by Henry Dillon
article

It’s 2 pm on a Friday and the traffic leaving Jo-burg is outrageous, everybody and their sisters french poodle seem to be leaving town for the weekend. With a truck careening up my rear end my cell rings.
- Hello is this Mr. Dillon?
It is a voice I have never heard before and it’s an overtly friendly one.
- Yes this is he.
- Hello Mr. Dillon my name is Toby from Link World how are you sir.
Bells ring inside my head as I immediately detect the attempted smooth operativeness of a telesales puppet.

- Do you remember entering a competition where you stood a chance to win a Nissan bakkie and a quad bike sir.
As I change lanes my mind tries to recall any recent competitions but nothing specific comes to mind, but wait, no there was one a couple of months back on a road trip somewhere.
- Yes. I say cautiously.
- Well sir I am phoning to tell you that you have made it through to the lucky draw which will be held next Tuesday at 2 pm. Will you be able to make it.
I swerve back to my original lane and contemplate my schedule for next week.
- You’re not trying to sell me something are you Toby. I ask as I slam on brakes to avoid a collision with the car in front of me.
- No sir, it is just a draw where you and a couple of other people have been selected to participate in.
- How many other people are we talking about here Toby.
- Not many sir I can’t confirm at this point but I can tell you that until now you are only the second person I am calling.
- So you can’t tell me an exact amount then?
- No sir, but the room in which the draw will take place is very small and the car will be in the room too. Everybody present will take a a key out of a box and who ever has the key that starts the car is the winner.
I ask a couple of further questions trying to ascertain the authenticity of this lucky draw that I have been selected to attend.
Toby assures me that the validity of the competition is unquestionably sound and that he, or anybody else, is in no way trying to sell me anything.
- Okay sure Toby I’ll be there.
He throws the directions my way as a car whistles past going one sixty, he then tosses in a landline number I can contact if I have any further queries.
With Johannesburg dwindling in the rearview mirror the phone goes dead after which I explain the conversation with Toby to my girlfriend, Michele, in the passenger seat.
- Baby you’re gonna win a car. She says
- I don’t know peanut. I’ll believe that when I see it. It doesn’t make sense to me that someone will ust give me a car. I’ll call them on Monday to check it out again.
Through my cynical mind the thought of winning a new car slowly begins to take hold though, and soon we are both entertaining visions of our next weekend away, with me behind the wheel of the new cruiser.

To say that I need a new car is an understatement. I drive a cream coloured nissan 1400 bakkie with a black tailgate and E.C. plates, a car that still belongs to my father. She’s a gracious 20 years old but all the years of living on the coast have riddled her with rust. To add to the equation I happen to be over six feet tall and work in an industry where appearances are pretty damn crucial. Needless to say arriving for a meeting always stresses me out, here arrives a tall lanky Henry Dillon in his rusty cream bakkie and then exits the car wearing a slick black outfit. When possible I park around corners or borrow my friends car, but more often than not it’s me and my trusty bakkie off to wangle, dangle and bojangle the clientele.
I must however clarify that I these things not because I suspect myself of being image conscious, but rather because I know everybody else is.

Over the weekend my phone call with old Toby pops up in conversation a number of times with varying responses from different minds.
- They’re gonna try sell you timeshare. My girlfriend's mother says.
- Life insurance. Is another's take.
- Sounds legit. Says another.
But on monday morning all the uncertainty from all the different camps piles up and compels me to place a phone call through to that landline number that I was given. Just to double check that it’s not a hoax.

- Link World hello.
- Hi, I am phoning in connection with the lucky draw for the bakkie.
- You are phoning in connection with what sir?
- The lucky draw to win the bakkie and quad bikes? I say surprised that she does not know what I am talking about.
- Oh yes the draw for car.
- Could you please tell me how many people are going to be there?
- I cant really say sir, I don’t know too much about it. Who did you speak with?
- Toby.
- I will get Toby to call you back sir.
I hand over my details and five minutes later Toby rings.
- Yes Toby I would like to talk to you about the draw for the car tomorrow.
- Yes sir.
- Can you tell me how many people are going to be there?
Toby spins me the same story he did on Friday; he’s not sure because not everyone has confirmed, the room is small and my chances are good etc. etc. etc.
- And can you promise me you are not trying to sell me anything.
- I promise you sir, you can leave your credit cards and wallet at home, all you need is your drivers license to confirm you are Henry Dillon.
I hang up the phone feeling even more dubious than I was prior to my conversation with the man without a face.
The fact that I have to drive halfway to Pretoria at 2 pm on a Tuesday is what bothers me the most. My workload at present is suffocating and I cant really afford to waste an afternoon on a joyride to Midrand.
- If I get there tomorrow. I say to Michele. - And they try and sell me something then I am going to have to react.

