a job interview virgin's woes

i had another job interview this week at a posh hotel lobby in makati. it was also my second job interview in that hotel, a personal favourite because of its gorgeous and spacious lobby, in three months. but  i was still a train wreck, i tell you.

i have always been uncomfortable about job interviews. in fact, i don't like doing it. i wish i could skip this part and just show up for work and prove to the company what i can do. if they don't like it, they can fire me anytime. no hard feelings.

maybe because i am a journalist, that's why i am used to asking the questions, not answering them. also, i don't know how to answer basic but probing job interview questions like why do you want this job, or why did you quit your last job or what are your plans for the next five years. i know anybody can answer them, even my three-year old niece, but i simply don't have it in me to come up with intelligent and coherent responses to these difficult questions. (i know all the textbook replies, but they sound so insincere). also, i don't like talking about myself and i am terrible at selling myself.

lastly, i am not comfortable discussing salaries, a key part of any job interview.

(i don't know why, despite writing about financial news nearly everyday as a business journalist, i am not adept at money matters.  i never like talking about money. ever. but i love spending it. i know nothing about investing or putting up a business. how ironic given my profession where i talk about the money trail all the time with fund managers, analysts, investors, ceos.)

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it certainly feels like starting all over again.

i remember my very first job interview. i was fresh out of college and just bumming around at my parents' palatial house (ok hacienda), getting drunk, stoned, sleeping the whole day and getting out at night like count dracula, doing all the things that i missed while busy (?!) getting a four-year degree in business management. i was so not into that course (i wanted to take-up creative writing, journalism, fine arts or fashion design) that i finished it after five and a half years.

one late afternoon, a college friend dropped by the house and told me there was a job opening at a government agency that paid as much as eight thousand pesos a month.

i was impressed. at that time, eight thousand was a lot of money, especially for a fresh graduate, inexperienced me. he said the agency wanted to recruit fresh graduates like us who did well in school with lots of extra curricular activities. i nodded my head, confused. why did he believe that i was qualified for the job?

i mean, what did he mean exactly by "did well in school with lots of extra curricular activities" when all i was good at was passing my subjects without attending classes and the only activities i was involved with were going to discos (this was the late eightys people. we danced and got drunk in discos. remember those dazzling disco balls? madonna?) and arranging drinking sessions at a nearby beach even during school days. then we would go skinny dipping when horribly drunk.
darn those were fun days.

oh yes, i attended an anti-nuclear rally and anti-tuition fee increase march when i was in my freshman, but only because i was prodded by a really handsome student leader belonging to the radical lfs (league of filipino students). i was lost though, had no idea what they were shouting and angry about. i was just standing very close to my friend, staring at his sweaty longish, bearded face all the time. he looked like keanu reeves (during his dude, where's my car? days). we were both wearing dark aviators, so i think he had no idea that my eyes were on him all the time and not on the speakers. did i mention that i didn't even understand the cause that they were fighting for?!

*****

despite my hectic domestic schedule (mostly cleaning up the mess i created when drunk and stoned. broken bottles. vomit. dirty sheets.), i agreed to apply for the job. (ok it was mostly because of the eight thousand peso monthly pay). i hurriedly typed what passed as a resume that read like a high schooler's slum book (remember this? where you write your name, birthday, age, hobby, the name of your crush and then you define love (is a mystery, full of rosary). then you have to leave a message to the owner of the slum book like japan -- just always pray at night. this was our version of face book and it was way way better than fbk, i tell you!!).

days after i sent my resume, i took the exam. yes, there was an exam. then a week after, i received a telegram (do you still remember the telegram?) for a job interview.
wearing a longsleeve yellow shirt, dark jeans, sneakers and lots of gel on my thick, wavy, black hair, i showed up at the office of the interviewer. for a government agency, the office was impressive: air conditioned, freshly painted walls and ceilings, new furniture, lovely curtains, computers, and there was even a coffee maker. can you beat that?!

when i arrived (i was ten minutes late. i was always late when i was young.), there was already a long queue outside of the interviewer's office. most were clueless fresh graduates like myself, others veterans of the job market. one was so clueless he asked me where i got the pen i was using to fill-up the application form. when i told him i brought it with me, he added: oh i thought you stole it from that desk (pointing to a vacant desk next to us). duh! then he showed me a pen that he apparently took from there. nice job, i said, smiling. we became friends. he said his name was dan, so i called him stealy dan. he loved it, not knowing what stealy connotes. haha.

after waiting for around twenty minutes (that was already too long then. i was so impatient and restless in my younger days that i could not stay seated for more than five minutes. this was the reason why i was always absent from class.), and having a nice time chatting with my new found kleptomaniac friend, who was wearing a barong tagalog, black pants and leather shoes as though he was going to his wedding or his own funeral, my name was finally called.

the interviewer was the head of the government agency, a gorgeous woman in her early thirtys (nyay, i am now a decade older than her). she was tan, skinny, wearing mini skirts, transparent loose blouson that i could see the colour of her bra and more, huge dark glasses placed on top of her head like a turban, high heels and glossy red lipsticks. i could never forget her face and the way she looked that day because she was my first time. i was a job interview virgin and she was the first to break it. luckily, it did not hurt and leave a scar.

