The New Neighbour and What to do about Him

My previous neighbors were a young couple who lived next door. No noise from them except the odd time hearing their evening pleasures. Not a big deal.

They moved out 3 weeks ago and 2 middle aged guys moved in next door. The one guy goes out and comes in all day and night every 15-20 minutes and lets the wind slam the door each time. He smokes really disgusting smelling cigarettes (if they were the usual type cigs from back home I could deal with it but these are a real sweet smelling brand, disgusting). He smokes out in the hallway and the smoke goes into my apartment all the time choking me up.

Then when I go out, I notice he throws the butts out in the hallway and in the elevator as well.

I could deal with the noise but the smoking is really getting to me. I am not sure if I should go next door and just tell him to knock it off, or tell the security downstairs, or as a friend suggested to speak to the woman who is the president of the board of the building. Either way I think he might end up getting pissed if he knows I am complaining and make things a lot worse. Not sure exactly how to deal with this.

Suggestions anyone?

My advise for step one would be to explain the situation to security and ask them if it would be alright if you posted signs asking people to stop smoking in the hallway and leaving cigarette butts in the hallway and elevator

A few years ago , I would have advised you to complain bitterly to management,neighbours, police . Now I have become resigned to trying to think out solutions in a Taiwanese way. Surprisingly, a polite word with the nighbour about the Door banging and the smell of smoke , may actually improve the situation. Sometimes ( if you are ultra apologetic in complaining) they are completely unaware of their annoying behavior and they MAY apologise themselves and be rather embarrassed.
After that at least , if the problem persists, you can then complain to management and tell them that you have politely asked them to be reasonable.

Sometimes you have more power, if they are renting, in that Landlords prefer no hassle tenants.
Hope you fix it and all ends well.

There’s always that one bad egg thats a trouble maker.
AT my apartment complex in the USA. Over last year iv had someone throw catsup on my car on a few occasions. No serious damage, just had to clean it off. Then a few times it was some disgusting spit.

And now recently it has escalated to scratching my car.

Can’t fathom who it might be , but it seems to be directed against me personally.

But it’s a large lot and since it happens usually at night nobody is around to see it happen.

I supposed I should install some sort of camera in my car that can record images all night long and then play it back if something happens.

Previously i’d not had any issues.

So some trouble maker moved in.

Sometimes there isn’t a lot one can do.

Looks like you have some sort of person who works odd jobs and is rather uncouth.

He may be smoking indonesian clove cigarettes? Those have a distinct smell.

I used to hate them , because that was the prevailing smell when I visited Indonesia.

Now I actually will smoke a few myself when in indonesia. They aint bad. And I don’t even smoke.

[quote=“dan2006”]My previous neighbors were a young couple who lived next door. No noise from them except the odd time hearing their evening pleasures. Not a big deal.

They moved out 3 weeks ago and 2 middle aged guys moved in next door. The one guy goes out and comes in all day and night every 15-20 minutes and lets the wind slam the door each time. He smokes really disgusting smelling cigarettes (if they were the usual type cigs from back home I could deal with it but these are a real sweet smelling brand, disgusting). He smokes out in the hallway and the smoke goes into my apartment all the time choking me up.

Then when I go out, I notice he throws the butts out in the hallway and in the elevator as well.

I could deal with the noise but the smoking is really getting to me. I am not sure if I should go next door and just tell him to knock it off, or tell the security downstairs, or as a friend suggested to speak to the woman who is the president of the board of the building. Either way I think he might end up getting pissed if he knows I am complaining and make things a lot worse. Not sure exactly how to deal with this.

Suggestions anyone?[/quote]
No smoking in elevators, that’s official.
I had the same problem with the men, room renters on the 7th floor, 2-3 of them always lighting up when entering the elevator going down or putting them out inside going up. I made them clear, bluntly, no smoking and the elevator is no ashtray. Told the security guy many times, they put up signs but it still took a while before they stopped. Now no more butts or smoking in the lift.
I used to kick the butts out the lift in front of their apartment as I live on the 14th floor … I always stopped at the 7th.
People like that are illiterate dumbass people that don’t give shit about anyone else, never consider others, show no respect.

