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boomerang.
Friday, October 23, 2009
Man, the last time I wrote on my website I talked about all the changes that were happening this week and next, and how it would be opening a whole can of worms to begin to write about it. Well, that was before I knew what I know now. Things that transpired in the last twenty-four hours have basically turned my world upside down. I'm not the type to usually talk about these things as they happen. I prefer to leave people in the dark, and then when everything gets worked out, maybe I'll talk about it, because at that point there is no need to worry. But, this strikes at an inopportune time, as it's my birthday tomorrow and I know a lot of people will be asking how I'm doing, how things are going, etc., and I don't want to lie, but I also know how much time it's going to take to explain everything. Plus, to be honest, I'm not so sure this time that things will just work themselves out, and if that's the case, interested parties should know.
I'll just say this right now: this will be very long. There's no two ways about it, I'm a verbose writer and by the time is done I'll have spent two paragraphs of writing without actually even saying anything, so you might want to sit back with a cup of coffee or tea or something. And I also warn you, it may not make perfect sense. When it's something you're living, it's sometimes hard to separate the parts you take for granted as common knowledge with the parts someone who's not living it needs to know. So, forgive me if anything doesn't make sense. The following events occurred to me in a rather convoluted and fractured way, and I will try my best to piece it back together into one semi-continuous narrative. That's another thing I would like to note, keep in mind, I work in Taiwan, a foreign culture with a language barrier. A lot of the time, it's like playing with half a deck of cards, you just can't know everything that's going on—even if I spoke Chinese, the culture differences themselves sometimes make understanding decisions really difficult. Also, since I'm trying to put everything into one (sorta) understandable narrative, keep in mind that I didn't know all I knew now at the beginning. I may fill in some details ahead of time and you'll go “well, that was dumb Hunter, why did you make that decision?” but keep in mind a lot of revelations only happened after the fact for me. So, with that out of the way...
Okay, so first a little backstory that you may already know, but it bears repeating for a more complete narrative. I work in Taiwan as an English teacher, and to stay in Taiwan you need to have a work contract (that you sign for one year) with an employer. No work, no visa, no ability to live in Taiwan. I have a job at a school I love, and I was originally fully intending to continue working there after my current contract expires at the end of November. Unfortunately, due to several circumstances, business at the school had not been stellar.
Originally, the plan had been something like this. My boss had offered me a renewal, with kind of an understanding that my work hours might not be so guaranteed if student counts continued to drop. But this would allow me to stay in Taiwan, and if I did need to find a new job in order to pay the bills or whatnot, that would be fine and I could do it on my own time. This was first floated in early September. This was the original plan. Well, as things transpired, either business conditions passed a certain threshold or the owner got frustrated and the decision was made that the school would be sold. Either sold or closed by the end of the year. This presented a problem in my plan in that, obviously if the school is closed then my work contract (and thus my ability to live in Taiwan) would be void. Additionally, when a school changes hands, the previous contracts are also canceled, since they are with the old school, which no longer technically would exist. So either way, it looked like even if I re-signed with my current school, at the longest it would guarantee me an existence in Taiwan until the last day of the year, but obviously the goal was to sell it sooner.
It may be prudent here to differentiate between my boss and the owner of my current school. My boss is the man I have dealt with since I first applied to my school, and the school is actually bears his name, but as I would later find out, he doesn't actually own the business. There is a separate owner, who also owns two other English schools. I avoid using names wherever possible, but yeah, this man owns three schools total, my school, which is “independent”, and then the other two schools are franchises of a Taiwanese English school chain. The other two schools have existed for a while (I believe someone mentioned to me 20+ years) and my school is wrapping up its 9th year. So, while my boss was in charge of making pretty much all of the decisions at my school, he wasn't the owner, and as far as I know the decision to sell the school or close it by the end of the year wasn't his—he seemed rather frustrated by it, in fact.
