The United Altered States of Maryam

“Congra……congra-che-li……congra-tu-la-lo-li…..” the guy from Human Resource was trying to pronounce the phrase ‘Congratulatory Leave’. He was going over the ‘Executive Handbook’ with me and this Other Newbie – it was our first day as employees of the organization. “So…the rule is, once you’ve worked here for a year, then say you get married-lah, you are entitled to two days congra….congra-ra-la-to-ree….congra…aiyah, here, you can just read it in the book-lah, haw?” said the HR guy, resigning himself to the fact that he will never be able to pronounce ‘congratulatory’ to anyone’s satisfaction (or understanding).

Customary visit to HR aside, I spent the first half of my first day as a Corporate Citizen making paperclip bracelets in my tiny cubicle. I wasn’t just making your run-of-the-mill paperclip bracelet, mind you; my bracelets were rather intricate with complicated twisty bits. I call the look industrial-office-punk. My colleagues looked at me as if I was retarded. The ones that bothered to look my way, at least. Of course, ‘retarded’ was exactly what I felt like on my first day of work; like someone’s mentally disabled child who had been let loose around the office to run around in mommy’s heels and blazer while destroying company property.

My blazer, by the way, was white-in-color. When I tried it on in the store, I thought it made me look like a fine cross between Nico and Diane Keaton in Annie Hall. But somehow, I walked into my first day of work, looking like I should be balancing trays of champagne flutes and canapés. My white blazer made me look like a waiter. It was just as well since my next big decision for the day was, “Coffee or tea?” I chose to drown myself in coffee since nerves had caused me to lose sleep the night before. All of it. 0 hours sleep. By noon, I was starting to drift off to a faraway land on a plush, velvet carriage driven by five purple unicorns and one deformed reindeer wearing fairy wings. Unfortunately, this was around the time my boss decided to have a one-on-one briefing with me in her office. As she spoke about my official duties as a junior executive in Public Affairs and rattled on about the company’s ‘vision’; I was having ‘visions’ of my own – mostly of the hallucinatory kind – of my army of unicorns doing jumping tricks over her head.

“Are you alright?” my boss stopped to ask me midway through her speech.

See, at this point, sleep deprivation and too many cups of strong black coffee had caused my right eyelid to twitch uncontrollably. My boss must have thought I was winking cheekily at everything she said or something.

She left me with a skyscraper-tall pile of reading materials to go over, materials peppered with terms like ‘Portfolio Prioritization Matrix’ and other corporate babble – things that can sometimes be shortened into neat little acronyms like GLIC, CSR, GRI, NEI, NOI, CPI-X, OMG, WTF, KILLMENOW.

“You’ll probably go crazy from reading all of this but it’s necessary to familiarize yourself with ---“ My boss either said “every aspect of the company’s operations” or “insanity”. If it was the latter, I could’ve assured her that I was quite familiar with it, thanks.

The reading materials worked strongly against my bid to stay awake. I kept slipping into micro-sleep before apparitions of corporate sycophants carrying whips and lashes (and one time, my old Form 3 Science teacher) would appear and shock me back into consciousness. That, and the fact that my cubicle-neighbour’s mobile rang loudly every 5 minutes. And it wasn’t just any old ring-tone. No, her ring tone was the sound of someone yelling, “There’s a party in Kazakhstan!!!!!!!!!!!”

So there I was, slowly dozing off in my cubicle when all of a sudden……….

“There’s a party in Kazakhstan!”

How can you fall asleep when there’s a party in Kazakhstan?

By 4 p.m., I was reduced to doodling pictures of domestic animals on the pad of yellow post-its that the company had so graciously provided for me. Here I go again – wasting company resources. Le Chat!!! El Perro!!! Si Kerbau!!! - I’d label the animals in a variety of languages.

“There’s a party in Kazakhstan!”

By 5 p.m, I went back to making jewelry out of office supplies. This time around, I used stapler bullets. And lots of adhesive tape. It fell apart on me anyway.

“There’s a party in Kazakhstan!”

At 6 p.m, I get a call from my friend, The Koors (don’t ask me why I call her that. I just do) “Are you done with your first day at work? How was it?”

“I’m still in the office-lah.”

“Eh, what time do you finish work?”

“Officially, 5.30 p.m. But no one has left the office yet. I don’t really want to be the first to leave,” I said.

“Hmm…… they’re probably there because they have actual work to finish. Do you have work to finish?”

“No.” I had officially run out of office supplies to waste.

