage, as just about every department, except insurance underwriting and claims management now came under my remit.

As the crisis in Shannon drew to a head, I was probably the most unpopular man in the west coast of Ireland, and I was even cursed from the priests’ pulpits at Sunday Mass. Nearly all the Shannon staff either lived in the nearby towns of Limerick or Ennis and the staff came from close knit communities from within those towns that had known each other for generations. Mobi was identified as the evil English bastard who was about to take away their livelihoods. I was even threatened, but in those days, with plenty of alcohol to give me courage, I feared no one.

Ironically, historically the staff from Limerick stuck together, as did the staff who hailed from Ennis. Two distinct groups of people who they hated each other almost as much as they hated me; but I became their common enemy, so for the first time in living memory, they joined together in a common cause – Mobi!!!

(Much later, I came to learn that the villages around Shannon were a hot bed of IRA terrorist groups who were living under cover and planning their next outrages in Northern Ireland and mainland England. If I had known this, I might not have been quite so brave!!)

So it doesn’t take much imagination to realise what affect this high pressure work and travelling was having on my alcoholic sickness. Travel time became drinking time, and as soon as I hit an airport, be it London City, Dublin, Heathrow or Shannon, straight to the business class lounge ands straight into the free booze, which continued as soon as I was air bound.

Evenings at the business hotels were notable only for the time spent at hotel bars, or maybe doing the rounds of some village bars in Ennis or Limerick. I often travelled with some of my senior staff from London or Ireland, and if not, there would always be local managers who would meet me and join me in my drinking sprees. The Irish are somewhat noted for their love of alcohol, and despite my unpopularity, I never had any problem finding local drinking partners.

When I was working in my London office, it was no different. My alcoholism was exacerbated by stress and the easy ability of booze (all claimed on expenses) and people to drink with, both during long lunches, and in the evening, however late I finished. Such was my position of power within the company that no one would dare refuse my invitation for a few drinks after work or at lunch time, so in those days, I rarely drank alone.

Every year, our internal “Three year Plan” to our head Office became more and more ambitious. After the a few years of successful, spectacular growth, we became discontented with just expanding in the UK and Ireland, and started to set our sights on continental Europe and even Eastern Europe, which at that time was starting to break away from the Soviet yoke that had restricted their development and access to the outside world.

This opened up a whole new world for me, and as the new relocated Dublin operation became finally bedded in, I started to turn my attention towards Western Europe and beyond. This gave  new opportunities to travel, which I loved, and of course, more opportunities to punish my fast deteriorating body with yet more alcohol abuse.

Today I have been sober for 38 days.

Last Saturday evening, my wife took off to her home village with her son and our gardener/houseboy for the Sunday “Buddha day”.

Originally she had planned to go on Sunday morning and return home that evening (it is a 190 km, 3 hour journey), but then changed her mind and they took off on Saturday evening, planning to return on Sunday evening.

On Sunday she called to say that she would now return on Monday.

On Monday she called to tell me they would all return on Tuesday.

It is now Wednesday, and still no sign of her, and no phone call either, but at least the houseboy is back; he  hitched a lift with the wife’s brother who drove here in his pick up, (another generous “Mobi Thai family gift”), as he is going to work with another relative near Rayong.

In the meantime on Sunday, Bob and I went to view the preferred condo in Pattaya that I had viewed the previous day, and he agreed with me that it was a lovely place, and that I would be very comfortable there for a while.

Then on Monday morning I attended my regular AA meeting, and to my surprise and joy, my house guest, Bob, announced that he would go with me to the meeting.

I have previously mentioned that Bob has been sober for a number of weeks now, and is an admitted alcoholic. However, he announced soon after his arrival in Pattaya that he had no wish to go to  AA meetings, so I did not pursue it any further – at the time. But last Sunday, I finally brought up his stated reluctance to attend a meeting as an indication that he should work on his humility and pride, and he backed off, claiming that he had never made such a statement. I did not argue with him, and on the following morning, I was  taken by complete surprise when he told me he would accompany me to the Pattaya meeting.

It was yet another good meeting and Bob was made very welcome by the others, and he actually spoke briefly and introduced himself to the gathering.

After the meeting we drove home, and I worked on my computer and Bob did some packing as we were going to Bangkok on the Tuesday.

So yesterday, Tuesday, Bob attended his second AA meeting with me and once again Bob was made very welcome. This time, Bob was presented with a free copy of the “big Book” by one of the senior members, and at the close of the meeting, we headed off for Bangkok.

After checking into our hotel we set off to visit with Dave, who has now recovered sufficiently to get out of bed and walk around a little, but he is still in  a lot of pain, and is still very weak. Dave wanted to go out for lunch, so we all climbed into a taxi, and  made the short journey to a nearby Italian restaurant – Italian food being one of Dave’s favourites.