But anyway, so the owner of the school has three schools. And they do like me, they think I'm a great teacher and they need teachers. So, they float this idea to me, where I would continue to work at my current school for as long as possible, but I would apply at the owner's other schools (the chain schools), and renew my work permit through them, and I would start to work there. It didn't sound like a terrible idea. I wanted to stay at my school, of course, but that was no longer going to be an option, and it sounded like a good deal to me. To me, at the time, it sounded like a lot of this would be a formality. Again, all three schools are owned by the same person, so it sounded like they would just be moving me around. So, I agreed to this.
Here is where things already started to get weird. My boss spoke to me on a Friday evening after classes, saying that he was working hard to “negotiate” with the other schools to get me all set up. He said it was causing him a lot of stress because he was lobbying for the same pay and stuff like that, and he said he couldn't do that for me. It was all fine, while it was very nice of him, I didn't expect him to and he certainly wasn't obliged to do so. He said, “they've got a job for you, but you will have to work out the details. I'll set up a meeting with them, and then I think you can figure it all out, and everything will be fine.” This was agreeable to me, so we arranged a meeting the following Monday at one of the branches of the chain school.
So, Monday rolls around, and the meeting occurs. They tell me some of the things, like yes, there will be a pay cut, but that's fine to me. I will say it here, but I may reiterate it later because it's so vital to me. I'm fine with that. I don't want to toot my own horn, but I think I am a pretty damn good worker. I work hard, I am dedicated, I am responsible, and I am also a very understanding individual. For all of this, I really am not asking for much in return. I am not looking to get rich or even make a lot of money, I'm not looking for a cruise job with few responsibilities, I'm not looking for a lot. There really is only one thing I am asking of my potential employers: I wanted a new full-time contract, that would ensure another year of living in Taiwan. That's it. The rest was negotiable. I think I offered a lot with my service, and I ask for one small thing in return, the basic right to continue living here, which is the most important thing to me.
And so we came to an agreement. But here, already, was more confusion. Again, the school I was “interviewing” at is owned by the same person who owns my school. They approached me with this idea of going through their other school, and made it sound, again, like it was just a formality. But when I got there, I was having to fill out an application and everything, including such awesome questions as “Do you foresee any difficulties in living in Taiwan?” which I was really tempted to write “Well, everything has been peachy so far, but maybe something in the 14th month will really surprise me!” Basically, the vibe I got was that no one at the other branch really knew what was going on. I didn't want to be perceived as a special snowflake (dad comment: all snowflakes are special) but the impression they gave me was that it was going to be a seamless transition between the two.
Well, as it was, I guess they “decided” to hire me, and training began the next day. Again, all schools are owned by the same guy, and I was under the impression that the right arm was telling the other what was going on, but when I showed up at the branch for training the next day, my trainer basically said to me, “uhh, so can you explain to me exactly, are you working for us or for your old school, or, I don't know?” I was like, “gee, this is great.” Again, another strike, they will keep on adding up, but at the time, I had faith that this was all a good organization so I put them aside as just small little bumps in the road.
At my current school, because business is already so slow, I was only working four days a week. So the training was supposed to be happening on my day off, and then as more and more of my days opened up (basically, I would stop teaching classes at my current school as the levels finished), I would do more and more days at the new school. But immediately, after that first day of training at the new school, my trainer told me that I would need to take the following Monday off from my current school, in order to watch more classes at the new school, as part of the training.
Well, when I told this to my boss at my current school, he was pretty confused, and to be honest this was a really awkward day for me. I know he wanted to just kind of not have to worry about my future anymore, but his position as boss was getting him all caught back up in it again. Plus, it was just confusing, again, my current school and my new school are all a part of the same larger company in a certain sense, and things were not being communicated. The new school simply didn't understand how the transition was supposed to work, they were trying to train me ASAP for working at the new school, etc. My boss got on the phone and talked it over with my trainer at the new school, who apologized a bunch and everything was changed so that I would only have to go to the new school on Tuesdays and Wednesday afternoons, since I only have late evening classes on Wednesday. Okay, fine.
To even further clarify things, my boss drew up my schedule at my current school, giving the exact dates I would be free from my current school and could work at the new school. This was well-received. So, I kept training on Tuesdays (and Wednesdays), even though that whole process itself was a bit silly. Again, it was presented to me as more of a formality, and instead I was stuck watching hours and hours of classes as “training”, because I “needed” 18 hours of training—despite the fact that the system was 90% the same as my current school, just different books. I felt ready to teach there from the first day, but whatever, so I had to waste my Tuesdays going in there to just watch things.