“Then? Go home-lah,” Koors suggested. “What about the other new guy in your department? Has he left yet? No?!!! What’s he doing?”

I peered over my cubicle wall to check on The Other Newbie. He was carefully twisting his telephone cord into flower-shapes.

Elsewhere, in Kazakhstan, a party was going on……….

P.S.

Tuan-tuan dan puan-puan, I’d also like to take this opportunity to thank the lovely souls who have posted such kind comments and welcome me back to the blogosphere with such warmth and ego-boosting support. I know it takes a lot of strength and effort to read through 5 pages of bad grammar and punctuation. If I wasn’t so frigid, I’d give you a hug; if I was a cabinet minister, I’d give you a government contract but for now, I can only give you my heartfelt gratitude. Don’t be a stranger now ya’ hear?

Posted by Maryam at 8:17 PM | Permalink |

I always knew they would eventually get me. They were never out to get me, no, it wasn’t like I was getting my head hunted or anything. On the contrary, they would much rather get someone else, if they could, I’m sure. They can sense the reluctance, the lack of focus and motivation, the fact that everything about my temperament and personality is ill-suited to the life they have to offer. They can sense that I will only end up disgruntled and under-performing. They can sense it in me like a dog senses fear and I sense a hot dog from a mile away. But maybe that’s what they secretly thrive on. Not money, not capital, not economic growth; not team-spirit and dynamism; not excellent organizational skills or pride. No. Maybe, they secretly thrive on the crushing of souls, souls who are delusional enough to think that they are sensitive, artistic and free. Muahaha, we’ll show them, they whisper behind their steel desks and removable cubicle walls, we’ll give them a taste of it – they won’t be hooked but by The Gods of Stable Monthly Income and Medical Benefits, they will be stuck, muahahahaha muahahahah muahahahah dan ini fail yang encik mintak. I always knew that I’d end up allowing them to have me. Because that’s the story of my life so far. I always somehow end up committing to things or situations that I’m utterly unenthusiastic about.

It could be the little things.

Like being enrolled in the Science stream at school when I was pretty sure I couldn’t care less about what chemical reaction would happen if I mixed, I don’t know, uranium hydrocarbonite with Boron and stuck it on top of a Bunsen burner; when I couldn’t care less what a fucking cross section of a dicotyledonous plant looks like (they’re all smiley faces to me); when I couldn’t care less about mathematics let alone Additional Mathematics – If 2XYZ = 36 is the blab la of bla what is X? (Tak tahu, nanti saya balik saya tanya kakak saya. Tapi dia pun tak tahu. So how? Like dat lor……0 – apa jenis jawapan ni? Sila jumpa cikgu selepas kelas.) And to all 15 year olds considering entering the science stream just because “it’s encouraged by the government and YOUR MA”; I think you should know, that I still haven’t found any use for any of it. Of course, if you plan to be a doctor, engineer, nuclear physicist, CSI-dude or just really, really want to find out what X is then I’m sure you will. All the best.

It could be the little things.

Like asking the stylist to give me an “edgier, not-so-boring haircut - think Chrissie Hynde or Karen O from the Yeah Yeah Yeahs or heck, even Rhianna (what? Her ‘Umbrella’ sucks but I like the hair)” I figured I could trust the stylist. He dresses like he’s in a cool indie band with the right touch of Gay. Instead, I come out of the salon with my hair all blown-out looking, in my sister’s words, “like a Katie Holmes-Bot. Hahahahahahah”. Great. Katie Holmes might be the Bride of Xenu and new best friend to that outer-space creature called Victoria Beckham but somehow, she doesn’t satisfy my definition of ‘edgy’. The next day, my sister says, “Well, actually, you look like Ringo Starr. Hahaha.” Circa before The Beatles discovered LSD. You know the hair. The Mop do’. She was being kind. By the end of the week, what my hair really looked like was Javier Bardem in No Country for Old Men. These days, my hair pretty much resembles a mushroom. There was an annoying kid I knew in Primary School whom I used to call “Mushroom Head” on account of her dodgy haircut. Well, who’s the mushroom head now? Who da’ mushroom head now? Yes, karma’s a bitch.

It could be the little things.