Tuesday comes as Tuesdays inevitably do and at 1 pm my girlfriend and I hop into he old bakkie to go insert the winning key into my new set of wheels .
The traffic, as per usual on the N1, is brutal. It is hotter than the underside of a frying pan on heat, and as always, I am the one being overtaken. I invariably get the sense of being overrun by a herd of buffalo from behind each time I venture onto that killing field.
Somewhere on the highway a man driving a white sedan pulls up next to me, slowing down to my humble 80 km/h. He rolls down his window and from his lane yells - Are you selling your car?
Its providence I think to myself. Here I am on my way to a lucky draw for a new bakkie and a man wants to purchase the one I’m driving now. I consider the option but vaguely remember an adage that warned not to count your chickens before they hatch.
- No sorry. I yell back.
The disappointed driver speeds of, leaving me to chortle my way to down the highway.
Toby’s directions are spot and we soon find ourselves cutting through the outskirts of Midrand, not the topography I envisioned winning my car in, but we push on. We push on through an unending quagmire of road works, through bottlenecks of congestion and traffic lights on strike, until finally a sign for V.I.P. World looms up on the left hand side.
Turning the corner I see a security guard blocking the road waving his guard stick at a driveway I am to enter.
- That’s interesting. I say to Michele as I turn into the premises.
Another security official blocks my path and inquires who am there see.
As instructed by Toby I give the correct answer - Celeste. Security guard number two guides me in and I immediately see four glistening quad bikes racked in a geometrically pleasing line, with “This could be yours”, gleaming off them like melted butter dripping of a hot mielie.
In the parking lot, surrounded by SUV’s and other finer vehicles my jalopy stands out like an ax wound on Charlize Therons right cheek or an intelligent comment upon the lips of George “Somebody else wrote my speech not me” Bush.
One look at the premises I have been lured to and my dubious doubts multiply like salmonella on viagra. The building reminds one of a modern day monastery where present day priests well versed in capitalistic principles and swindelry exercise the rands and cents from a congregation of sheep.
The trip to Midrand lasted a little longer than expected and the only thing I can truly think of at this point is freeing my bladder from the pressure it finds itself under. Hence everything else takes a back seat.
We walk inside I immediately feel like I’ve stepped onto a conveyor belt in a production line. Before I can even ask for a bathroom, they have my name, my lucky number and I’m being escorted up a wooden staircase to where another group of fine tuned tongues garnished with suits and ties await.
It is at this point that I know what hell must be like. A building where helpless and voiceless souls are ushered from torture chamber to torture chamber, their will bent and contorted until they forget everything they know, and believe what ever they are told. A place where lobotomy runs rife and free thinking is crushed with an iron fist.
Something is taken out of my hand, something I was given down below at the front desk after which I am herded toward a room where my supposed bakkie awaits. On route to our torture chamber I finally get to ask for a bathroom and am pointed down to the end of a corridor. As I walk down this corridor the truth unfolds itself in a flash of demeaning splendor. I pass by open doors through which I see rows upon rows of hoodwinked punters sitting like apathetic sardines at a cooking show.
As my bladder drains I can finally begin to think again, and think I certainly do.
A promise had been made to my girlfriend that either I was going to come here and win a bakkie in complete legit fashion, or I was going to throw my toys out of the cot. Michele is waiting for me outside the bathroom with a severely concerned expression painted or her face. We walk back up the corridor and a man rushes up to us and literally tries to push me through one of the doors with a “Please mind your step sir.” Followed by a “Here is a form we would like you to fill in in order to make you eligible for the bakkie.”
A bakkie I thought I was already eligible for.
Before I take the step I pull back. I pull back out of pride, I pull back out of an inherent respect for myself and my relationship and I pull back because I was lied to.
From inside the room an odor of stupidity reaches my nostrils as I look at all the suckers patiently awaiting the delivery of what ever sales pitch has been fiendishly contrived around their hopes and gullibility’s.
I immediately know that were I to see my girlfriend sitting beside me in one of those chairs I would loose all respect for her, and one look at her tells me that the sight of me in one of those chairs would do the same for her.
- Excuse me, I was told over the phone that this was simply going to be a lucky draw and that you people were in no way going to try and sell me anything.
- Its just a quick presentation with no obligation, about some wonderful international holidays that we offer, after which coffee and tea will be served before the draw sir.
- So you are trying to sell me something then.
- It’s just a small presentation sir.
- It’s just a small lie that made me drive halfway across town.
Sensing an awkward situation brewing and not wanting to spoil the pleasantly veiled mood of fabrication in the room, the man steps back and out of earshot of those duped by their scam thus far.
I walk up to him and before I can begin my rant he points me down another corridor.
- Not a problem sir please take your first left and you can go ahead and draw for the bakkie.