Additionally, I should point out that I just got a really strange vibe from the new school. It wasn't like the new school was bad or anything, it just seemed really, hmm, oddly managed. When I first moved to Taiwan, I was given a nice big “policies and procedures” book which laid out everything expected of me in plain English, and just laid out the basic terms of my contract. You know, things like monthly reports, payday, dress code, cell phone policy, vacation policy, hell, even just telling me I need to sign in to a teacher's book. At the new school, on the other hand, there was nothing. I had to specifically ask questions about everything, and when I did, they were kind of like “uhh, do you really care about this?” I don't know, it wasn't a huge problem, but I just had this strange feeling like no one really knew what was going on. These are basic things you would tell an employee, but they weren't telling me, not because they were trying to hide it or anything, they basically just didn't know that it was something you should do.
So, that continued, and I guess I will take us to the 6th of October. My “finalized” training schedule was laid out to me, on the 13th I would teach my first class at the new school, and on the 20th (both of these Tuesdays) I would teach two classes. Both of these would still count as “training” as in-class demonstrations, and then I would be done. Okay, sounds fine to me. The 13th came and I did my class, fine, it was problem-free and they said I did a super job. But on the 13th they told me that now, actually, I would only have to teach one class the next week, and then my training would be done. Sounded good to me, so that was fine. So that was last week Tuesday. Now, the next day, I found out that my current school had been sold, to two people who were really interested and eager to buy. Well, nothing was finalized, but it was basically as completely sold as it could be without any paperwork being signed.
So that was Wednesday, and when I went in to work at my current school on Thursday, oddly, my boss wasn't there, but the owner was, and a couple of other people. I figured they were the prospective buyers. Well, everything was happening in Chinese, and I had work to do anyways so I didn't really pay attention to what happened. All I can say is at the end of it all, the owner was very irate, he was yelling what sounded to me like very angry Chinese into a cell phone and he just seemed to be in a very unhappy disposition. I didn't know what happened until yesterday, actually, but this is what I was told. Basically, the school was supposed to be sold on Thursday to the two people. But, for some reason that was not told to me, a new buyer approached the owner on Thursday as well. For some reason the owner just decided to try and sell it to this new buyer and basically told the original two to go get bent. Well, what should happen but the new buyer drops out of the deal, and the original two are understandably no longer interested after being treated poorly, and now there is no buyer for the school. So, I guess that's what happened, but I didn't know any of that.
All I know is that, on that same day, after the owner (who was still angry) leaves, I suddenly get a phonecall from my trainer at the new school. He suddenly says that I have to teach two demonstration classes on the 20th, and that I should bring all my paperwork in even sooner so they could begin processing my new work permit. Great, I thought! That is what I wanted, I had been very proactive in asking my trainer at the new school when they were going to process my new work permit. This was because, way back when the plan was to renew the contract with my current school, we had been given a deadline of September 25th or something like that, and so it seemed like time was of the essence. But the attitude at the new school was “don't worry, we'll have enough time, we'll take care of all of it for you” and I had definitely asked them a million times, so I figured I should just trust them, because if they're wrong they'll certainly be responsible since I did more than my part of trying to get it done as quickly as possible.
So that happens on Thursday, no red flags yet. Monday rolls around. My boss tells me on Monday that the deal did not go through and the school wasn't sold. He also tells me that Friday (aka today, as I write this) will be his last day at the school. This is huge. First of all, he runs everything at the school, hell, the school is named after him! But secondly, all of the documents we use to teach are actually his, not the school's. So, while I know how to teach the material from the books, a lot of the supplementary material (vocabulary list with Chinese translations, homework, quizzes, tests, etc.) are all his and he is taking them with him when he leaves. I'll put any personal allegiances to my boss aside for the moment and just say that I foresee anarchy at the school after he's gone. Without those materials, suddenly we're left with just generic books not even designed specifically for Taiwan or Chinese-speaking children to learn English, we have no homework, no assignments, etc., and as far as I know and have been told, there is no contingency plan. No one has even seemed to put any thought into who will teach my boss's classes, either.