Like ending up being stuck in conversation with The Ugly Friend at a party because I could barely even look The Cute One in the eye, let alone charm him with my wit and humor. Not even when The Cute One notices my new haircut and says “You look nice.” Not even when The Cute One whose sight and judgment had been affected by Vodka (that means finally, a chance for me) comes swaggering over in his skinny jeans and says “Hey, they’re playing the song we both like. Come and dance.” And I say “Okay, in a while” right after I politely finish the sentence I was saying to The Ugly Friend. And then the song is over. And Cute One’s gone off with some gorgeous Scandinavian (someone try to convince me that not all Swedish girls are insanely fit and good looking!) skank he met on the dancefloor. And I’m left to hang out for the rest of the night in The Stoner/Social-Pariah corner with The Ugly Friend who says such things as, “You know, I’m only doing my MBA over here for fun. I’m actually an actor back in the States. Got an agent and everything.” Oh really? What have you done? “Just this commercial. For a bible.” A bible commercial? “Hey, the bible’s the best selling book of all time,” he says. Yes, I’m sure the publishers have Jesus, Peter, Paul & Matthew and not you to thank for that. The Ugly Friend asked me such questions as, “Are you a tortured artist?” What the fuck? “You look like a tortured artist…what you’re wearing, makes you look like a tortured artist.” I should’ve known. I was wearing all black. Black smock dress, black ribbed wool stockings, black ballet flats, black peacoat. The look I was aiming for was Parisian Chic. I should’ve known that my aim, with all things be it bowling or sartorial statements is as good as a drunk with Parkinsons who just got off three thousand turns on the Merry-Go-Round. I wanted to look like a chic Parisian woman and I ended up looking like a broody frustrated art student. And I was classmates with a lot of the latter and knew for sure that it was exactly something I didn’t want to come across as. But I did. Because success in my life is a 7 letter word spelled backwards. I’ve achieved many things in life that I never thought I’d like to achieve. And still don’t want to. And Ugly Friend asks again, “So are you a tortured artist?” No. I’m just tortured. Period. And at the end of the night, I go home mentally kicking myself in the ass for not taking advantage of the Cute One while he was drunk. That is not to say that there was any certainty that I would’ve succeeded even if I tried (I’m aware of my limitations, thanks). And that’s just the thing isn’t it? It sucks a lot less to fail at the things you don’t care about than the ones you do.

I took an online quiz for fun that ended up being no fun. The quiz was called “How Will You Grow Old?” And it said if I continue on the path I’m currently on, I will grow old “Grumpy and Resentful”. But I’m already grumpy and resentful, Captain Obvious.

I listen to music, watch films, look at works of fine art, read books and essays by people who have attained a certain degree of success (or at least some small form of recognition) for it and I think to myself, “Well, if this is absolute crap is considered fit for public consumption then so is my crap. Heck, I can do better.” But I don’t. I don’t do. I just sit there and rant like Jack Black in High Fidelity without the triumphant performance of Let’s Get it On at the end. Because I don’t have the talent but most importantly, the balls, the guts, the mental strength and the shamelessness to go after what I really want. Because sometimes, I think I don’t really know what I really want.

You get what you know. The secret is you get what you know.

And sometimes, I think I only know the things I don’t want.

And now I’m getting yet another something I don’t particularly want.

All wrapped up in a crisp shirt and tie.

They called to say that I start work on Monday.

The people from the company I didn’t actually apply to join; they called to say that I start the job I don’t really want on Monday.

It’s a company that handles Industrial Manufacturing, Engineering and Oil & Gas. Yeah, that really sounds like me, doesn’t it?

They said be in the office. By 8.30 am. Welcome to the Corporate World

And I didn’t say no. I didn’t say, “Fuck ye and yer cocksuckin Mondays; I’m gonna live on love and poetry, man! Oh, and also rock and roll. Damn the man!” No, I said exactly what I didn’t want to say. And then I felt sick.

Of course, at this point, I have to (as usual) include some wise words from The Mother. “You don’t seem too excited about your new job. Why are you not happy about getting a job?!! You scowl when you don’t have a job, you scowl when you get a job. You know why you’re always unhappy, Maryam? Because you’re bleeding ungrateful. UNGRATEFUL, UNGRATEFUL, UNGRATEFUL!”

Hmm..That’s probably it.

Thank You.

Posted by Maryam at 3:03 AM | Permalink |

Earlier this year, I had a short stint as a “Marketing Executive/ Asst. Business Development Consultant” for a restaurant/lounge/club. My eldest sis however, kept telling everyone that I was “some kind of Club Promoter chick” not that there’s anything inherently bad in being a club promoter girl but it led some idiots to suspect that I was actually working as a “GRO” (I’m not condemning them, I’m just saying it’s not for me, alright?)

