August 20, 2013

• Report # 1034

  Hey everyone, I hope that you’ve all been having an awesome week so far. I went out to the Galerias mall on Saturday evening to meet up with a friend, though she didn’t arrive for an hour and a half later. I spent my time sipping a frappe from Starbucks, and well eating a donut from Krispy Kreme…. it was kind of a dessert before dinner. When she arrived we had dinner at Chili’s and sat and talked until midnight. I had to take a taxi home as I don’t think there would have been any buses running at that time, but I arrived home around 1:00 am and went to bed after a while.

  I went for a run on Sunday afternoon. I really shouldn’t be running too much in the sun, but some days I just don’t want to wait until the evening, and just get my run over with early. The clock/thermometer in front of a building by the park said it was 43 C (109 F), but that was absolutely impossible…. if it had  been that hot and I had been running for 40 minutes, I don’t think I would have survived ! I think it was probably around 33 C (92 F) as it certainly wasn’t as hot as it had said. The time was off as well by one hour, so someone really has to do some maintenance on that clock. Later in the day I headed out to Cinépolis and I watched The Big Wedding, which was a very funny movie, though another one of those movies with a lot of stupid humour.

  Last week I went off on people who use their cell phones in the movie theatre, but this time I had the unfortunate luck of sitting next to a lady playing with her phone during the whole movie. She hadn’t actually been talking on it, but she was certainly texting or something. Eventually she asked me if she could make a call so I just gave her the phone seeing as I didn’t want to cause a scene, though for some reason she wasn’t able to get the number dialed… maybe it was wrong. Finally she just got up and left half way during the movie. I don’t think I’ll ever understand some of these people. I got home around 9:00 pm though I don’t think I got to bed until 2:00 am, so I was super tired yesterday morning as I woke myself up at 7:00 am.

  I took a bus downtown and then took another bus, but apparently the bus I took has two versions, one that says direct and one that doesn’t. I took the direct one, so it didn’t take me right by the migration place as the other one always did so I had to get off and take a taxi. I’ve been to that migration place many times and that had never happened before, so I don’t know if they started a new route with the same bus number, or I had just been lucky enough to never manage boarding that other bus. Once I arrived at the migration offices I was able to pick up my visa, though I wasn’t too impressed when it says it expires on July 12, 2014. Seeing as they didn’t actually give it to me until August, they should have given me the full year from some day in August ! I suppose it’s just another way to squeeze out a little more money out of people.

  Seeing as the company was on my way home and I had not been able to get a hold of anyone by telephone I just headed there myself. I talked to a security guard and he sent me to the recruitment building on the other side of the street. There I waited for like an hour and a lady finally called me in. I explained the situation to her and she said that I needed some other letter that I didn’t have, and asked me if I would be ok speaking on the phone mostly in Spanish, as she told me 80 % of the calls would be in Spanish. I just told her I would, even though I think I would be a little over my head trying to help customers on the phone in Spanish.

  I can talk with people just fine, but I’ve never done any type of work over the phone before, and the customers calling in expect fast service and probably aren’t always in the best of moods, so it would be very important that I fully understand and be able to say things 100 % correctly, 100 % of the time, so it certainly would be a challenge. The lady talked with some of the other people that had helped me during the visa process and then told me that I had to meet with the same lady who interviewed me in November, in the other office, and she would be able to help me.

  So I took a taxi to the other office, and headed in, and once again I had to wait about an hour. I finally was able to see the lady and explain to her the whole situation. Apparently in the other office it’s mostly Spanish workers, but in this office is where they have more of the English work. She told me there was a campaign starting on August 30, working with customers from Kohls and that it’s not hard work, and there would just be two weeks of training. I would be working 1:00 pm to 10:00 pm Monday to Friday and Sunday… so six days of work a week !

  This is actually quite common in Mexico as I’ve talked to a number of people who work six days a week. I won’t complain as I’ve had basically a year of vacations so I am ready to get working and keeping busy and doing my very best. The salary would be a little higher than I was told last year, as I would be getting around 9000 pesos a month (719 dollars) plus 5 % bonuses for always arriving on time and another 5 % bonus for assistance. I was relieved to hear that it would all be in English for now as it will be a lot easier to get used to the job and see how I do. I won’t be working where I originally thought, as the place I thought I was working was the head office, which I went to a few times, but I’ll be working where I had my original interview. Unfortunately it will be a little longer to get there, but nothing I can do about that.

  So even though I got the visa and was being told about the start date, I was given even more homework to do. The company didn’t have my test results saved from last November, so I had to spend another hour doing the english/computer test, which I really didn’t like because I did it once before and it’s just a long and time consuming process. The company also seemed to want everything but the kitchen sink as well. They wanted two photos of me, which I was lucky to have extras from my visa photos, so I was able to give her those, as well as a copy of my visa card, passport and birth certificate.

  They also want a proof of address, and I had to go and get a number from the Mexican social insurance place. Also they want two reference letters, even though I gave them those last November, and a copy of my schooling, I guess to show I’m not a high school dropout. I was told that I could come back on Thursday morning, giving me 3 days to do all of this. I left the office and headed downtown and had lunch at VIPS before picking up a frappe from El Globo and heading home. When the roommate arrived at home I explained the situation to her and she called the guy who administers the property to bring something to prove that we live here, though I don’t know when he will do that.

  I went for a run last night and I stayed up until around 1:00 am before going to bed. I woke up at 9:00 am and then decided to go to the social security place. I noticed that we got the bill for the internet/telephone, so even though it was in my roommate’s name, I was hoping that could count for proof of address. I walked the majority of the way, though I took a taxi for the last five minutes as I didn’t know where the place was exactly. Things there worked out a lot better than I imagined. I was given a number at the front desk, and was called up to a window within 10 minutes, and after waiting for around 20 minutes, everything was done and I had gotten myself a number. They didn’t ask for proof of address, but they wanted the company number as well, so I was lucky that I had brought the paperwork for that.

  I took some photo copies and headed out and walked home, picking up a fruit smoothie and then just having some waffles and eggs at home. So in the next day I will just have to print off my school credential and some reference letters, and see if that internet/telephone bill will be good enough for proof of address. Aside from that I should be ready for Thursday morning to hand all this stuff in and to officially say that I’ll be starting work next Friday. It’s been such a long process though I am really, really hoping this truly will be the end and I really do start in 10 days. I am ready to get going, learn everything I can learn, and do the best that I can and succeed. So if all goes well on Thursday I will be able to enjoy one final week of days off and then it will be work, work, and more work !

  I’ve read about some places wanting to create special license plates for those people who have been arrested for drunk driving, so for the next question:

  Do you support the idea of making people arrested for DUI put specialized license plates on their cars, why or why not ?

  That’s all for today. I wish everyone all of the best with everything. Take care and I’ll talk to you all on Friday, bye for now.

  • 1:53 pm
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