As to why my boss is leaving, I don't know exactly. I believe that they told him they just can't afford to keep him around anymore, and he also needs to start looking for something to do in the future, as well. Unlike me, he's married and has a kid, and has been the primary breadwinner for the family as far as I know, he can't just bum around looking for any old English teaching job. I think he promised to stay at the school and run it until they sold it (and for all I know he took a paycut or something for the time being) but after the deal fell through, he told them he just can't keep waiting on it forever. That's just my speculation, I really have no idea, but he's not too happy at the school and to see it end this way, and I can't blame him, especially due to some of the malicious things that happened that resulted in the school falling into the state it's in.
So, okay, fine. He's leaving at the end of the week. This was Monday. Tuesday, the 20th, I would have to go in and teach my two classes and then I'd be done with training at the new school. To me, some of the stuff was starting to make sense, I thought. It was starting to become clear. The deal didn't go through on Thursday, the owner decides maybe he will just shut the school down, and so tells my trainer, “let's go ahead and accelerate Hunter's process, just get him all set up here as soon as possible” which would explain giving me more classes and wanting to process my paperwork sooner. Keep in mind I really thought that closing the school was the only option, because without my boss there it was going to be a sinking ship without a captain, and it was going to be falling apart at a rapid rate.
When I get to the new school on the 20th, the trainer asks me right away, “What's going on at [your current school]? Is [your boss] leaving or what is the deal?” I told him plainly that I didn't know much, that this was my boss's last week and that I really have no idea what the plan is for the future there at my current school. I was confused, because I'm just a random worker, an English teacher, the lowest rung of the ladder. My trainer at my new school had direct access to the owner of both of the schools, and so I didn't really know why I should be the one he goes to for information. But whatever, okay, I did my two classes, again, they went super, I was given all the paperwork to sign for processing my new work permit, and then I was told training was finished, and next week Tuesday I would start teaching classes there in earnest.
So after that, I was feeling set. I was still bummed about my boss at my current school leaving and I still had a lot of questions about what the hell would be happening at the school after this week, but I figured at most it was four more weeks, and then I'd be out of there. I figured I could ride out four weeks of insanity and then have my job at my new school and all be set up and ready to go.
And that's how things went until yesterday, Thursday afternoon, 3:47 PM, to be exact, when I see my phone is ringing with the new school's number in the caller ID. I can't say I was happy, I couldn't believe it, because at this point my “finalized” training schedule had already been changed three times and I guess I was getting familiar with these Thursday afternoon phonecalls from the new school just changing something. I had no idea.
I talk to the trainer. He says to me, “Did [your boss] tell you about what [the owner] said?” “No.” “About you not coming to work here [i.e. the new school]?” “Uhh, what?” “You should ask [your boss].” He actually repeated that phrase three times. So, I just said “okay...” and hung up the phone, my heart already beating at the mention of “you not coming to work here.” I felt set, everything was ready and done. Pardon the French, but what the fuck? So I turn to my boss. His reaction was...uh, similar. It's not exactly reassuring when the person at the new school who is in charge of dealing with you just tells you to ask your current boss, and then you do, and he literally has zero idea what I am talking about.
So my boss gets on the phone with the trainer and explains that it's not right that he keeps getting dragged into the middle, and that it is the trainer's responsibility to get the story from the owner, who is now making all the decisions. So, the trainer again apologizes, and promises to get the story directly from the owner himself.
And he calls back a bit later. Keep in mind this was all before I was due to teach 4 hours of classes, and it blindsided big time. I was feeling so confident, and it was falling apart, and it was about to get worse. The trainer calls back, and speaks to my boss. My boss tells the trainer he should be telling me directly, and puts him on hold. My boss turns to me and says “It's [your trainer] on line 3, he's going to tell you something and it's not going to make any sense, but go ahead and pick up anyway.”
