The revelation that some House Hunters and House Hunters International episodes might not be as truthful as they first appear hit some people hard. When I was back in the states one woman’s account of making her episode was national news. But nothing was affected more seriously than the strained diplomatic relations between Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan as a consequence of the scandal that broke after I wrote about my own experiences with HHI on this blog.
Wait… what?
Okay, I’m kidding. Remember Harvey? Harvey the fake real estate agent?
He is a real lawyer and is teaching a law class at AUCA this semester. For real. He made up a fake scenario based (loosely) on our HHI experience in which my blog somehow causes my business to fail (not true), Harvey’s (fake) real estate business to fail, Harvey to get evicted from his apartment (not true), and a diplomatic rift between Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan after the Kazakh ambassador accuses Kyrgyzstan of discriminating against Kazakhs with rental prices (not true, relations between the two countries were just dandy last time I checked). So then everybody sues me.
With this set-up, I need good legal advice. Harvey’s co-teacher became my fake lawyer and I went to her today to explain (in front of a class of local law students) the whole mess. They were required to take diligent notes of my mock-interview (unfortunate for them, my acting skills have not improved) and will learn about how to deal with clients and go through a typical (though completely hypothetical) case. It was a fun exercise to participate in and a good excuse to see Harvey again. I hope the students will benefit more from seeing the lawyer-client interaction than if they had only been given a written explanation of the “case”.
But most importantly, let’s hope these students are smart enough to figure out how to get me off the hook. I’m totally innocent, I swear!