ministry of friends
Saturday, April 22, 2006 (8:46 AM)
seems that a lot of people are going for government jobs nowadays, not to mention the entrepreneurs. though not most of my friends are working for the ministries, there's a significant number heading in that direction.
the most popular of all, ministry of education. to work as a teacher? no. the site says 'general education officer'. it's the era when we are less interested in the actual job and more interested in having fanciful titles. after all, the job scope nowadays don't fit the titles. a clerk, now known as 'administrative executive' simply does every other job no one else wants to do. the linesman in soccer matches have been linguistically promoted to 'referee's assistant' because apparently, 'linesman' sounds derogatory. how? don't ask me. a technician is now a 'technological executive', a network engineer is called a 'network consultant' and a young mama shop start-up is called 'ceo'. it is fair enough to call qian hu's boss a director because afterall, it has grown to a corporation.
i had contemplated going for the moe teaching award mailed to arts undergrads months ago. but thinking of the bond and the students nowadays, it's hard to put my pen to it. no doubt, the salary is attractive with a minimum $2406 for degree holders. and mind you, that's the salary during training. after training, it could go as high as $3292. but then again, is it all about the money? probably not. i've seen how mr. suhaimi kinda regretted taking up the teaching bond. he was in his first/second year of bond when i was in tpjc for the 3 months of 'harrowing experience' and he couldn't wait to get out of teaching line. the whole experience in tpjc was fine except for the toilets. ask anyone in the 2000 batch, you will know how terrible it stank during that period.
speaking of toilet, i wonder who designed my toilet door. it is so user unfriendly and dad has to choose it. oh well, we've lived with it for almost 9 years now. i just remember the first time grace came over, she didn't dare to call out to me when she got trapped in the toilet. it was until quite some time later, probably around 15-20 minutes, that michelle asked me, 'how come grace take so long? you better go check it out'. it was only then i realised she could've been trapped in the toilet. when i went into the kitchen, there was no sound in the toilet. then i called out, 'grace, are you trapped?', hearing my voice, she started moaning like a kid frightened out of her wits, couldn't wait to get out of there. thankfully, the door was pretty new, and i helped her release the knob from outside (don't worry, i don't go around releasing door knobs). when the door opened, she jumped out patting herself repetitively as if she'd just seen ghost. since then, she never dared step into my house again. muwahahahaha... *stupid door* but it was pretty funny that she just waited in the toilet for someone to come along. there wasn't anyone else at home anyway besides mich, shar, des and jun. she could've just shouted. des is another funny character. towards the end of an iiso tutorial, he wanted to go to the toilet urgently but he thought he could've just waited for a while more since it's ending soon. but doris teo kept talking and talking and he was so desperately in need of a toilet that he actually typed www.toilet.com on his browser. talk about fantasizing. i got lost somehow talking about toilets.
anyway, teaching is tough work which is exactly why not many people can last decades of teaching. many simply leave once their bond is up. there is only one person i know of going to work with the ministry of foreign affairs but it sounds pretty cool to deal with foreign delegates, not so much the policy making. the posting overseas makes it sound more fun, except that it's like 3 years. doesn't sound so fun anymore huh? no one can beat jun when it comes to fun at the ministry. of course his job isn't that much fun but it's the ministry that youngsters love the most - the ministry of sound.