We had a good lunch, and Dave provided us with more details about his current state of health. As mentioned, he is still in a lot of pain, and this pain is coming from his liver. He has no idea if, and when it is supposed to ease, and will ask the doctors at his next appointment in 6 day’s time. He told us he was on a strict pain medication regime, and as the medication wore off, he was in considerable distress until the next dose ‘kicked in’. It is disquieting that he is still in this amount of pain, almost a month after he collapsed and was admitted to hospital. I do sincerely hope that this is not an indicator that the end maybe near to hand.

Dave was clearly very happy to be with us – his oldest friends, and in particular to be out dining with us, but both Bob and I felt that underneath his good humoured bravado, we detected an uneasiness, and we agreed that not all was fine and dandy with Dave from a psychological standpoint. Of course no one could expect him to be full of the joys of spring after what he had been through, but we know him well, and it wasn’t just the state of his health that was bothering him – we felt there was something else as well.

I even speculated whether Dave might be drinking again, and hiding it from us, but Bob did not think so. I hope he is right, because one more drink and Dave will be dead within weeks.

I shall call his wife today and try to see if she knows what is wrong, because undoubtedly something is, and it goes beyond his physical sickness.

In the early evening, Bob and I  made a return visit to the Centara Hotel and the rooftop bar on the 55^th floor, where  once again we sipped on our drinks and enjoyed the fabulous view. We were awaiting the owner of a condo which I was about to lease in Pattaya. I had previously been in touch with the landlord and told him I was going to Bangkok, and he suggested that we meet in Bangkok, as he lived there. He duly arrived, I signed the lease, and handed over the 1 month security deposit.

I was committed. My new life is about to begin. Bob and I sat at the bar for another hour or so, and he helped me plan the exit strategy from my marriage and ‘old life’, and how I would handle my wife and try to divide and dispose of our joint property, once I had departed for good from the marital abode.

My lease commences on 15^th October, but I have my keys, so can start to move belongings in at any time.

This is not the first time I have taken this action, but this time around I am much better prepared, both from a practical viewpoint and an emotional viewpoint, and I am very confident that this is will be my final exit from this bitter and unhappy relationship.

We raised our glasses to the sky, and toasted a new life, both for Bob (who has recently separated from his wife) and for me.

This morning, I arose at the crack of dawn as Bob had to check in at the airport at 6 a.m. We set of from the hotel at 5.30 and I made it with minutes to spare. Then I continued on to my home, east of Pattaya, and found that my wife had still not returned home, but that the maid ,(who lives outside), had spent the night  in one of the spare bedrooms. The wife must have called to tell her to stay there and protect the home!! (But she hasn’t called me)

Last night while Bob and I had been chatting  at the rooftop bar in Bangkok, Bob reminded  me that during the 3 weeks he had been living at my house, he had only seen my wife briefly on two occasions.

I know not what the future may bring, but I do know that whatever it turns out to be, I will embrace it with hope and joy; hopefully a clear, sober mind; and  NO MORE WIVES!!!

Today I have been sober for 36 days.

Today, another exciting episode in the life and times of Mobi.

MOBI’S STORY – (PART 12)

THE INSURANCE YEARS (CONTINUED)

I should recap as to how it was that I received the coveted appointment of FD of my company’s European Operations.

When I first started working with my colleagues at the reinsurance company, about a year or so before the merger was completed, the company was headed up by a bright young Irishman, who had been brought over from the back office in Shannon the run the show after the company had been purchased from it previous owners.

But during the merger process, he was “poached” by a major German reinsurance company, and was subsequently replaced by another bright young man, this time English, whose previous company had been one of the many casualties of the Lloyds’ meltdown.

This was a very fortunate change of leadership for me, as the Irish Manager obviously favoured his Irish colleagues from back home, and in particular was keen to promote his own financial people into senior positions in the soon to be merged entity. Luckily for me he gave in his notice before his plans had been finalised or approved by head office, and I immediately hit it off with the new English G.M.

Things were still touch and go for a while, for my masters in head Office were in love with all things Irish, not least because the CEO and The CFO both boasted Irish ancestry. However, as I have previously mentioned, my stock was very high following my successful completion of the project; I had a very strong ally and supporter in the name of my boss, (the G.M. of the insurance company, who over the past few years I had built up an excellent and personal relationship with), and now the new GM of the reinsurance company was also fast becoming my strong supporter.

Against me was the fact that I was an unqualified accountant, as compared to the entire Irish mob who had qualifications coming out of their ears, and also their loomed the distinct possibility of recruiting a new, qualified insurance heavyweight to head up the newly merged department.

But my supporters won the day and I was subsequently  ensconced in my new, very powerful position.