Sure enough. Here's the deal. The owner decided that he doesn't want to hire me at the new school now. He's still trying to sell my current school. So, he wants to renew my contract at the current school, have me work there until it sells, and then he promises to hire me at the new school. The trainer then apologizes for this whole process being such a pain in the ass, and tells me I can come by and pick up my documents I left with them and I can also pick up my NT$1,500 training completion fee that is owed to me. Oh, joy.
Even just typing this now, it makes me so angry. I don't know if my story telling has been sufficient enough to explain why, maybe this even sounds okay to some of you. But, there are a lot of things wrong. For one, in theory, it should be impossible for me to keep working at my current school because the deadline for renewal passed a long time ago. Plus, with my boss leaving, the school itself is going to be descending into anarchy, I wanted out already. And now I need to stay there, try to hold it together, and hope at the end they take care of me and send me to the new school?
I mean, on the surface, they're still offering me a job. But it's become such a headache at this point. And the bigger problem has pretty much been that, so far, not one thing they have told me has come true. So at this point, it really just seems like nothing makes sense, and nothing can be trusted. I don't know why they even had me go in on Tuesday to finish my training, because all of the events corresponding to the status of my current school had already transpired. If this was the plan, they should have told me before, but that's just getting to the root of the whole problem. I don't believe the owner or the new school are intentionally doing something bad. It's just—a lot of things don't make sense—and a lot of things are being miscommunicated, or not communicated at all, and there is a lot of confusion. I said earlier my one thing I wanted was a new work permit, a new contract. That's the one thing I have asked for, and instead they have helped me waste a month and a half I could have spent looking elsewhere, telling me one thing, then the other. Left, right, up, down, apply here, no work here, no wait we'll do it there. I'm tired, I'm fed up with it.
So needless to say, there were some unhappy individuals yesterday in the organization. At this point, even if they came to me and promised they'd make it all better and we would just go back to me working at the new school and they would even submit my paperwork today just to make a point, I'm pretty sure I'm done with it. There is something not right there. Even from day one I was not getting the best of vibes, but I put them aside because I trusted my boss and he set me up there (something he has now apologized for many times) so I thought it was for the best. But really, I am just getting so many conflicting reports, and now they may have jeopardized the one thing I really wanted to make sure was okay—getting my work permit in order. I'm pretty sure I'm done.
It's funny, and I feel bad, because my boss originally started this whole thing by saying he didn't want to be involved in being responsible for me starting at a new school, but he's now been pretty much as helplessly entangled as you can get. And, he's been interviewing himself for new jobs since his last day is...today, and he told me he knows four or five places that would literally hire me today. I'm really thinking that this is what I want to do. I want to just have a clean break, I think. I don't even know how much longer my current job will exist anyways after he leaves, I've said it a lot of times, I really think next week things are going to be going downhill there in a big way.
It sucks, because basically I have less than one month here to try and find something new. Truth be told, I have no idea, even if I found a job today, there might just not be enough time to switch now without having to leave or something. That's all something I will be investigating in the coming days.
Basically, the plan for now is, well, finish today. Finish this week. I can hopefully talk to my boss some more, like I said, he had some leads that might help, and that would be great. Next week, I will see how things are going at the boss-less, material-less school and hopefully just start canvassing the area, figuring out if they want to hire me, like literally that day. And if I find a good place that I am happy with and that is hiring, I'll do it. Like, now. That day. Lock and load, ready to go.
And hopefully that's how it will go. But, as I said way back at the beginning, I really have no idea. I would like to come off as confident, but I look at the days remaining and I just go “shit.” I really have no idea. I might have to go home in one month. I really have no idea. So that's where I'm at, it's not a great mentality to have over my birthday weekend and I don't think I'll be able to sit back, relax, and enjoy it, but there's not much I can do about it right now. It's a little funny, in that I actually applied for my current job on my birthday last year, and now I'll be suddenly spending my birthday this year trying to figure out what I can do to stay here.
We'll see. I'm trying to remain hopeful. So, happy birthday to me! There's the scoop. Surprisingly enough, I actually left a lot out, but seeing as this is now getting to be seven pages and over 5,000 words long, I think it's time to wrap it up. Feel free to ask me about anything that doesn't make sense.
posted by Hunter Morrison at 12:47 PM | 0 Comments
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