Ted's New Realm

I saw a part-time job opportunity on the department website last Tuesday and just gave it a shot. It was looking for translators in the Taipei lantern festival. I then, sent my resume and, quite surprised, got a call in the next morning around nine or ten from the company. A man said that he wanted me to have an interview as soon as possible, so I had an appointment with him during four to four thirty on the day. I was a bit nervous what the interview would be. 
              After receiving the call I came to awareness that I would probably have class till four thirty. The first period of the class began at 3:30, that is, I was destined to be late (LOL~). I got a call again as expected from the man during the class, asking “where are you now?” “I’m so sorry that I am still in class right now” apologized I. He told me that he wanted me to work directly today without interview and that I could take it easy. I still, in the end, left an hour earlier the class which probably lasted until six thirty.
            After arriving the venue for the festival in Sun Yat-Sen Memorial Hall, I was asked to punch in immediately after I was introduced the basic information about the job just for a few minutes. My job was to stay at one of the information counters and receive visitors, especially foreigners. I was kindly instructed by the fellows what kinds of questions were raised often by visitors, and I handled the job pretty soon since it was such a simple work.

About my work time, I was given the right to decide the time I leave. Since the exhibition ended at 11 thirty every night, having no clear idea yet about the entire situation, the first night I stayed almost until the midnight 12. I got home completely exhausted around 12 thirty. Some poor fellows arrived at their home even after 1 or 2 am. So the next day I asked the senior if I could leave at 11 and he said OK. I was lucky, by the way, that I lived relatively close to Sun Yat-Sen Memorial Hall, some fifteen minutes away by bus, though there were not any buses at all after around 10:45 pm.

I was assigned to different counters almost every night. Some of the counters were full of people, in another word, full of tasks, while some were not. The busiest day I had was the night at which electronic glow sticks were distributed for free. There were so many people that I even had to direct the people waiting in line to the place where would not obstruct the traffic flow of the entrance to the hall. I was almost standing for a couple of hours in a row at the night.

I started working there from the middle till the end of the festival, from last Wednesday to Sunday, five days in total. I was paid 100 dollars an hour and dinners were provided. During the five days I saw different sorts of people among the visitors and also learned something from the job this time. I will talk about it next time.

From the short-term part time job, five days in total, I gained some experience and perspective I had never had before doing the job in person. It was the first time when I did a serving-related work, meeting so many people in just five days, some quite funny and some quite bizarre. Through the work, in addition, I found that I am not the sort for serving customers, or people.

It is said that the job was of translation but there were only a few foreign visitors a night, just around 5 or so. Therefore I still did the same content of work as the other general workers did. Visitors coming to the info counters were varied kinds of people, really just as a Chinese proverb goes, 一樣米養百樣人 (I literally translate it, ‘one kind of rice/food can raise hundreds of different people.’) I give some cases of strong impression in the following.

I met an almost-insane advocate of the Taipei City mayor. He came to the counter asking the policewoman for the method to send written files to the mayor. The files were his journals of visiting the entire Flora Expo with all of the photos taken himself. “I’ve been to every corner in the expo and took pictures wholeheartedly,” enthusiastically said he, “the mayor makes the whole city much warmer and nicer than ever.” He kept doing on, “And the lantern festival, the lanterns were so artistic” showing to us a picture of a lantern in his V8 camera. The lantern in the picture, for me, was just so ordinary, nothing artistic at all.

Listening to the blabla he said, I kept laughing out loud in mind, though only “smiles” appeared on my face. His prodigious enthusiasm for the mayor made him so funny. I think he definitely would fight till the end for the mayor with the mayor’s opponents, also wholeheartedly. LoL~

Another case in which I saw something social was a well-dressed middle-aged lady from China coming over to ask me where He-ping East Road was. In order to answer her question, I turned around to get a map for her since it was quite far away. And she stopped me immediately and emotionally, “No, no , no! I don’t need the map. Just tell me where to take a taxi!” Her anger, thinking me disturbing her, told me the truth that how rich the people at the top in China are. It costs quite a lot to taxi to the road!

Next time I will talk about the last visitor I was impressed at and my conclusion to the part-time job.

The last visitor whom I was impressed at was a middle-aged Taiwanese lady, wanting to borrow a flashlight because there was a game of stamp collection and each different stamp located differently. Some of the places were dark where the stamps were. It was sure that no flashlight available.

She then began arguing about the bad design of the height of the stamp tables, “the tables are too high to reach for children.” I answered I would inform the authorities of it for her. Then she replied, ”No use! I’ve already called 1999. And the officials just said they’ll improve NEXT YEAR!” She kept murmuring for a while before she left. Two days later, I met her again at another info counter. Both the policewoman and I recognize her. The policewoman told the lady that she knew her, and I said I also did. The lady seemed a bit embarrassed, just a bit, “why everybody knows me!” This time she came to fill out questionnaires to get free drawing books. How many questionnaires are filled, how many books she could get.

The lady chatted with us, saying that she had come for days in order to make more stamp collections because her children loved it. And it was so funny that she prepared her own ink pad for “perfect collection.” LoL~ She grumbled that the stamps were all worn out, and that she knew the main info counter had the whole set of the stamps, which usually only the workers knew. Because I wanted a collection too, I told her that I had asked the main counter for the set on that day but it was taken away. So it meant that I had to hop around the whole exhibition area to collect the stamps.

After the lady finished a number of questionnaires, I secretly gave her two more drawing books other than the number she deserved. From then on I went to help other visitors. Later on, no idea how long had pasted, she came to me and stuffed me a collection of hers, whispering “Here you go!” I was so touched by her action!

The rest is my conclusion to the entire part-time job. I found that there were many fellows are college graduates who don’t get a decent job yet. For the general fellows, some of them are still college graduates but major in something I think not that useful in pursuing decent works. They, to be frank, possess no proficiency.

 For the translators, excluding English ones since those I met are still students like me, two out of the three Japanese translators I know are college graduates, and the other person is about to apply for a translation program. I think one of the reasons the two girls are still taking par-time jobs is because of the recession nowadays though they have proficiency. All in all, no proficiency almost absolutely finds no job, while proficiency also would find no job. It is such an era of puzzle.
                In addition, by the job i caution myself that I need to work/study hard so that i don't need to work for a job hourly paid for $100 NT. Compared to the job of tutoring paid $100 NT hourly, the job of 100 dollars makes me think that "IS MY TIME SO WORTHLESS?" It is true that knowleage, or knowhow, is something very important.