Once the two operations were merged into one operating entity, we found ourselves  in the difficult and touchy situation of having two general managers. The first GM was the traditional, ‘crusty’ general insurance GM in his early sixties, and the second, a brash young professional in his mid thirties. The older GM was made in nominal, overall charge, but on a day to day basis, the younger man could run his reinsurance business with minimal interference from his boss – “Mr. Crusty”, the older man.

This was an uneasy situation, and for a year or so we all had to “walk on egg shells” in an attempt to placate Mr. Crusty when we started to introduce new ideas and a new “culture” into the London Company. The two men got on pretty well on a personal level, and both had respect for each other. The younger man respected Mr. Crusty’s experience, sense of humour and wisdom in a general way, and Mr. Crusty respected the younger man’s intellect, work ethic and undoubted profitable track record.

But in spite of this “mutual respect” there many clashes on all manner of issues ranging from salary scales and bonuses, to petty matters like how the junior staff should address senior Managers; in the old man’s mind, he still expected to be addressed as “sir” and was shocked and upset when the new reinsurance staff had the temerity to address him by his first name!

This really was a “changing of the guard”, as new professionals were recruited into the company on much higher salaries than the existing insurance staff, and who were given superior benefits, including top of the range, expensive company cars. Of course all this was absolutely necessary if we were to attract the right caliber people to help us make our mark in the London market, but the older man struggled to accept these young upstarts, less than half his age, who wore garish, “Larry King” type suspenders, drove fast cars, had fast women, and addressed him by his first name.

As for me – I was caught in the middle. I got on extremely well with both bosses, and had to tread a delicate, middle road, as I listened sympathetically to complaints from both men, whispered sage advice into their ears and tried to calm their burgeoning egos.

To his credit, my elderly boss was not so stubborn that he could not see the direction the company was going in, and as business increased, and we started to become a bigger player in the market, he started to admit that his “day’ was over and it was time for this new, brash breed to take the company to the next level. His respect for his younger colleague grew, and he started to appreciate the philosophy that in terms of staffing, you get what you pay for.

I will never forget one particular day, when the three of us were ensconced in the boardroom to review the staff annual salary increases and bonuses. By this time Mr. Crusty was pretty much sold on the idea of  higher rewards for key staff and suddenly, out of the blue, he told his colleague that he would recommend a huge increase for yours truly – Mobi, and on top of that, as my car was up for replacement, he said I should be given a top of the range 5 series BMW, or equivalent. At that time I was driving a bog standard Vauxhall Cavalier. The younger GM concurred heartily, and I soon became the proud owner of my very first “beamer”.

My older boss was around 62 or 63 at the time, and it wasn’t long after this that he suffered a massive heart attack and had to undergo triple bi-bass surgery. The surgery was successful and he made a complete recovery, but he was away from the office for many months as he went through a period of  lengthy rehabiliation, and when he finally came back to work, it was really all over for him. Much had happened during his absence: my younger boss had taken over the full reins of the company, and there was little for the older man to do. He maintained his huge, “prestige” office in Fenchurch Street, but he found himself without any meaningful role, and it wasn’t too long before the head office started to negotiate a retirement package with him.

The package offered was very generous, and he was very happy with the outcome. It was truly the end of an era when he entered his office for the very last time, and I was honoured by being invited to have the very last drink with him at his favourite city pub, before he jumped on a commuter train and headed off into the wintery sunset.

In actual fact, he remained on the various  London and Irish boards as a non executive Director for many years into the future, and I saw him often at board meetings where we would catch up with the City gossip over a few pints and a ‘ploughmans’ at one of his many favoured pubs.

But his going represented the end of an era in the London Insurance market – an era where there were countless small players – like our old insurance company, who transacted small, labour intensive insurance transactions for minimal profits, and staffed by people who earned low salaries and as a consequence had little initiative, and were basically clock watchers – waiting for knocking off time so that they could rush to the pubs for some beer and darts.

We were now in a new era of highly paid, dynamic professionals, who were dedicated to their work, spent 18 hours a day in the office, dined and drank in up market wine bars and who were going to take us to previously unforeseen heights. And as F.D, I was sitting right up there with the gods, on the right hand side of our insurance God, my mate the General Manager.

We were really going to take this outfit somewhere big and exciting, and if we didn’t, it wouldn’t be for the want of trying.

Today I have been sober for 35 days.

Yesterday was quite a busy day for me, which is why I didn’t post anything.

The day started with my morning AA meeting in Pattaya, and as ever, it was a good meeting.

After the meeting I had my first official meeting with my AA sponsor. We took my car and drove up to “Buddha Hill”, parked up, and took a short walk to a large shelter which overlooks the hills and some gardens.

My sponsor had previously asked me if I was been prepared to go to any lengths to give up alcohol, and I replied that I was. In all, he has asked me this question three times, the last time just before we started on “Step One”, and each time I replied in the affirmative.

