The perils of making a good first impression

Freeflight had impressive offices for a ten-person design operation. Ant remembered them from the interviews. A freestanding double-story with full glass frontage in a Midrand office park.
This indicated either a design shop that was ready for lift-off or an operation hopelessly overinvested in its corporate image.
Seeing as he’d just won an art-director’s position there, Ant was going to keep believing it was the former until it was proven otherwise.
It was his first day at work, and he was set to make a good impression. He rocked a stylishly unkempt new haircut from Theo in Melville, a fashionably torn Magents T-shirt from the Y shop at the Zone and a new pair of Counter Culture sneakers. He’d offset the torn, scruffy look with a smart pair of 501s for an overall image of edgy, creative ambition.
Gift, the dreadlocked creative director, showed him to his desk and introduced him to the team. Six okes and four girls – including a stunning designer named Simone.
“We’re gonna have a rocking time, dude,” he said. “Get settled and then meet us in the bar downstairs. We’re having a farewell for Shane, the oke you’re replacing.”
The word was Shane was moving to a more conservative design shop. He was in his thirties and recently married.
Freeflight was notorious for having the hardest-partying creatives in all of advertising. Their exploits at the annual Loerie awards were the stuff of legend. At last year’s one Ant had seen the entire Freeflight team playing touch rugby with their Golden Loerie in the parking in Spiderman outfits at 4am.
That’s when he’d decided he’d like to work here.
He could party down with the best of them and he was anxious to prove that to his new colleagues, especially Bohemian young Simone with the blonde ringlets and the beret…
They commenced Shane’s farewell drinks at 11am, and had drained the beer bathtub by 2pm. By three they were in Newtown at Kapitan’s curry den, screaming through plates of mutton vindaloo and a terrifying series of tequila suitcases.
5pm saw Ant dressed in a sari, serenading his new co-workers with a version of Loslappie that he’d picked up during his time working for Mossel Bay Tourism. “Ek is ‘n loslappie,” he crooned, suggestively waving the fringe of his sari at Simone, who seemed more confused than impressed.
By 7pm they were at a bowling alley in Randburg, blowing vuvuzelas and breakdancing in the lanes wearing luminous-green afro wigs. An hour after that they were at the casino, smoking cigars as thick as broomsticks and lining up absinthes so strong it made Ant’s eyes water just to look at them.
At one point, as they staggered down the cobblestone alleys of Montecasino’s Tuscan backstreets. Thabo the copywriter asked if Ant was doing okay. But, painfully aware of the office culture, he felt obliged to shrug him off and hit the Vacca Matta action bar for brandy and more cigars.
Ant’s first sign that he might not have the capacity required to ride with the big boys was when the face of Simone, his object of desire, morphed into triple-focus as he delivered his most successful chat-up line: “You know, we’re just the right size for each other…”
Then there came dance music so loud that talk became meaningless. So Ant’s only way to demonstrate his manliness was by showing her. For some reason, and for the rest of his career in advertising, Ant would wonder why, he decided to whip out his lighter, partially drop his pants and set his pubic hair alight.
It made sense at the time, but it proved a bit more than the bouncers could stomach and the entire Freeflight staff was soon evicted, while Ant was taken to the security office and charged with public indecency.
In the cold light of the next morning, Ant’s eagerness to impress the hip guys also appeared to have gone a step too far. He was fired on arrival for his second day of work and for the rest of his career would be known as That Oke Who Set His Pubes Alight.
It was also the kind of notorious exploit that makes a creative’s reputation. Ant would never struggle to find ad-agency work, but his relationship with cute, Bohemian Simone with the blonde ringlets never developed.
They were, though, just the right size for each other.