Oy, I really wish I could get back to updating this site on a regular basis again but life has been pretty shitty for me. It’s the kind of shit where you’d actually go to your blog at least once a week to try to conjure something up but all you can write about is how shitty your day went, and you don’t want to pile your site with shit lest it put readers into a shitful mood.
Nah, I’m not about that, but I do miss writing here a lot. I just wish I wasn’t such a fucking baby.
But enough of that, so one of the things that’s been stressful for me is not being able to find/get a job. I’m running low on money to pay for the bills and boy does it suck.
Luckily, my sister’s mother-in-law informed me about a job opening at a medical home for old folks where she works at. When I found out they needed a Vietnamese receptionist, I declined the offer because my Vietnamese is generally pretty bad. Heck, the main reason why I quit my last job was because the communication barrier between the Vietnamese-speaking patients and I. It’s a huge thing that I cannot tolerate.
The mom-in-law said it didn’t matter as long as I knew the basics of the language. All I’m going to do really is to look cute, greet the customers and answer “basic” questions. Nothing to it. Teehee.
So after a couple of minutes of her pushing me to go for the job, I’m thinking, okay it shouldn’t hurt to go in for an interview, I mean after all, I can understand and speak simple Vietnamese, I know how to say “hi” to people, and hands fucking down I can look cute.
I drive up there and four-five minutes later upon arrival, I’m in the boss’s office to get interviewed. I find out that his name is Ryan. Ryan, Ryan, Ryan…I kept repeating to myself, since I’m terribly…terribly bad with remembering people’s name.
(Kind of off-topic: I use mnemonic device for remembering people’s names now and it’s been fantastic! Like, for Ryan, he has Seacrest hair. Yup. Message received)
Five minutes later, in comes his assistant, Clark.
(Mnemonic device for Clark: Picturing him to throw his hispter-lickin’ black thick-rimmed glasses out the window and rip open his dress shirt in a dramatic slow-mo baywatchy manner, revealing the insignia of Superman. Gawd, this mnemonic device thing is fucking amazing!)
So we’re all talking and so far, it’s going fantastic. There was never any kind of awkward silence, I’m making them laugh, we all share some common things, I mean this ball is pretty much rolling.
Well…that is, until, Clark brings up, “We know that you’re applying for a receptionist job, but we’re hoping that you’d also be our official translator for doctors and patients…you are comfortable with that, right?”
“Yep,” I nodded. I know! Really dumb answer, but I was completely thrown off. I thought this was basic gawddamnit.
Ryan cuts in, “That’s great. Hey…why don’t we bring in one of our Vietnamese worker to test her out.”
“Sure!” I nodded some more. Dumb, dumb, dumb…
A Vietnamese employee was brought into the office to put me on the spot by having a casual conversation with me in Vietnamese as the two men watched. He spoke really fast, and really Vietnamese that I wasn’t able to catch on most of the thing he blurted out. He asked me when I moved to the states and I was trying to tell him that I wasn’t born in Vietnam, I was born here.
He turns to the two men and informs them, “She say she was born in Vietnam and move here when she was five.” Five minutes prior to that, I clearly stated to them that I was born in Massachusetts and moved to California later. Gah!
After my failed conversation with him, the man lied for some odd reason and told them that I was an excellent Vietnamese speaker. Ughh (I later found out that that man was a good friend of the mom-in-law. Ha).
After all of that, Ryan tells me that I got the job. Yeah…yay. I’m screwed. I’m not sure how I’m going to handle with the whole translating for doctors and patients deal…
Doctor, “Tiff, can you please tell this patient that he has respiratory arthritis in your native language?”
Tiff, speaking in Vietnamese, “You’re screwed, dude.”
The next day, on the way to my boyfriend’s place, I got rear-ended. I was stuck in traffic, everyone was going 5-7 mph, except for the totally obliv driver behind me.
It wasn’t a severe car-accident (thank gawd) but let me tell you, the terrifying part about this was knowing it was going to happen, before it happened. Three seconds to be exact. And not being able to do anything about it.
This is basically my thought process when I looked at my rear-view mirror:
There is a big black SUV charging at me. *Whiplash* Fuck.