Flash forward three days to the next Friday, I am sitting at my desk writing this article when my phone rings.
- Hello Henry speaking.
- Hello Mr. Dillon this Brian from Media Magic Numbers.
- Yes Brian what can I do for you?
It is at this point that the friendly Brian from Magic Media Numbers asks me whether I remember entering a competition to win a Nissan Bakkie and a quad bike.
- Off course I do. I say excitedly.
Brian then spins me the same story Toby did, asking me to come to the same premises Toby did and wishing me as much luck with the draw as what Toby did.
Abruptly my fronted excitement wanes and I please ask Brian to find what ever foreign object he can within reach, and forcibly persuade it up his own rectum, and that if he needs help inserting it he should request the assistance of Toby.

Flash back one week to the previous Tuesday and I enter the room where I know the chances of me wining a car can be represented by a negative integer. Especially when the car that is supposed to be inside the room has been transformed into a piece of wood covered with carpet sitting on a table. In the middle of the pretend dashboard a steering wheel and an a ignition switch have been precariously placed, and it would not take the inventor of the tin opener to know that there most certainly are no wires anywhere behind the carpeted plank before me. A women instructs me to pick a key from a plastic box filled with identical looking keys, I take one knowing that my plank and steering wheel are going nowhere. It would be impossible to get the thing roadworthy to begin and and I’d rather drive my rusted bakkie in the rain than a table with a wooly dashboard.
My irritation is maxed out and I summon the manager who attempts to placate my frustration with sincere apologies and utter amazement at his employees lies to me. Mmm I wonder who instructed old Toby to say what he said. No offense Toby but you didn’t sound like the sharpest chisel in the toolkit on the phone, and I’m pretty certain your fibs were concocted by the people you work for. Although I might be wrong.
My words rain down like water of the feathers of pheasant so I retreat back into the main foyer where a queue of deceived people are being escorted into their chambers.
- I would like to thank all you people for lying to me.
I begin at a favorable pitch for all to hear.
-I would like to thank all of you people for wasting my time and making me drive all the way across town to possibly win a carpeted piece of wood
The group being ushered in ignore me as a madman and the suit and tie crew ignore me knowing I’m right. I then descend the staircase into the reception area where more innocent souls are arriving. After a proclamation of disgust at the tactics that were used to deceive me and waste my time, I am promptly requested to lower my voice by the staff and abruptly ushered from the building.
My other thought, post my uncouth public display of disgust was as follows -
I enter the room where the presentation on the international holidays was to transpire and half way through the sales pitch I raise my hand and ask.
- Excuse but I was told that you people would not try and sell me anything, and forgive me if I’m mistaken but I think you are trying to sell me something. I was also told that there would be a car in the room here and all I see is an easel with pretty pictures of your vacation destinations. Does anyone else in this room feel like they have been lied to?
But the saddest part of this course of action would have been that all the people in the room would simply look at me blankly and in there minds be thinking. - He’s not going to win the car, that means there is more chance for me.
The moral of the story people is - wake up, please wake up and realize that if somebody lied to get you into their offices, nobody is going to win a car. Not me and not you. The only people that are going to win anything are the fraudsters that lured you here.

I would like to thank Toby, Brian and the scourge those boys work for, for reminding me that when you run a business it should be done honestly and truthfully. That deceptive terrorist sales tactics, though they will work on the fools with blinkers, benefit no one else other than those executing them. And, most importantly that it is far more pertinent that those who can and have the power should educate the masses rather than to give them false hopes to liven up their dull insipid lives. For when we raise the consciousness of the herd, we all win.

The irony of the situation however, was that that very same night my father phoned me to inform me that he was going to give me the bakkie that I had been borrowing from him. So I did eventually win a car even if it was the one I had been driving all along.
And since then I have reflected upon the car I drive and realized.
It is far easier to connect with a wealthy man if you drive a rusted bakkie, than it is to connect with a poor man if you drive a Beamer.