Responses to dumb posts were sent from my Nexus 7, I hate Apple BTW, with Tapatalk 8

I’d say talk to the building mgt, if these are renting, mgt might even ask the original owner to step in. If mgt will get on it they might be quite powerful.

To the OP:

Whatever you do, don’t piss the guy off, at least not yet.

He sounds like a bit of a low-flyer, so he could become even worse if he takes a dislike to you. The guy coming in and out every 20 minutes. Could he be a drug dealer?

[quote=“BigJohn”]To the OP:

Whatever you do, don’t piss the guy off, at least not yet.

He sounds like a bit of a low-flyer, so he could become even worse if he takes a dislike to you. The guy coming in and out every 20 minutes. Could he be a drug dealer?[/quote]
Is he carrying a bag or man purse? Money collector or dealer.

Responses to dumb posts were sent from my Nexus 7, I hate Apple BTW, with Tapatalk 8

[quote=“Belgian Pie”][quote=“BigJohn”]To the OP:

Whatever you do, don’t piss the guy off, at least not yet.

He sounds like a bit of a low-flyer, so he could become even worse if he takes a dislike to you. The guy coming in and out every 20 minutes. Could he be a drug dealer?[/quote]
Is he carrying a bag or man purse? Money collector or dealer.

Responses to dumb posts were sent from my Nexus 7, I hate Apple BTW, with Tapatalk 8[/quote]
Or he could just be, you know, like, an asshole.

Dumb responses to dumb posts were sent from my Asus laptop, death to homicidal maniacs BTW, with fingers.

[quote=“Belgian Pie”][quote=“BigJohn”]

The guy coming in and out every 20 minutes. Could he be a drug dealer?[/quote]

Is he carrying a bag or man purse? Money collector or dealer.
[/quote]

Oh for fuck’s sake. He’s a smoker. He’s going outside for a cig. Didn’t you guys figure that out?

by the way, technically it is illegal to smoke in any building, especially not in public areas, so go with a soft approach first, if they are being douche bags, then going to the police will at least get them into some trouble, however, once you go that route, they might try to get back at you in a very passive aggressive fashion.

I have a neighbour one floor below who burns the ghost money in his little ghost money burner every month or so (indoors, smoke ends up in my apartment).

Last week I called him out on it. He gave me a dirty look. And he did it this week again.

What can you do? Their country, their culture.

Smokers - different story. I’ve been in a Shangri-La hotel when a bunch of ‘tuhao’/‘fuerdai’ clowns got in smoking. My instinct was to reprimand them. I got off at the next floor and caught the next lift. Too old to fight the useless ruffians who walk around.

Start soft and get progressively tougher if he persists. If hes always out in the hallway smoking, it should be easy enough to pop your head out and say something.

“Hi hows it going” big smile, “you guys settle in ok?” , “so, you might not be aware of it, but when you smoke, the smell comes into my apartment”

if he persists, “yeah, so how about not doing that, can you smoke outside please?” , if he agrees, pick up some cookies or something to reward him for being a good boy. If not take it up with building management.

Theres many ways to approach the situation. Pop your head out and say “wow, pretty heavy smoker, thats the 4th today…want to know how I know? Because every time you go out for a smoke you slam the door so hard, you can hear it half way down the road, plus the smoke comes into my apartment and sticks the place up”

when I moved into my current place, I noticed that every night someone from downstairs smokes in the bathroom and the smoke travels up the vents so my bathroom smells like a bar in the 50s. I went to my building’s manager, who said if they are smoking in their room there’s nothing they can do about it, unless I have proof who is smoking in their room. Frankly, there is no legal way that I can think of to obtain such proof… so in the end I shelled out 500 NT and an afternoon for this sucker:

pcstore.com.tw/053701111/M12825166.htm

the smell has since gotten into a tolerable level. By the way, I noticed my vent fan already has something similar built into it, I stuck the new one directly next to the existing device, and it did the trick…

[quote=“Baas Babelaas”]I have a neighbour one floor below who burns the ghost money in his little ghost money burner every month or so (indoors, smoke ends up in my apartment).

Last week I called him out on it. He gave me a dirty look. And he did it this week again.

What can you do? Their country, their culture.

