Gaining experiences of life through doing, some of which, aren’t at all, that pleasant one bit, translated…
I’d Felt, that Something, Wasn’t, Quite Right, But Our Four Legs Got, Nailed to the Floor, Like Under a Spell, We Both, Left Our, Personal Contact Information, and Paid a Fee for the Guarantees………
A Two-Hour Session Gained Us the Allowances We Received from Home of an Entire Week
A young woman who volunteers at the arts museum said she was headed to France to work-study and travel, I’m forty years older than she, and, I’d, recalled my own, part-timing experiences from back when.
During the summer after my first year of middle school, I was only fourteen, the week before school started, my homeroom instructor called me to the office, commanded me on: working hard in school, following the rules, having a very articulate way of speaking, is a good leader, as I was, basking in my own glory, she’d, given me the task of training of the volunteer team for the freshmen orientation.
The trainings started at the end of August, I led over forty first-year students, under the scorching sun, took them to practice on the marches, ready, set go! I’d hollered aloud, “one, two, one, two, one two, one”, and had my younger schoolmates answered me back. My homeroom watched under the tree in the distance. For two whole hours, I’d, set the line straight, earned $50N.T.s, this was, my allowance, for an entire week! I was so ecstatic, bought myself a very pretty looking notebook, as well as a log toast with raisins inside for my own breakfast.
The year I became a freshman in college, I’d worked in the cafeteria owned and operated my older cousin’s husband, to check people out for their orders. What’s mentioning, was that in the employee cafeteria of the United Daily building on Zhongxiao Road, section four, there are, a ton of my favorite writers, columnists, who’d come in for the foods, I’d, taken peeks at their work id tags, and, as a young fan, I’d, given them bigger portions.
On the summer after my freshman year in college, I’d wanted to make some extra money, my best friend, Ling and I followed the newspaper ads, gone to Hua-Ying Street in Taipei, and saw a row of steel-roofed shacks, with the billboard, “Work is guaranteed, otherwise, money back!”, there came a heavily made up middle age woman, with her bird nest hairstyle, saying hi to us smiling.
We’d felt something wasn’t, quite right, but our legs were, nailed to the ground for some unknown reasons, it felt like we were, hexed, and left our contact information with her, paid the money, then left. As I went home, the more I thought on it, the more wrong it’d, felt, the following morn, I’d, pulled Ling to the job hunting office, a bald man with his belly protruding forward, chewing on the betel nuts, shook his head stated to us, “There’s, no refund for the money for guarantees”, Ling was frightened she’d started, crying, I’d, forced myself to stay calm, stated in a tiny voice, “we don’t want your help looking for work then!”, the middle aged woman there added, “we’d sent out your information, and there will be, multiple job offers available for you to choose from, don’t hurry off yet.” And, don’t know where I got the courage, I’d told them loud, “my father is the manager of a police substation, he’ll come here in a while.”, then, the bald guy spat out his red phlegm, told the middle aged woman to return the money back to us, then, chased us out.
Not Everyone Can Afford to Work as a Waiter/Waitress, Moving the Plates
Being a Chinese department major, it’s hard, to find a job as a tutor, my friend from another major, Feng asked me, if I wanted to part-time as a waitress at a restaurant in the summers, other than a wage, I can also, earn some extra tips too, I’d thought of how I’d, worked at a cafeteria, and told her yes. The location of work is a very classy Chinese restaurant, the waitresses needed to dress themselves up in heels, traditional Chinese dresses, Feng taught me how to put on the eyeliners, mascara, lipsticks, but, she’d, given me a tightly fitted traditional Chinese dress, it’d, not felt like me. I’d imagined myself in that tightly fitted dress, high heels, bringing out the hotpots, it’ll be a blessing, not tripping and falling flat on my face, how can I possibly look, elegant?
And, this gig only, lasted two days, I was, so ashamed to go back to my families, I’d not gotten a cent in wages or tips, but spent, a whole lot of extra money on the mascara, the lipsticks, the eye shadows, and makeup. Ahh! Fine, my loss, this job isn’t, fitted, for everybody.
illustration from UDN.com
There were, a reduced number of mandatory courses for my senior year, and most of us were distracted from our studies, they’d all, gone looking for part-timing experiences using what they got. I sorted through the papers, found a job with “Chinese majors only, no experiences okay”, and started interning at a small scale publisher, the owner of the company was a man of about sixty, very gentlemanly, with his white hair, white beard, trimmed well. He’d told me to observe more, to learn more, not taught me anything. I’d realized, that books aren’t published here, the only thing this publisher published were, the three-page weekly news, with the commentaries, the columns, the essays, the poems, and translated articles, etc., etc., etc. Other than the cleaning lady, I was, the only other employee here.
And all day long, I can only, flip through the old pages of the news, I can’t help but wondered, where the articles in this newspaper publisher comes from? And what, can I learn here? About ten days later, the C.E.O. of Ya-Er Publishing finally showed up, and asked me what I’d learned? There came, a series of, question marks inside my mind, I’d, lowered my head down, said, in a hushed voice that I didn’t know. He’d, patted my back gently, hugged my shoulders, lightly said, “Don’t worry, I’ll show you everything I knew.”
Suddenly, my face turned red, my heart raced, chaos started off in my mind, that alarm started, sounding off inside, I’d, gotten up abruptly, and hit his face, grabbed my purse, ran out of the office. Holy SHIT! Another hard-to-open-up about, work experience.
If five years equals to a generation, then, I’m, eight generations older than the volunteer of the arts museum, and now, the younger generations’ minds were, evolved a lot, way faster than our, generations, I don’t need to teach about the dangers of the world anymore. I can only wish her, bon voyage!
And so, these, are the work experiences you had, and, most of which, weren’t worth, mentioning, because of your inexperience in life, people took or at least, tried to, take advantage of you, and you hoped, that this will NEVER happen, to the younger generation of first-time job hunters like it’d happened, to you, way back when.