Journal no. 3

went to the food factory today and was immediately sent to work - into the deep end.
luckily the most of the people are young and nice, and from Taiwan.

the place was really disorganized like the boss's office.
i first went into the toilet to put on the white shirt and pants. the toilet lights didn't work and it was filled with boots.
things were placed haphazardly in front of door ways.

in the food prep area, no one explained anything. just "pretend to wash your hands really well". then i was putting carrots and mayo on the conveyor belt for teriyaki chicken rolls. and they had trouble with the machine that placed a flat square of rice on seaweed, until the fierce Chinese floor manager was yelling "what's the matter?" x 4 at the auntie trying to figure out why the machine was not rolling the seaweed at the same time as the rice.

then i was adding rice on the cucumber, putting soy sauce and wasabi in packages, sticking labels, stacking packages, rinsing trays and putting things away...
it was quite shocking how dirty and messy it was. and they didn't wash the things properly, so i was rinsing things with rice still encrusted in them. oops.
you had to be fast, and the floor manager liked to yell at people and generally abuse them. but it seems like the people treated it like water off their backs. and he didn't want to speak to me directly - instead he said i "didn't add enough rice" or to "come tomorrow" via a proxy.

one of the ladies cooked beehoon, sticky rice, stewed pork, boozy prawns and they were nice enough to encourage me to eat some. the young staff seemed really close. and there was a nice auntie, she was from Singapore too. she worked there for 4 years and would be retiring in Feb to have a long holiday in Europe with her husband.

and i have nothing to show for today, except for punching a card. have to ask them about the essential formalities tomorrow.