Smokers - different story. I’ve been in a Shangri-La hotel when a bunch of ‘tuhao’/‘fuerdai’ clowns got in smoking. My instinct was to reprimand them. I got off at the next floor and caught the next lift. Too old to fight the useless ruffians who walk around.[/quote]
You can hope he burns down his place … right, forget I mentioned it as he lives under you

Sent from my MI 2S using Tapatalk

Thanks for all the replies and sorry for my slow response, I was working 2 full days and just flopped in bed when I got home.

Buzzkill, I was going to prepare the signs to put up and I had decided to put one on every floor so it did not look like I was singling him out. However I decided to run the idea past the regular security guard. He said that other people had complained too and the cleaning lady was getting pissed finding his cigarette butts all over the floor and elevator. He told me in no uncertain terms to speak to the tenant, and that he would do so. He said 3 times, don’t talk to the guy.

shiadoa Your suggestion also sounds good because that is what I would do back home. Just directly speak to the person. It was funny because in one of my classes, my students all said not to do that in Taiwan because he might just smile and then later slash my scooter tires :laughing: I decided to reserve this idea if speaking to the guard didn’t work since I don’t want any retribution.

Tommy that sucks about your car. The ironic thing is that once you install a camera, someone will probably look in and see it and try to break in to steal it :smiley: Had that happen once to me. Some thugs thought there was a laptop case in my car and broke my window to get it, then realized that it was full of books, then smashed another window to punish me for fooling them. Your case might just be some punk kids thinking they are funny but who knows.
As far as my neighbor he is a bit uncouth but friendly and all. That’s why I want to resolve this with a minimum of fuss.

Belgian Pie your method of kicking the butts to their apartment is quite smart. My mom used to do that with our neighbor. Their friends would come over and throw the butts on our side so she would pick them up with the dustpan and send it back to the neighbors side. The butts on our side slowly went down in number. And yes, these type of people don’t have any respect.

mukashi yup I did that, spoke to the building management.

BigJohn I have a feeling he might be a dealer of something. He always gets on the phone immediately when he goes out and talks loud in the hallway, even at 2am. But sometimes he comes back within 5 minutes.

Varmint “Or he could just be, you know, like, an asshole.” - Yes, yes he is

monkey - He can’t be going out for a cig since the entire hallway and his room reeks of cigarette smoke, I don’t think he goes out to smoke.

hansioux I didn’t know it is illegal for him to smoke in his room too. Interesting.

Baas Babelaas I don’t know what goes through peoples heads to burn ghost money indoors or right near the door of the entrance. At some McDonald’s in Tainan, they also set up the ghost money burning outside the doors. I was going to complain to the American office about this, but ended up not. Nothing is more disgusting than trying to eat while smelling that crappy smoke. You should take a garden hose to the guys bucket of cancer paper. :smiley:

Mick I had a good laugh with your suggestion “wow, pretty heavy smoker, thats the 4th today…want to know how I know? Because every time you go out for a smoke you slam the door so hard, you can hear it half way down the road, plus the smoke comes into my apartment and sticks the place up” Too funny…!

Again thanks everyone for your ideas

Since speaking with the guard, the guy doesn’t let the door slam often anymore, and the smell of smoke is greatly reduced, but not completely gone.
I’m going to ask the landlord to come over and install weatherstripping on the door and I think that might help a lot. There is no smell coming through the drain, I checked that. If it still continues I might buy an air filter for the room.
If the guy starts smoking again to the same extent in the hallways or elevator, I will go speak to him myself and try to sort it out. But as of now, the situation is much better.

So I finally snapped and called my landlord about the neighbors smoking in the hallway and throwing his butts on the floor. My landlady is nice but loud so she was quite upset and marched down to the guard to complain. The guard looked concerned so he went to the neighbor telling him to cut it out but he didn’t wait for us to go downstairs so we hid in the hallway but im sure the neighbor heard us.

The guy looks and acts like a gangster so Im awaiting slashed tires any moment now. Or even the guy to wait for me one night.

Do be careful. I knew a foreigner here who was stabbed and killed by his upstairs neighbor because the foreigner went upstairs twice to complain about partying noise.

Er, :whistle:

Do be careful. I knew a foreigner here who was kidnapped, beaten to black&blue and thrown away to the sea by his downstairs neighbor because the foreigner went online describing all the neighbor perks during the last few months.