April 28, 2007 by SUM.

Another photo incident was plotted at another Microsoft Office party event. And that event took place at Christmas in 1998. That year a younger Chinese man, John, approached me at a Microsoft Toastmasters meeting. That was the perfect opportunity to get in contact with me because we didn’t work together, but these informal meetings gave him the opportunity to meet me.

At the beginning he seemed like a nice guy, and I’m a person who doesn’t turn my back on someone who approaches me. I trust people and give them the benefit of doubt until they prove otherwise. As soon I found out that he wanted to get to know me closer, I’ll made it clear to him that I wasn’t interested in any close relationship with him, but I kept on talking with him even when he stopped unannounced by my house.

In the year when I met John, he invited me to the Office Christmas party at a hotel in downtown Seattle. I accepted his offer because I lived by myself, had nothing else planned, and thought it would be fun to attend the Office Christmas party.

John picked me up at my new house in Redmond. In September that year I had bought a house in Redmond, just around the corner of the main campus from Microsoft. When he picked me up for the party, he showed up with dark roses and a toy-box with a Mercedes car in it. At the time I just thought that these are strange gifts to bring. I had told him already that I wasn’t interested in any intimate relationship with him therefore I found the roses inappropriate for the occasion and the car toy a very unusual Christmas gift. Now I know that his acts were carefully planned and not only by himself.

Before we drove to the party, we stopped by his friend’s house Lucius in Bellevue who accompanied us at the party. Lucius was a German guy working at Microsoft, too, and he was married to a good looking woman from Hawaii. I believe I met Lucius the first time at this occasion. Lucius, his wife and sister-in-law were at the house, and a Christmas tree was set up in the living room.

When I arrived at Lucius house, the women weren’t ready yet and we had to wait a little bit. While waiting Lucius’ wife asked me for a photo with John in front of their Christmas tree. I wrote already that I don’t like having photos taken of me and especially not with someone I hardly know, but on that evening I felt compelled to take a photo with John. He had invited me to the Christmas Office party, he had bought me some flowers, and it was Christmas. And I didn’t want to snub him on Christmas in front of his friends. Reluctantly I took this photo though I may have smiled. I actually have never seen this photo. I don’t know what they did with it. Later I asked John about the whereabouts of this photo, and he told me that he doesn’t have it. Now I ask myself for what devious plan they used it.

At the Office party I danced a little bit, John pulled an act like a jealous admirer, and I was glad when this show was over, and I was again at home by myself.

I’m not sure whether other pictures were taken of me during that evening, but I can imagine that this has been the case. Now I know that luring me into certain situations had been carefully planned not only once. Therefore I can imagine that more photos of me were taken that evening.

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April 27, 2007 by SUM.

I just read in a German newspaper that Hugh Grant acted belligerent when asked by a photographer for a photo in his residential neighborhood. Since I wasn’t there I don’t know what exactly transpired. I can imagine that some people were present who witnessed this incident.

This article reminded me of a few incidents where I had been asked for a picture and an event where I had asked someone for a picture.

I described already in my earlier posts the close-up taken from me at the UW dental clinic and how this incident in connection with the treatment from Dr. G. served as mocking and humiliation.

Here I would like to mention an occurrence that lies back almost 11 years. It was in the year 1996. At that time I worked at Microsoft in the quality assurance department of the Microsoft localization group. The incident I’m writing about definitely accounts for one of my ‘not so common experiences.’

One of my former colleagues, Dagmar, who had switched groups within Microsoft and was working in the Access localization group, invited me to the Office party because I had worked closely with the Access group during the localization process. And I accepted enthusiastically.

At arrival we were handed a one-time camera and some fictitious chips to play on staged gambling tables. We didn’t know why we received the camera but the reason for it became quite clear after a while because Bill Gates showed up at the party.

We noticed that female Microsoft employees constantly asked him for a picture with him. And picture after picture he patiently complied. Later we heard that he had just come back from Japan and there he had been constantly asked for having a picture taken with him.

Dagmar told me that she wanted a picture with him, too. And she asked me to be her photographer. And I complied, but I was neither knowledgeable about cameras nor the ones that you throw away after one-time use.

She also thought that I wanted a picture with Bill Gates, but that wasn’t the case. I’m actually a shy person, most times I’m an introvert, and I’m not the photogenic type. I don’t like pictures taken of me. But besides that I had another reason why I didn’t want a picture with Bill, but I keep this to myself. I only want to say here that the reason for not wanting a picture with Bill was not based on any resentment towards him.

When I took the picture of Dagmar and Bill, I just pushed one button on the camera and that was the trigger. After I had taken the photo Dagmar started to whine and told me that the flash had not gone off. I just knew that I had to press a trigger, and I had done this.

But her whining made me feel uncomfortable, and to make sure that she would get her picture with Bill Gates I decided to ask him for another shot.

Therefore I followed him while he was constantly asked by other female employees for a picture. At some point I plucked up my courage and approached him and asked him for another picture with Dagmar. The way of me approaching him was a bit unconventional because many people always surrounded him.

While I had followed him I snapped at the opportunity when he stood with his back an arms length away from me. To get his attention I just tapped him on the back of his left shoulder. And Bill turned very slowly around so that he could face me. I asked him for another picture with Dagmar, and he patiently accepted.

At that point I was pretty nervous. Firstly, I barely knew cameras nor did I know the camera I had in my hands, and secondly I felt overwhelmed by the whole situation.

When I took the second shot of Dagmar and Bill Gates, the flash didn’t go off again. I didn’t know what was wrong and I felt very uncomfortable. This time I had paid attention and I also had noticed that the flash had not been working.

After Bill noticed, too, that the flash had not gone off, he walked towards me and stopped at about a foot length in front of me. I had the camera in my hands and I was looking at it and I couldn’t believe that I was in this awkward position.

Bill asked me in a quiet manner to hand him the camera, which I did. And he looked at the camera while we both stood facing each other less than an arm length away from each other. While we stood so close to each other I had a kind of yoga-meditation experience that I had not known of. The overall awkward situation and the yoga feeling that I had experienced for a very short moment caused me inwardly more turmoil and to release this pressure I pulled the break by doing something that wasn’t really appropriate. At that time I just reacted to my inner turmoil.

While all this was going on I had noticed that another man hurried towards us and when this guy reached us, I took the camera out of Bill’s hands, handed the camera to the guy next to us, said to him “you do it”, and turned around and walked away.

I don’t know what was going on behind me, in that moment I just had to remove myself from this situation. Sure, the situation could have been handled better, but it wasn’t. And I’m certainly not proud of having acted this way at that time.

When this happened, many Microsoft employees and guests witnessed this incident. For quite some time I was reminded in subtle ways of this situation. For example, one time when I came home in the evening a neighbor blinded me in my car with a very bright flash that just went off when I passed by his house. Though I didn’t work at Microsoft anymore, I lived just around the main campus.

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