New Job: First Week

First Day:


First day was alright. I arrived early and saw my friend there. Coincidentally she was working there as well, so at least I had topics to chat with her. The first day went well, I just needed to count the books, take their names down and wrap them.

The there was an one hour lunch break between. I drove to the restaurant I previously worked at and told them I resigned and that she need not bothered to help me in finding another job. She looked relieved and I didn't care. Then I went to visit another friend who was working in a restaurant nearby. Lol. The life of a waiter - I experienced it first hand, and it sucked.

Then I went back to work. After that, the boss came in. He looked young for his age, and when he stepped into the shop he saw me and greeted me. I was sitting on the floor then, and I made a mistake by not standing up to reciprocate. I know it's bad, and I regret it. He looked hostile and fierce when he was serious, but when he greeted me he wore a totally different facial expression - he looked hospitable and loving.

He was acting a bit weird when he asked me how long I could work, before I could give a reply he said "the longer the better". It was curious. He didn't know how I perform, why would he say that? What if I turned out to be someone who was incredibly fragile and unable to lift a single box of books, and I was always reluctant to do any physical work or simply wrap a book? Would he betray what he said and fire me?

Well....I guess I won't know.

Second Day:


Book fair day! I had to start my work before the sun ray struck. As a boy I had to help to transport the piles of boxes of books to the lorry. It was hard in the beginning, since I ain't physically strong, but it was indeed a good exercise.

Then we travelled to SMK TAR, about 30 minutes ride from BM. At first, my boss brought us to the venue, and the venue, frankly, looked screamingly incongruous. The place looked like an ignored part of the school, where students gathered around to laze around or chit-chat after schooling or during recess. Weird.

But then we had our book fair there. It was tiring, since I had to unload all the boxes of books (with the help of another two guys though) and emptied their contents on the tables. It was extremely tiring and wasting time, and before we could finish unloading them students began to pour in. We were told to dump whatever they were still un-dumped on the table, and so did we heed his advice and let it be.

After that my duty was to walk around, secure the area and prevent thefts. It was fine, and I began to chum up with the guy named David there. After hours of fair, we began to pack the books back into the boxes and, tiringly, sat on the tiny little kancil and drove back to Bukit Mertajam which is situated approximately 30 minutes drive ride from the school.

Back in the office I was told to join boss to another location on the next day (expected, since he needed me to carry the loads) and he asked me a question: "Is today tiring?", to which I answer: "It'll take me some time."

A feeble answer, I know.


Third Day


My third day was spent at another two completely different places, and I'll regale you with what I did in the next post as it'll be extra lengthy considering I had done quite a lot in the day.


Fourth Day


The third and the last day in STAR. People had begun to lose interest in book fair, as those who were interested had already visited it two days before and those who wanted to buy anything had bought what they wished for. Rarely there would be a person whose interest was enigmatically rekindled after two days of exposure.

As it was the last day, the job was rather easy and the throng was significantly less.

We finished at around 5pm, and began to pack everything. All books were collected back into the boxes, and the lorry came to help us ferry the books back to the office. It took quite a while to pack them and clear the scene as we were short-handed (can't imagine how it would be without us, since they were already short-handed even with 3 helpers), and we left the school around 6.15pm.

Alas, the traffic congestion was terrible. Around 7pm, out of concern, the boss' wife called me and inquired where we were, and I told her we just exited Juru toll and then probably she felt relieved.

Well, first book fair was all right. I'm looking forward to other book fairs.