I have not been in the best frame of mind recently. I have this tension building up in me. With no job (and no real good job) in sight, I am not in a very comfortable position. At home, I can't roll over on a single bed, there is no TV , no computer, no nothing for home entertainment and I feel restricted and stifled as I can't bring friends in. It is just NOT HOME.
I worry about the days ahead especially over fast dwindling finances. My investment had not grown as much as I wanted it to and I have to be really tight-fisted. I can't buy my own place yet and I can't do any single thing.
It is my head that suffers the most. There is this throbbing pain centred between my eyebrows every time I am anxious or tensed up. When I am stressed like this, I can't think straight and I can spiral into despair and depression very quickly.
Every little incident or demand triggers negativism and I feel like I am snapping in two and breaking down when I am like this.
I just hope to get myself out of this rut real soon. I can't go on like this forever.
I really wanna kill all those FUCKTARDS (schools, government agencies, wimpy landlords and everyone) who push me into this unenviable and precarious situation. They are like pushing me to the brink of death without a single regard for my well-being and health.
FUCK YOU ALL, FUCKING BASTARDS!!!
The bus journey to get to the interview
I set off at exactly 3.30pm. The bus didn't come till 3.45pm. When I reached the bus-stop near the interview venue, it was almost 4.35 pm. Walking round MAS building to get to Springleaf Tower and taking the elevator up to the 19th floor took a good 7 minutes or more at least. I made it to the office at about 4.45pm.
A total of 1 hr 15 minutes (give or take 5 minutes) . And this is during the off-peak hour. Bus service 162 meanders its way through Thomson Road, Upper Thomson Road , Orchard Road and Shenton Way, all high-traffic areas with many stoplights.
The interview venue
A glitzy outfit redolent with the air of too much corporatism when it should be education.
Filling in the application form
A standard operating procedure. But of course I can't speak for the sanity of some of the particulars required.
If it is me they are employing, why does it have to involve my parents, spouse and children (some even need your siblings' information).
There is a column for naming the dialects I can converse, read and write in, with ranking ranging from excellent to average. Ihave to fill these in.
I deliberately left the reading and writing parts out as all Chinese dialects are read and written in the two standard Mandarin forms : simplified or traditional. It is only the spoken form that differs.
There are other application forms I have filed which need academic grades for every subject you sat for in all the major exams, right down from secondary to pre-university level. As if grades are any real measure of performance and competence.
The interviewer
A Vice-President of Administration and Student Affairs. It is also very sad that all the calls I have received so far (and previously) with regard to a schedule for an interview appointment never had the caller identifying who she/he is (or at least from what department) and who I will actually be meeting up with at the interview.
She was purposeful, full of questions and regal. I found myself loosening up a bit and softening my rigid stance. I warmed up a little. That is because this is already my 4th instance of interview and by now I am more than amply prepared. Questions were too fast and furious though and I would have preferred more time to reflect on them.
I must hand it to her - by far the best interviewer I have had- so far.....
The interview
I had to talk about myself. I talked about why I like education and training.
It went on to my teaching experiences in commercial schools and that was when the past rankled just a little.
For one, I won't be writing materials for anyone except unless I am tasked and paid to do so.
What the interview raked up from the past
Lots of assessment books to work on. That was exactly what two commercial schools did. And the books were not the really well-written kind.
Another had one master copy for moi and I had to xerox copies for the class. I had to supplement this with my own materials. The school had none whatsoever and worse, there were no audio tapes for the listening comprehension section. I had to read it out.
Talk about adequacy of administrative and educational support.
Conclusion
This is probably a job I can do over the next few months untill what I desire most comes along.
Gut feels
If what I experience here is extrapolated to the way Singapore conducts business with the rest of the world, I can't keep feeling that not many would be impressed or would even like to transact with us.
It leaves one cold and administratively burdened to sift through tonnes of paperwork like this. Not to mention dealing with issues of legality , rules and regulations.
That could explain some of our limited success in the international sphere for doing business or even in diplomacy and in general human relations.
It is like this kindly and friendly old lady down at the coffee shop who serves up rojak on a platter. She has a ready smile, is easy going and sincerely good at putting people at ease. Not a hardened female dominatrix.
No wonder she has won scores of ardent fans hankering after her food. Maybe we should all take a leaf from her. A BIG LOTUS LEAF.
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