Sentiments of An Office Hours Worker
My Facebook status said, "When you don't work office hours, and have a so-called long holiday, don't assume everyone else will accomodate to your schedule."
Lest you think that I am taking a dig at Singapore's educators, you are, well, almost correct.
Truthfully, I was responding to a friend's complaint on how she felt forced and got really irritated when she was confronted with incessant pestering from two of her teacher friends.
I've been down that road before, but I've always viewed this as a sensitive topic due to my close friendship with people in this profession. Don't get me wrong, I respect them a lot.
I also respect the fact that they can reach their workplace (aka respective schools) before the sun is up when I'm still having my warm shower after snoozing my alarm.
I also respect that they have started preparing for their morning lessons while I'm still applying on my makeup and sculpting lotion on my hair, and if I do so a bit earlier, I'd get to enjoy my morning cup of tea and light reading of the newspaper.
I also respect their ability to talk for long hours in front of immature kids while I either stone in front of my desktop, enjoying breakfast amidst the light gossiping on MSN with fellow colleagues, or, the worst case scenario, seeing my Lotus Notes get all explosive on me.
Which reminds me, shit, I need to archive by tomorrow. :p
Coming back, I also respect these teachers for being able to add their students on their social networking platforms whilst carefully deciding which photos to upload, and what kind of language to use should they decide on situations where expletives would be an understatement to what they wish to express.
Lastly, I respect them for giving up their Sundays for marking while I would be going for movies, picnics and doing leisure activities. Oh, enjoying my night soccer games when EPL is in season. Yeaps.
See, I respect them a lot.
I understand their profession. A lot. I was once a relief teacher (on full-time teacher duties minus CCA and admin work) so I had been in their shoes.
Unfortunately, there isn't quite a two-way understanding between teachers and office hours workers.
For some reason, many (not all) teachers choose to glorify things like:
1) their paycheck because they are amongst the highest paid in civil service (I think they're also paid for the Saturdays CCA days and Sundays for marking at home)
2) their annual IT allowance (weird part is many of them remains more "illiterate" to applications compared to the office workers)
3) the so-called long holidays during June and December where many of them would be summoned back for work in the first and last week of those holidays
and many more.
Once again, I do not hate teachers.
But I wish for everyone to have mutual respect for each other's profession, no matter how different your schedules may be.
If you do have some tiny ounce of respect, you would consider:
1) Not hounding your friend to go karaoke with you on a Wednesday night in June when the friend has already stated she really got loads of work to clear.
2) Giving up a weekend day with boyfriend/fiance/fiancee to meet up with your other regular office hours mates who are also actually sacrificing their time with their loved ones to meet up with you.
3) Thinking twice that your other friends are too busy to meet up with you during your curricular time when the actual fact is that we understand you have to be home by probably 9pm as you might have things to prepare for the next day. So we just choose to meet up on our own without you.
4) Not talking about work when you meet with friends who aren't teachers. Work is office hours (plus paid/unpaid overtime) for us, it stays there. We don't want to hear how some kids irritate you because they didn't bring their homework as we deal with adult-management, and prefer it that way also.
The list goes on, but you get what I mean. ;p
No worries, I don't harbour any grudges against teachers. Its just that I wish this line of distinction of behaviour would just become blurrer and soon, everyone will just respect each other's profession, whether you are in the education sector, regular office hours workers or even in shift-dominating industries.
Because no matter how much you earn, or how much freedom you get in your work, every job comes with pros and cons.
You don't have to cover everything up. ;)
Lest you think that I am taking a dig at Singapore's educators, you are, well, almost correct.
Truthfully, I was responding to a friend's complaint on how she felt forced and got really irritated when she was confronted with incessant pestering from two of her teacher friends.
I've been down that road before, but I've always viewed this as a sensitive topic due to my close friendship with people in this profession. Don't get me wrong, I respect them a lot.
I also respect the fact that they can reach their workplace (aka respective schools) before the sun is up when I'm still having my warm shower after snoozing my alarm.
I also respect that they have started preparing for their morning lessons while I'm still applying on my makeup and sculpting lotion on my hair, and if I do so a bit earlier, I'd get to enjoy my morning cup of tea and light reading of the newspaper.
I also respect their ability to talk for long hours in front of immature kids while I either stone in front of my desktop, enjoying breakfast amidst the light gossiping on MSN with fellow colleagues, or, the worst case scenario, seeing my Lotus Notes get all explosive on me.
Which reminds me, shit, I need to archive by tomorrow. :p
Coming back, I also respect these teachers for being able to add their students on their social networking platforms whilst carefully deciding which photos to upload, and what kind of language to use should they decide on situations where expletives would be an understatement to what they wish to express.
Lastly, I respect them for giving up their Sundays for marking while I would be going for movies, picnics and doing leisure activities. Oh, enjoying my night soccer games when EPL is in season. Yeaps.
See, I respect them a lot.
I understand their profession. A lot. I was once a relief teacher (on full-time teacher duties minus CCA and admin work) so I had been in their shoes.
Unfortunately, there isn't quite a two-way understanding between teachers and office hours workers.
For some reason, many (not all) teachers choose to glorify things like:
1) their paycheck because they are amongst the highest paid in civil service (I think they're also paid for the Saturdays CCA days and Sundays for marking at home)
2) their annual IT allowance (weird part is many of them remains more "illiterate" to applications compared to the office workers)
3) the so-called long holidays during June and December where many of them would be summoned back for work in the first and last week of those holidays
and many more.
Once again, I do not hate teachers.
But I wish for everyone to have mutual respect for each other's profession, no matter how different your schedules may be.
If you do have some tiny ounce of respect, you would consider:
1) Not hounding your friend to go karaoke with you on a Wednesday night in June when the friend has already stated she really got loads of work to clear.
2) Giving up a weekend day with boyfriend/fiance/fiancee to meet up with your other regular office hours mates who are also actually sacrificing their time with their loved ones to meet up with you.
3) Thinking twice that your other friends are too busy to meet up with you during your curricular time when the actual fact is that we understand you have to be home by probably 9pm as you might have things to prepare for the next day. So we just choose to meet up on our own without you.
4) Not talking about work when you meet with friends who aren't teachers. Work is office hours (plus paid/unpaid overtime) for us, it stays there. We don't want to hear how some kids irritate you because they didn't bring their homework as we deal with adult-management, and prefer it that way also.
The list goes on, but you get what I mean. ;p
No worries, I don't harbour any grudges against teachers. Its just that I wish this line of distinction of behaviour would just become blurrer and soon, everyone will just respect each other's profession, whether you are in the education sector, regular office hours workers or even in shift-dominating industries.
Because no matter how much you earn, or how much freedom you get in your work, every job comes with pros and cons.
You don't have to cover everything up. ;)
posted by Ryu Arashi @ 8:05 AM
3 Comments
