The Working World

“Z-U-L-U/That’s the way you say Zulu” I bought the soundtrack to “Vanilla Sky”, one of the songs is Afrika Shox by Leftfield and it’s brilliant and it’s the new theme tune to “Do the right thing”. It should be played over an intro shot, taken from a helicopter as it follows one car driving a car at high speed towards the M50, the edge of the city. The city, Dublin, is finally getting battered by wind and rain just like it was this time last week. This week I joined the working masses.

I’m going to be two years in my job at the end of this month, which is a long time in the IT industry. It’s practically reaching retirement age when you take into account the fact that I’m not even 21 yet. And yet I’ve always been part-time. This week I started full-time. Eight and a half hours a day on the phones, taking directory enquiries from the UK. Still. No sign of a transfer to the Irish division. But it ain’t that bad.

The secret to working in a call centre is to talk fast. To talk fast you need at least two spoons (biggish spoons, mind) of coffee and sooner or later you’ll stop flinching. Or else get it made by a professional. At this point, I could go into detail like Patrick Bateman. The need to mix the sugar and the coffee, to never use the same polystyrene cup twice, that you mustn’t ever let someone else make it. Coffee is an artform, really. I am reminded of Joe, the friendly bloke-behind-the-coffee-counter on “Ellen”, the show that came out and went off soon after. Joe was asked in one episode to make tea. “Tea? TEA????” He filled a cup of hot water, dropped a tea bag in it and served. And that’s really all there is to it. Except I’d put the bag in first.

Coffee keeps me buzzing as I ask questions of each caller in the kind of rapid-fire way Anne Robinson would adopt, were she on E.

My new boss seems like a bit of a tool. He gave me one set of hours last week, telling me to be in on Monday at 8am. First bus leaves home at 7am, it takes me an hour and a bit to get to work, so I break my bollocks trying to get in, only to be told that the hours changed. Then he came to me at the end of that day and said “the team” would be working Thursday instead of Saturday. Joe comes in Thursday, only to realise it was changed back to Saturday. Today Joe realised, when the rest of the team leaves 45 minutes early, that he was to be in 45 minutes earlier this morning. Where’s the boss? Out the fucking door. He didn’t tell me shit. He’ll probably ring and ask where I am tomorrow. Feckim.

The company I work for (henceforth The Multinational) is such a 90’s company it’s ridiculous. Every cliche is there. The office slapper, the flirty water cooler chats, the physical contact junkies, the David Brent-a-likes (“only me, don’t call me sir, call me Dave”), the grudges, the flashy cars, the nights out, drugs are probably rife (and not just the good ones) and most of all, the bullshit is there. In my job, there is a “Dress Down Friday” except only the management dress up at any stage so I pretty much wander in in the same clothes I ever do. Ayvin, the Operations Manager, wears black hipsters, a white blouse, a denium jacket and looks like she’s 16 instead of the ice-cold businesslady-type she was yesterday. Dave, the HR officer, wears baggy jeans, a short-sleeved shirt and black boots, striding around the office like there’s springs in them. I’m half-awake, with my cheapo Next jumper on back-to-front, loose jeans and those brown Kickers moccassins I’ve worn since 1999.

The thing about chugging coffee all day is that the sleep has to go somewhere. Tonight, it’s all resting on my eyes.

I’m feeling a lot better, soon I’ll be unrecognisable amongst the throng of workers on their way to work in the windy morning, side-stepping between held-up Saabs and BMWs. I’m finally working 9 to 5, coming to work like every other schmuck and for once it feels right to get up at the ungodly hour of 6am to go somewhere. For some strange reason, I feel rewarded by this work. Isn’t it strange? I caught the bus three times home this week. Each time, we raced the red sun home and I slept deeply for 30 minutes once it sunk west. It’s a routine every day, and yet I like it. I like drinking coffee and reading the paper on the way to work. It’s great. I sit alone a lot now, but I think I need a little time. You’d never know where I might end up when I decide what to do. All I know is I need a story to tell when someone asks me in a year “where’ve ya been?” I want to go somewhere far away, where when someone asks me where I’m from, I say “Ireland” instead of “Dublin”. Somewhere I can be a foreigner. It may be something in my blood telling me to leave this country, just like it told all those relations out there.

The primary influence on my life in recent years was a man called Eoghan Harris. He writes for the Sunday Independent now, after he fell out with The Sunday Times. He taught me in Dun Laoghaire and I was struck with awe in each class. So much of his advice I know I’ll never ever forget, and one is that you’ve got to “make it strange to yourself”. The only way you can truly know something is to make it unfamiliar to you. To see how others see you, you have to look at things from their point of view. I have this urge to know my place in the world. To know where I fit in in all of this. Where does the town, county, country; where the continent I’m from fit in to everything. Recently, I’ve taken to reading a newspaper representing eveything I don’t stand for; The Daily Mail. You can such an understanding of British people from it. And in turn how they view you and people like you. But how do I do this with other cultures. The only way I can think of doing this is by leaving.

I’ve attended an information night on travelling to work in another, far-away country for a year. €2000 would be needed. If I rustled up that much dosh together, a new adventure awaits me.

j