Pancakes

Waking up to the smell of pancakes for breakfast is truly one of the better things one gets to enjoy in life. Luckily, for those of us who work in a call center, those of us who don’t get to wake up for breakfast there’s lunch, dinner and all sorts of edible stuff you can get from the friendly convenient store around the block.

The call center industry has indeed - for lack of a more unique term - boomed to exponential proportions with all those foreign multinational corporations setting up their sites here and there. It had opened up a lot of opportunities for people to explore their potential and become a contributor to society without having to be confined to the limitations of one’s educational attainment.

So how does a typical Juan dela Cruz (he has since changed his name to John once he got signed by one of the top call centers in the Philippines) spend his day? He wakes up at around 7:00 PM (he hit the sack at around 11:00 AM earlier), eats a hasty meal and prepares to go to work. By 7:30 he’s saying goodbye to his wife and kid then he’s off to work. He gets to the office at around 8:40 PM and has just enough time to enjoy 1 stick of cigarette before logging in. He enters the office at 9:01 PM and is late by 1 minute. He gets his first call as soon as he logs in to the phones. Its a sup call. The customer is so irate about the product or service that he purchased, so naturally John tries to calm the customer down while holding back his own unrelenting fury. He checks the time and he can’t believe its just 11:00 PM. To him it felt like he’d been wearing that headset for days.

The hours dragged on.

Finally his day mercifully ends. He logs out of the phone as soon as his last irate customer hung up at around 6:45 AM. He goes down the elevator and walks amongst executives and businessmen, except that he goes the other way. Their day’s just beginning. For John, he’s glad to be going home.

He gets home at around 8:30 AM. His wife made breakfast (pancakes), and his 2-year old son wanted to play. He spends almost the entire morning with his family and finally got to sleep at around 11:15 AM, while trying to block out all the noise outside. The following week his shift schedule was changed and he barely had time to see his family awake before going to work.

Now I know typical does not apply to everyone. Some don’t get to do the things John did in the previous example. If anything, working in a call center has made me realize the value of things that I normally took for granted - sleeping, eating right, and spending time with the family.

Pancake anyone?

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Build Me Up, Bitter Crap

Posted in infuriatum, patheticism

How many times do I have to keep ruining great friendships, huh? What fine crap have I gotten myself into again this time? At this rate I’m never gonna keep any real friends. Now she hates me because I told her I liked her. How many times have we seen that happen to me eh? Some idiots never learn.

I know you don’t even bother reading this so it makes no sense for me to post this but hey, in case you do I just wanna let you know how much I regret ever telling you that. Honestly if I could take that back just to keep this friendship going I’d do it.

We were fine for about a week after the revelation and I thought that was the end of it. Now you drop this on me? That you’re not comfortable with me anymore? I’m offering you pure friendship despite the fact that I did like you, and you show me the door. What gives?

Now, I really don’t want to get into another argument (especially with you) on the very first day of 2008. I’m just really frustrated about how things turned out between us, so I vent. I know I brought this upon myself. If this is really how you want it to be then so be it. If we can’t be friends anymore then we could at least be civil. We owe each other that much. Hope you have a great year!

edit:
It's crucial that I add this bit of comment that I made about this post.

VinCe Says:
January 13th, 2008 at 7:07 am
Know what? Scratch this blog. Let’s not be civil. For the record, you started this.

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Note to Self: Drink Less, Forget Less.

Posted in happy thoughts, subservience

I really have to stop partying too hard. Dammit I was falling-down-drunk again last night. Well yeah it was iZone’s first ever Christmas party and we really had plenty of reasons to celebrate, but I didn’t mean to celebrate like that! It was fun really, the parts that I remember. I’m afraid I won’t be able to tell you folks the rest of the story because I think I passed out some time after we started slamming into one another. It must have been so embarrassing. I never got any of the raffle prizes. Oh well, maybe next year. And oh by the way, we won the grand prize for our Christmas presentation. We rock! Here are just some of the photos I took last night, while I was still conscious.

Rock on people, rock on!

Me, Boss Ed, DJ Chloe, and DJ Nina

Mother warned me about you.

Despite my memory loss, the whole event was a blast!

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Hey...

Posted in happy thoughts, patheticism

Thanks for taking the time to read this. I am happy that we are back to our old ways again, although I would have to admit that I still wish sometimes that you had given me the chance to prove my worth. But its OK, I know you have your reasons. I just wish you all the best, and hey - we’re still friends so you can come to me anytime. Take care.

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