Me : Can you please stop telling people that I was a “Club Promoter Girl”?
Big Sis: You were, weren’t you? You promoted the club therefore you were a
club promoter.
Me : I marketed it, market ; marketing executive.
Mom : These days they call everyone an executive. Tukang cuci pun executive.
Big Sis : So when are you going to get yourself a real job?
Me : It was a real job! Just because I only had to go to work at 2pm doesn’t mean the
job was a freaking mirage, alright?
Big Sis : What exactly did you do? You weren’t a GRO, were you?
Me : NO.
Big Sis : So you were one of those promoter-girls in the little skirts?
Me : No.

I did not stand outside clubs in my mini skirt (which by the way, I’m too fat for), thigh high boots and cropped Tiger Beer tank, handing out flyers and trying to lure male passers-by to come inside and spend money. No sir, I didn’t do that. The job also did not involve me slinking around in a skanky dress, sitting on the laps of patrons, using my feminine wiles and seduction skills (which by the way, I don’t have) to get them to buy as many drinks as possible while they butcher “Endless Love” on the karaoke machine. No, my job usually involved me sitting in a corner during the day glued to my laptop, replying emails, sending emails, designing flyers, writing useless promotional blurbs and press releases which never ended up being sent to the press. Occasionally, when I had some free time and was desperate, lonely, blind, mentally impaired yet strangely confident enough, I’d flirt unsuccessfully with one of the DJs. Mostly, my party hour duties only included calling to check on the night’s scheduled DJs to see what time in this century exactly they plan to arrive. Anyway, to cut a long story slightly less-long, the novelty of the job wore off so I quit.

I have now been successfully unemployed for 2 and a half months but because my previous job didn’t count in the eyes of many; as far as these people are concerned, I’ve been unemployed since graduating uni (7 months plus). Since then, I’ve gotten a million and one suggestions on what I should work as; the most common one being, “Anything, just get your ass of the couch already!” Of course when this was first said, I was only 3 weeks unemployed – a time which I spent recuperating from knee SURGERY and the mysterious week-long fever that I developed following the surgery. Anyway have you ever had someone tell you to get off the couch while you’re practically a fucking cripple? My mother keeps going on about how Tiger Woods had the same surgery I did and how he’s already training for his next PGA tournament. Of course, TIGER FUCKING WOODS IS ONE OF THE BEST PROFESSIONAL ATHLETES the world has ever seen. That’s like telling me to leap off a building because “Well, Superman can fly.”

My eldest sis decided to rush things along by submitting my CV to her friend who was offering a job at a company which, in my sister’s own words, “would put you in a great position to net an investment banker for a husband.” (Great, fucking great, my life’s dream, apparently). Anyway, one of the first things this dude said to me was, “So, your sister tells me you were a….uh…. club promoter. What did you do? Did you have to uh………layan the customers and things?” (GARGGGHHHH!!!!!!!).

The rest of the interview sort of went like:

Interviewer: (who had previously asked to read one of my academic essays. I gave him
the one entitled ‘Adventures in Identity, Punishment & Capital in the
Age of Electronic Reproduction featuring the music of Radiohead). Hmm..
I find your essay…..interesting but to be honest, I don’t really know
much about Talking Head.
Me : Radiohead.
Interviewer: Oh, not Talking Head?
Me : No.
Interviewer: Well, I’m an 80s kind of guy. Well anyway……………..
I see that you’ve also listed ‘writing’ under your ‘interests and hobbies’
Me : (Well, what else was I going to put? Watching E! TV? Contemplating the
nothingness of things? Seeing how long I could go without a shower
before something tragic happens?) Yes, yes, I do enjoy writing.
Interviewer: Have you had any of your works published? Newspapers, magazines,
maybe?
Me : (Does this blog count?) No, not quite.
Interviewer: What about back in college and in school? Did you contribute to the school
magazine?
Me : (No, sir, I was too busy trying to get out of going to school to compete with
the kids with perfect punctuation writing profound rhymes about cold, dark
rooms or short, sweet tales about this wondrous thing that happened to
them which would inevitably end with “……it was all just a dream.”)
Uhm..no…
Interviewer : Why not?
Me : That’s an interesting question, really. (Thank you, for making me reflect
upon my under-achievements at such a young age. Please come again).

