condemned to:fold, as you would

my mum's very very annoyed and very exhausted, thanks to that cad of a boss she has. Trying to hold her down cos she's relatively cheap and very efficient labour. I've been telling her for ages: say NO if you feel you're being injusticed or manipulated. But would she listen? NO! sigh. i can't do very much for her - after all she exercises her own judgments. i just hope she'll solve it soon, by way of action rather than moans and complaints simply because they don't work. we're not her boss and complaining to us leads nowhere.

my peers are smartening (up, or not) from their first taste of society and its multipleated dark arenas of politics. it is true to a large extent that HC-ians are the most guileless of the elite, cos we live in a sheltered, brother-ly environment that's completely idealistic and nowhere near what society doles out to a fresh jc graduate. we step out of jc expecting jobs to fall from the sky (huh? what's a resume? u need one to get a job?), expecting people to be nice and non-bitchy and perfectly pure and upcoming and un-deceitful. well, good morning, darlings. and welcome to the Big Bad World. you slog for 2 weeks poring over job listings, call and call till your ears drop off, send resumes by the dozens via email, put out postings asking for tuition candidates, and chances are you're still not employed 3 weeks after all these measures. why? because singapore has lots of jobs, sure, but how many temporary ones? not a lot in comparison to the multitudes of permanent posts waiting for the people who REALLY need the jobs. (not us, cos we only pretend that we need a job.) check out the straits times to get an idea of what i'm alluding to here.

and then there's office politics.

there are nice people, there are nice people who're actually hypocrites or gossips, and then there're hypocrites and gossips who're actually nice people. and my dear huddleclique-mate, you're the poor unknowing fellow stranded in category 3. cos u're too accustomed to talking without consequence, so you automatically assume that everyone in society wants to hear your bit about others. sure, it's human nature to hanker after gossips and injurous news about others (especially competitors), but it's a different story when the subject of your gossip turns out to be the person who hears them. i'm sure after 2 painful incidents you've picked up a couple of lessons about what to say (and more importantly, what NOT to say) when in public. it's even worse when you work in an enclosed office, cos the subject always has ready access to your neck for throttling when he/she hears the unsavoury news about himself/herself. so what to do? cannot be a mute (people will say you're antisocial or a prude) and cannot prattle (unless you're sick and tired of having your head attached to your body). being alive can be a pain in the ass sometimes. but just make do - try to exercise discretion whenever you speak amidst your colleagues and try your best to keep another colleague's name from a conversation. even for compliments - you'd never know when they'll backfire and land you in the bad books of another person who dislikes the person whom you praised. and woe betide the soul who offends the senior personnel or the boss. good luck and pack your stuff. i guess the keyword here is discretion. we're just cheap labour while waiting for results, so swallow your indignities and keep your head down with a low profile. that way if someone's out to get your head he or she would have a harder time catching your tail (and yanking it off with grim satisfaction).

i suppose life is much darker than all of us supposed. but we can't do anything except learn to be smart, grope our way along and buy good batteries for our torch haha. and i've just heard an excellent ghost story regarding the rg squash toilets, so kakis in search of mindless balm and nonsensities :) i'll tell y'all over lunch or a cuppa.