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after a few introductions about the agency, came the difficult questions. (if memory serves me right, this is how it went):

her: why should we give you this job? what are your qualifications?

me: (after being quiet for an eternity, i answered stammering.) my friend who recommended me this job said this will entail a lot of meetings with people in far-flung barangays to inform them about your agency's loan program that they could avail of to raise capital for small businesses. i am good at organizing events and public speaking. i am a skilled debater and orator. (lies. i'm scared of talking in public!)

her: what would you tell them?

me: that they could borrow at really low interest rates as long as their project is feasible. (i smiled. i thought she was impressed.)

her: (poker face and i thought i impressed her with my well-thought of answer) this job will require you to stay in far-flung areas for as long as six months. are you willing to stay there? most of these places have no electricity, no nice places to stay, no discos. (this was the early ninetys, still the era of the discos. madonna was still the queen of the charts!)

me: (hesitant) why not?

her: won't you get bored?

me: i will organize dances on weekends. parties at the beach or the river banks. i am good at it.

her: hmmm...(she took notes). where do you see yourself five, ten years from now?

me: ah..ah..

her: married, with children, with a stable job? driving a car?

me: ah...ah...

her: or single, still staying at your parents' house, with no job?

me: ahhhhhhh......i don't know. i don't make plans.

her: (stood up) we will call you.

(i stood up also and we shook hands).

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outside, when my new friend who was training to be a politician asked me how did it go, i gave him a thumbs up sign. he was so overjoyed that he said we should celebrate by having a beer. his treat. i agreed immediately. what can i say? i can't say no to free booze.

*********

they did not call me. after a month or so, my friend (not the future politician. but the one who informed me about the job opening) got the job.

after six months, i got a letter from him. i was already in the city by then, reviewing for the cpa (certified public accountant) examinations at that tiny review school along espana street in front of the esteemed university of sto. tomas. i wonder if it's still there?! 

my friend said i could have gotten the job because the agency head was impressed by my guts (plus the fact that i topped the written exam given by the agency to screen hundreds of applicants).

the only downside was during the interview when i failed to answer the part about my plans in the next five to ten years. the agency head told my friend during a party when they were both tipsy that it was important to show prospective employers that you have plans for the future and that you were ambitious.

then he added that he just bought a new motorbike, paid for in cash. oh wow!

i did not write back.

i was green with envy.

here i was sleepless, neck deep in reading all these accounting text books, memorising accounting and business theories, analysing financial statements, hardly had time to eat, get drunk or watch a movie, and there he was having a grand time in his brand new motorbike and enjoying an eight thousand peso monthly pay!

i soooo hate him. (ps, my friend is now a successful businessman with a construction company that takes mostly government projects like constructing roads and public schools. my other friend became, you guess it right, a politician. he is now a mayor of his town. rich beyond my imagination! ah pork barrel thy name is almighty!!)

*******

since then i promised myself that i would brush up on my interview skills.  i read, researched, learned the basics before showing up for an interview. being prepared is the key. research the company, the position, the interviewer (it helps to learn something about him. it comes in handy during awkward moments). see? i learn easily. i am a good student actually if i focus on it.

so i mastered all the textbook answers that interviewers ask job applicants (their questions are also culled mostly from textbooks or blog posts). i practiced with a friend first a day before the interview.

"why should we hire you?" = because i am the best there is. i came from  a very, very poor family so i learned the value of hard work at an early age. i am not afraid of working hard for long hours.

"how do you see yourself five or ten years from now?" = successful, with my own family, living in a nice house, driving a brand new car, taking my children to school and my wife to work. hopefully, i will be managing people too, just like you now.

"how much salary are you expecting?" = if it's possible, i don't want to quote any amount. i want to prove my worth first to this company before putting a price tag on my ability and skills.

it worked. everyfreakingtime.
but it didn't feel right. it was too studied, too textbookish.

people are always impressed by a man in his early twentys, well-dressed (i always wore a tie when showing up for interviews, shiny black leather shoes, dark pants, blue long-sleeve shirt, and hair well pressed with gel), idealistic, ambitious, eager to please and work hard, brimming with confidence, smells good (i always put on a perfume, even it it was only lord wally.) and could speak decent english.

of course, i had charlie sheen in that wall street film as a role model. remember, greed is good?!

******

now, i wonder if i can still pull this off twenty years after, when i am in my mid fortys, still aimless, jaded, battle scarred and has long discovered the truth that in life, it doesn't pay to be an idealist all the time, otherwise you will end up finishing last. that some sort of compromise is always needed to get to where you are, to get what you want. that you have to choose your battles to win all the time.
(oh well, i am an idealist. maybe those misdirected rallies that i attended in college because of my crush had indeed influenced me in a way bigger than i gave them credit for.)

as i grow older, but not wiser, i realize that sometimes, you need to lose to win. that idealists are shot in luneta or finish last in the race.  that they are a vanishing breed.

(meanwhile, my role model, charlie sheen is wasting away his life and talent on drugs, alcohol and porn stars.)

having said this, i am happy to say that i never lost the idealism of youth. i haven't compromised enough to the point that i would lose my self respect, that i would be ashamed of myself. luckily, i have always been ambivalent about money. i was never obsessed by it, so i could proudly say that i never prostituted my job as a journalist. though i don't judge others who did, do and will continue to do so. it's their life. it's their conscience. 

i never twisted the truth in my stories in exchange for money.
i haven't sold my soul. hopefully, never will.