What are the chances of living a corporate life and then getting yourself detached from reality?
Um… maybe 80 percent?
That’s already a modest estimate, I think.
I learned that when the MassComm class I was handling – and I in tow --- went to an exposure trip to Manila, a trip that was so f*cked up, well-behaved colegialas were cussing like lumberjacks. (More of that later.)
Anyway, part of the itinerary was a call center (don’t ask!), which has offices all over the world. So we went up one to of its offices in the Philippines and met two of the most vapid, vacuous individuals to ever walk the planet.
One, a girl in disconcertingly coordinated green, told the group that her company takes pride in competition. "[Name of company] doesn't want people who stay in one place. You have to move up while you are staying here. That shows you are competitive." And on the next breath, she gushed (upon seeing her co-worker’s new laptop) in her whiniest voice: “Uy, ang daya… you have a new laptop…. I gotta have one of those…” And she spoke it in a colegiala accent so bad, it ought to be shot.
She displayed more of her vapidness when she toured us inside and went, “Ah… this area [points to an area where people are apparently waiting for something – I don’t care, really] is like a fishbowl. It’s made of glass, see [yeah, lady, we can see]… so when we see someone cute, we go, ‘Uy, look here… that guy’s cute.” Eyes were rolling.
And that’s just half of the story.
The guy who was with her, the one with a new laptop, was a classic case of what happens when one actually believes his/her own hype and thinks he/she is better than others. Check out the gems coming out of his mouth:
“What is needed in this company is constant practice and training. After six months, we don’t exactly expect you to speak like me.” Ah… yes, because if we speak like you, that would be retrogressing. Check your grammar first before you go all hoity-toity on us… Gawd!
“It doesn’t matter what kind of accent you speak. It’s just that, it’s not good to speak like the taxi drayber ober der who speks layk des…” Yeah… right. Well, newsflash. The taxi driver you just poked fun at knows more about life than you do. In fact, I learned something so much more from any 15-minute ride with a taxi driver than you, moron. Sheeeshhhhhhhhh…..
But what really gets me was when one of their co-workers actually told us flat-out she couldn’t accommodate us because she was interviewing somebody in 10 minutes.
Uh… hello… I can see she was just chatting with somebody.
So I asked Ms Girl in Green: “Is that how you interview people? Online?”
“No… we have telephone interviews and walk-in interviews.”
My students could sense the sarcasm in my voice. Ms Girl in Green couldn’t. Maybe, such subtleties just couldn’t penetrate through her (green) thick headband.
So a few points to ponder: If you are given a chance to work with these kinds of people, would you? That would mean improving your accent (not necessarily grammar and vocabulary. Ms Green just confused “indulge” with “splurge”… ahahahaha!), having a new laptop, and a fab wardrobe.
But then, that would mean being one, politically incorrect; two, absolutely rude; three, socially unaware and four, downright insensitive to people you think are lower than you.
Would you do it if it means you would someday imbibe a culture so superficial, so petty the highlights of the day are comparing laptops, chatting through YM and spotting cute trainees?
I say thanks, but no thanks.
I doubt if these idiots know who the President is.
Or name any three representatives from a party-list.
Or know that the capital of the country has been changed from Quezon to Manila.
Or care about how people in sweatshops and haciendas are exploited.
Or what the implications of outsourcing really is to our labor force (Newsflash: MNCs want us because we offer cheap labor -- and we speak good English. So that means the Philippines is a mill for mediocre, English-speaking cheap labor. Ain't exactly something to be proud of.)
These people are so caught up in their own vapid world, I doubt if they know anything outside their own ivory towers.
So, I’d rather deal with the stress of the job I have right now.
At least I get to grow and see the world as it really is -- with or without laptops.
Um… maybe 80 percent?
That’s already a modest estimate, I think.
I learned that when the MassComm class I was handling – and I in tow --- went to an exposure trip to Manila, a trip that was so f*cked up, well-behaved colegialas were cussing like lumberjacks. (More of that later.)
Anyway, part of the itinerary was a call center (don’t ask!), which has offices all over the world. So we went up one to of its offices in the Philippines and met two of the most vapid, vacuous individuals to ever walk the planet.
One, a girl in disconcertingly coordinated green, told the group that her company takes pride in competition. "[Name of company] doesn't want people who stay in one place. You have to move up while you are staying here. That shows you are competitive." And on the next breath, she gushed (upon seeing her co-worker’s new laptop) in her whiniest voice: “Uy, ang daya… you have a new laptop…. I gotta have one of those…” And she spoke it in a colegiala accent so bad, it ought to be shot.
She displayed more of her vapidness when she toured us inside and went, “Ah… this area [points to an area where people are apparently waiting for something – I don’t care, really] is like a fishbowl. It’s made of glass, see [yeah, lady, we can see]… so when we see someone cute, we go, ‘Uy, look here… that guy’s cute.” Eyes were rolling.
And that’s just half of the story.
The guy who was with her, the one with a new laptop, was a classic case of what happens when one actually believes his/her own hype and thinks he/she is better than others. Check out the gems coming out of his mouth:
“What is needed in this company is constant practice and training. After six months, we don’t exactly expect you to speak like me.” Ah… yes, because if we speak like you, that would be retrogressing. Check your grammar first before you go all hoity-toity on us… Gawd!
“It doesn’t matter what kind of accent you speak. It’s just that, it’s not good to speak like the taxi drayber ober der who speks layk des…” Yeah… right. Well, newsflash. The taxi driver you just poked fun at knows more about life than you do. In fact, I learned something so much more from any 15-minute ride with a taxi driver than you, moron. Sheeeshhhhhhhhh…..
But what really gets me was when one of their co-workers actually told us flat-out she couldn’t accommodate us because she was interviewing somebody in 10 minutes.
Uh… hello… I can see she was just chatting with somebody.
So I asked Ms Girl in Green: “Is that how you interview people? Online?”
“No… we have telephone interviews and walk-in interviews.”
My students could sense the sarcasm in my voice. Ms Girl in Green couldn’t. Maybe, such subtleties just couldn’t penetrate through her (green) thick headband.
So a few points to ponder: If you are given a chance to work with these kinds of people, would you? That would mean improving your accent (not necessarily grammar and vocabulary. Ms Green just confused “indulge” with “splurge”… ahahahaha!), having a new laptop, and a fab wardrobe.
But then, that would mean being one, politically incorrect; two, absolutely rude; three, socially unaware and four, downright insensitive to people you think are lower than you.
Would you do it if it means you would someday imbibe a culture so superficial, so petty the highlights of the day are comparing laptops, chatting through YM and spotting cute trainees?
I say thanks, but no thanks.
I doubt if these idiots know who the President is.
Or name any three representatives from a party-list.
Or know that the capital of the country has been changed from Quezon to Manila.
Or care about how people in sweatshops and haciendas are exploited.
Or what the implications of outsourcing really is to our labor force (Newsflash: MNCs want us because we offer cheap labor -- and we speak good English. So that means the Philippines is a mill for mediocre, English-speaking cheap labor. Ain't exactly something to be proud of.)
These people are so caught up in their own vapid world, I doubt if they know anything outside their own ivory towers.
So, I’d rather deal with the stress of the job I have right now.
At least I get to grow and see the world as it really is -- with or without laptops.
