| Ja-Naru |
| The Interview |
| I woke up on the Thursday morning feeling pretty strange. I put some of that down to an evening down the pub the night before (just a couple of drinks to settle the nerves, obviously) but mostly because of what was happening later that day. I was only a few hours away from my interview. The interview for a job that would allow me to live in Japan for a year. Before I carry on, perhaps I should explain what I had been doing up until then. After finishing uni and enjoying a good summer with a few weeks work here and there, September suddenly arrived and I was out of a job. I began trawling through the job sections, sending off applications but with no luck. One morning, I saw an advertisement for a job teaching at English school in china, so thought 'why not?' and applied. A week or two later the school in question offered me an interview, after which they offered me a place. That was it. A fresh start in the Far East. Then Osama reared his ugly head. A week after the terrorist attacks in New York, I received an e-mail telling me that because of the attacks in America, enrolments had plummeted and they were no longer able to offer me the teaching post. I was gutted. It was from that point on that I decided to try and look for work closer to home...... |
| After months of trying, I was still no nearer to finding that elusive job, so when I saw the advert for teaching in Japan, I decided to go for it. A few weeks later I heard back from the company, inviting me for an interview. |
| So, back to where I started. After a short train ride into the City, I met up with a mate of mine and we grabbed some lunch in Carnaby Street. It had a nice, laid back feel apart from the Big Issue salesman who was constantly shouting. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for the Big Issue and the good it does for the homeless, but this guy was doing my nerves no good at all. His claims of being able to speak seven languages, fly planes, drive buses and anything else you can imagine were winding me up more and more... |
| I arrived at the company offices and the butterflies started to kick in; I went into reception, introduced myself and was asked to take a seat with three other applicants. The office was as I expected-surrounded by photos of Japan with a few magazines about life in Japan scattered on a coffee table. I noticed the receptionist was an immaculately well-dressed, with a crisp side parting and perfect posture. He almost looked like a drone or a robot designed to make the company look good. Or the kind of guy who lead a double life as a psychotic killer. I pushed these ridiculous thoughts out of my head and tried to concentrate on the interview. After about ten minutes, we were ushered into a room and given what we had been told would be 'a presentation'. Two hours later we emerged from the room, brains overflowing with information about the company and teaching in Japan. I felt drained and the interviews hadn't even started yet. We were offered a drink and told that the interviews would begin in 15 minutes time. One of the applicants had left before the presentation had even begun-apparently the company does not allow its teachers to have piercings or dyed hair. This girl had plenty of both; piercings in her ears, nose and eyebrows with purple, green and orange hair done in dreadlocks. She would have probably scared most of the students to death. The three of us who were left began chatting (you know, that nervous, prevent-the-silence type of chat about anything you can think of) and were then called in one by one to the interview rooms. |
 |
 |