Category Archives: jobs

London

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I moved to San Fran at the end of July, but I’ve actually been in the city only a total of 12 days so far. During my second week in New York on a Wednesday, I was told I was flying to London on Friday instead of flying back to SF. Surprise!

London! That’s in Europe, you know.
All expenses paid! It was for work.
Two weeks! Yes, most of it would be spent working, but I still get two weekends.

London was everything I imagined it to be. Double decker buses. European buildings. Small roads. And oh, the British accents.

The weather was fabulous the weekend I arrived. It was sunny and warm, and not at all the gloomy and rainy London I was expecting. And the British people were all perfectly nice and helpful, re: the below.

(Seriously though, if it weren’t for these signs, I probably would’ve been hit by one of those double decker buses driven by a guy with a British accent on those small roads full of European buildings within the first hour.)

It also happened to be my cousin’s last week in London, since he’d been studying English there for the past year, so I had a friend in the city to show me all the touristy sites and how Londoners party. I met his friends, and they were all Asians with British accents.. how cool is that?!

Unfortunately, I got really sick during that first week, most likely from all the partying travelling, jet-lag, wonky sleep schedules, and just being in a foreign land. I had to go to the emergency room, was told the wait was 3 hours because it’s NHS (National Health Service which is free for UK residents), actually waited the 3 hours until 3 in the morning, saw a really nice doctor who prescribed some antibiotics, and then walked away without paying a pence. (Because it’s NHS – travellers get free emergency treatment. Did I mention they were a really nice and helpful country?)

I ended up taking a day off work to sleep for 24 hours, got better, and spent the rest of the trip working and eating. 

THE BEST JOB IN THE WORLD

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Job Listing: Island Caretaker of beautiful Queensland, Australia for six months (from July 2009 to January 2010); duties mostly consist of exploring the island and blogging about it; accommodations, transportation, and lucrative salary included.

God, how I would love to do this.

Winner Winner.. Chicken Dinner?

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It’s about 45-50 minutes of a bus ride, about 40 minutes to walk to the subway, take the subway, then hop on a bus, to get to my job from where I’m staying now. I think we found a place that probably would not make a difference in the commute time. But that’s the price you pay to live in an area like this to be close to everything convenient.

We are this close to finding an apartment. We just have to like the place when we visit and convince the landlord to like us. Do you have any idea how hard it is to find an apartment online? Ok, how about trying to find one already furnished? And with air conditioning, especially here in Taiwan? Now try doing all of that in Chinese. Yeah, not fun.

Oh, and you know another thing that’s really not that fun either? When I get stopped on the street by people passing out surveys. They’re all, Oh it’ll only take a minute. Just one minute, just check a few boxes, and that’s it. Then I glance at their half-page survey and it’s covered in Chinese, and I’m all like, No thanks. And then pretend I’m in a big hurry to get somewhere and really don’t even have a minute to spare. Just because I look like I should know what I’m doing, do they have any idea how long it would take me to take their little survey? Try half an hour. I would probably have to ask them what every other word meant, and then they would think I’m dumb, so why don’t we just spare everyone’s feelings and call it a day?

People don’t want me because I’m not Caucasian, and yet other people assume I’m straight up Asian and should be doing everything like I’m supposed to. It’s like I can’t win.

Hopeless

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Today I experienced my first taste of blatant discrimination. I certainly talked about it enough, but it actually happened to me.

I called a school today asking about a position. “Hi, my name is Tina, and I’m responding to your ad online about the part time morning position.”

A nice lady answered, “Oh, yes yes. Are you available to come in for a face-to-face interview? How’s today between 2:30 and 5?”

“Oh sure, today’s fine,” I replied.

So she asked, “How does 3pm sound?”

Of course, I’m excited for such a quick response. “That sounds great. Can I get an address for the school?”

“Sure. But first, can I get your name and number?”

“Ok, my name is Tina Wu. And my number is…”

She interrupted me, “Wait, what? Tina Wu? Did you say Wu?”

Confused, would I have to spell it for her? “Um, yes…” I replied.

“Ok, no offense, but are you Caucasian?” She stumbles over her words.

Ok then, actually I am a bit offended. “No, I am not,” I huffed.

“Oh. Sorry. We only want Caucasians.”

How do you respond to that? I gave up, “Great. Thanks.” *Click*

In other news, I accepted the job in Neihu! It sounds fantastic. I know it’s only part time for now, but I’m sure there’s enough room for me to add more hours, tutoring and what not, when the school year starts. You know the one aspect that kind of decided it for me? They have a Christmas program! It’s going to be adorable.

And now the hard part, on to the housing search. I think Jen is going to go with something that’s about 30 minutes from my job, so we’ll have to find someplace in between with easy access to the subway and buses. I’m ok with commuting for a bit to get to work, as long as our place is close to lots of stores.

I Think I’ve Died..

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I have found my slice of heaven here in Taipei. It’s called SOGO shopping mall and has everything from Hermès to Christian Dior to Shu Uemura to Kate Spade. It’s like Sephora, Green Hills Mall, and 5th Avenue all compacted in two separate buildings with about ten floors each and they’re all filled with pretty and expensive things. It even has a bookstore consisting mostly of English books. I think I’ve bought more English books and magazines than anything else since I’ve been here, especially purses or shoes. You should be proud of me.

Fun Fact for the Day: Did you know that they don’t eat peanut butter and jelly sandwiches here? It’s either a peanut butter sandwich or a jelly sandwich, but never together. I let my cousin take a bite, and she freaked out. Strange.

There is now air conditioning at my Uncle’s place. They just had it installed yesterday. I kind of had hoped that it wasn’t because Jennifer and I were staying there, and they thought we wouldn’t be used to the heat. We were coping just fine. However, it seems like they’ve been talking about it for awhile, and we just sped up the process.

I have a job offer! It’s from my favorite place out of all the places that I interviewed at last week. It’s in Neihu, which is about 20 minutes outside of downtown Taipei (and 20 minutes from SOGO). Even though it’s only part time in the afternoons, I think I’m going to take it and then find another part time morning at another place close by. And I never know, it might turn into full time. I’ll make a decision tomorrow. In the meantime, I technically have a job!