The funny thing was; the interview wasn’t for a job as a staff writer or anything like that. It had something to do with finance. So yeah, why don’t you just go ahead and ask if I can do a pirouette in ice skates at the Winter Olympics? He offered me an internship with the kind of pay that wouldn’t even cover the cost of petrol to get to work. It is my belief that internship is really just a prettier (and cheaper) word for cheap white collar-slave labor. I was also turned off by the interviewer saying that at the company, “they work hard and play hard”. I don’t know why finance people have to be so hard all the time (no, not in that way) I don’t like things being described as ‘hard’. ‘Hard’ requires effort. I want everything to be light, fluffy and effortless, like fairy dust in the wind blowing through a field of tall grass and pink clouds. (ugh, I just vomited in my mouth). Of course, I appreciate the opportunity but alas, I was living with the hope that something better would come my way. But so far, it’s just been one absurd interview after another.

Here is a bit from another interview with a panel of goons.

Interviewer 1: I see on your CV that you were active in debates and public speaking at
school and college…… Why did you do a degree in Communications?
Me : Sorry?
Interviewer 1: Why didn’t you do Law? It seems a waste that you didn’t do Law.
Me : (imagining myself in the Wild West in a cowboy hat and leather spurs with
guns hanging off my hips and saying with a cigar dangling from the
corner of my mouth, “Cause ‘roun here purrdy lady, I AAAYM THE LAW
- BANG BANG YOU’RE DEAD BITCH!”)
Interviewer 2: You mention that you like to keep up to date with current events…….
Me : (I kept up to date with current events in the past; if that counts)
Interviewer 2: Can you tell me the exact inflation rates for (something or other) these
days.
Me : (Dammit, I should’ve just said I liked long walks by the beach) To be
honest, no.
Interviewer 2 : I don’t either.
Interviewer 1: Then why did you ask?
Interviewer 2: Just wondering. Anyway, can you play softball?
Me : Yes (No, not really)
Interviewer 2: Yah, because the company has this sporting tournament every year and our
department really needs softball players.

These people also mentioned that the company encourages its employees to be “gung-ho”. When they said that, I couldn’t help imagining myself as a Rambo-type figure, machine gun belt strapped across my chest, American flag tied around my head, charging through the door of a conference room and going “Ga…ugh….ruhhhh… yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!” The vision scared me. The interview was for a trainee executive position in Human Resource. Why would I want to work in Human Resource, you ask? I don’t. My dad submitted my CV in for me without my explicit permission. He told me he just wanted a copy of my CV just “to reflect on what I’ve been doing.” I should’ve known that my dad is too much of a pro-active type (when it comes to work, at least) to simply ‘reflect’. I like to blame him for my passivity. He’s forced me into this mode of rebellion. Because it’s your obligation as a child to be the exact opposite of your parents. Otherwise, society would not evolve……. and civilizations would not crumble. Anyway, these HR people said I’d probably be better suited to “Corporate Communications” (what the fuck does Corporate Comm. really mean?). Then for two months I don’t hear from them and to tell you the truth, I felt relieved. Then suddenly, I get a call saying, “Cik Maryam, I’m ****** calling from the Public Affairs Division of ***** and last week, you had an interview with our HR department, right?” Yes, if we were stuck in a funny time warp it would’ve been last week. But in this earthly reality, we like to call it nine weeks or better known as just slightly over two months. “Well, we’d like you to come in tomorrow to have a chat with our Head of Something Something Public Something Communications and also our Executive of Something Corporate Talk Talk.” So I went to have a “chat” because there was nothing good on TV and also, I need something that would give me a paycheck, soon! Anyway Head & Executive of Something involving Communications said to give them a few weeks to something something before they get back to me. Of course in this organization, if one week = nine weeks; I’m thinking few weeks= a year before they get back to me on something that I didn’t quite catch because I was too distracted by the dodgy plaid pattern on Head of Something’s suit collar to listen.

(yeah, yeah, I’m fully aware of why people aren’t lining up outside my door to employ me).

And then there were two other interviews with two different channels under a certain broadcast media organization; both of which went too badly for me to want to mention at great length. It’s a shame seeing that among other qualifications, I watch enough hours of TV to keep 10,000 toddlers stupid. You think I’d be able to get a job working with a TV station. But no, “Too young with no experience in the media industry,” was their main issue. Okay, sure, I’ll just wait until I’m old with no experience in the media industry. And oh, one of the interviewers said to me, “What are your weaknesses?” but then cuts me off by saying, “Oh, wait, you’re probably too young to even be able to properly recognize your weaknesses.”

Dammit, lady, I was going to say “Pasta”!

(Anyway, I’m suddenly overcome by intense boredom while writing this entry. Also I sound like a really big twat.)

Posted by Maryam at 2:50 AM | Permalink |