Then we started reading from the “Big Book”, (the nick name for the AA book upon which the organisation was founded and uses as its principal source document).  Step one reads as follows:

1. “We admitted we were powerless over alcohol – that our lives had become unmanageable.”

We discussed this at some length, but there is no doubt that I have long since accepted that I am indeed an alcoholic, and am  powerless over alcohol, so within a short while, we moved on to Step Two, and thence to Step three,  which I have set out below:

2. “Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.”

3. “Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him”

Of course these are very big steps for most people, especially for those of us, like me, who are or have been agnostics or atheists.

In AA, God can be interpreted as any “Higher Power” in this universe that an individual wishes to identify with. It does not have to correspond with any formal definition of God that we have come to understand from established religions.

AA will teach you that some form of Spirituality is essential for an alcoholic, if he or she is to achieve long term sobriety. Eminent psychiatrists such as Carl Jung have endorsed this view, and in Jung’s opinion, the only hope for a chronic alcoholic is for him to embrace spirituality and to rebuild his life according to a new set of moral principles.

Of course I have known about these steps for some time, and have heard other alcoholics ‘share’ at meetings how they came to believe in God or a Higher power as they understood Him; how this belief had transformed their lives, had brought them to joy and harmony with the world, and effectively stopped their craving for alcohol. Some of these ‘sharers’ were ex convicts, admitted thieves, muggers, wife beaters and disreputable people from the very dregs of society. In the first instance they had all totally rejected the concept of any kind of God, but in time came to realise that it was the only way forward and finally embraced a new belief and a new life which has helped to keep them sober for many years.

Please understand that I am not talking about any form of organised religion. I am talking about a personal belief in a “Higher Power”, whatever that may mean to each individual. Organised religion of whatever colour or creed plays no part in an alcoholic’s embracement of spirituality. It is rather a new, moral way of life that is directed by ‘something’ out there, in our universe.

I have listened to much and read much in the last few months, including some compelling books on spirituality, and as a result, I was able to inform my sponsor that I felt I was now ready to accept steps 2 and 3. I also told him that I was just a beginner, and that I had a very long way to go on this road to true spirituality, but at this point in my life, I was ready to accept and believe in the concept of a “higher Power” and that I was ready to make a decision to turn my will and life over to “Him”.

Then, for the first and only time in my progress along the ‘twelve steps’ road, we both got down on our knees and read a small prayer which reflected my acceptance of God, and my willingness to turn my life over to him.

I realise that many of my readers will start to cringe when they read this, and will think that in one way or another I have “got religion” and that I will now try and ram it down everyone’s throat.

Well I can assure you that nothing is further from the truth, and may I remind you that my journey towards spirituality is a personal journey, and has nothing whatever to do with any religion known to man, and the last thing I ever wish to do is to try and convert anyone to my way of thinking on this subject. I am reporting what happened – purely and simply – because it was my stated aim when I started this blog to be honest in all matters pertaining to my alcoholism, good or bad, crazy or sensible.

Later I will write more on the subject of spirituality, as it is a very important subject, and integral in the recovery programme of all alcoholics. I have started to open my mind to some new ideas, and as a result, I have learned more about spirituality in the past few months than I have in the rest of my life put together.

The meeting with my sponsor concluded at this point, and he asked me if I had noticed any changes in myself. I shook my head. He said: “Well I have. Your eyes are glowing, and for the first time you are looking at me straight in the eyes. You never did that before”.  I realised that I was indeed looking straight at him, and that I was smiling as I spoke, which is something I rarely do. He told me that many people, after they sincerely complete steps two and three, will invariably appear different to others but the individuals themselves will not be aware of these subtle changes in their behaviour and countenance.

We returned to my car, and I dropped my sponsor off and returned home.

In the afternoon, I returned to Pattaya and looked at some Condos for rent as I am now proceeding with my plan to move out this month.

I saw a couple of very nice places; one, a studio on the top floor of a condo in Jomtien with a partial sea view, and another, nearby, which was larger and had a separate bedroom, a huge balcony with a magnificent sea view. It was more expensive, but it was definitely the favoured one, and I indicated my interest to the owner. He wanted a year’s lease, but I knocked him down to six months, and also got 5,000 Baht off the posted monthly rental. I told him to make out the lease to commence on 15^th October. Later this week I will sign the lease, pay a deposit and that will be that.  The die will be well and truly cast on my new beginning.

Later, I drove to the airport to pick up Bob, who returned from his two day trip to Vietnam and by the time we had returned to Pattaya and had a meal, it was very late, and I had little problem in dropping off to sleep.

I forgot to mention that my wife, her son, and the house boy/cook/ baby sitter all took off yesterday to their home village for the Buddhist festival which is being held across Thailand today. So Bob, I and the dogs, had the house to ourselves. It was almost too peaceful!

Tomorrow I will continue with Mobi’s Story, God willing.