Be strong!

Hey guys,

It's been a while since I posted anything here...or on blogger at all. I remember a time when it was just me who was blogging to keep the blog alive, now it's Jackie and Jay.

After reading you guys' posts, I feel a great urge to hug you guys (although it's pretty easy for me to do that to Jay). I know that right now is probably going to be a tough time for you guys. But have faith! I'm sure you guys will be able to make it through. ATAR is not everything, knowing the both of you very well, I KNOW that you guys will be able to get very far in life and do commemorable things that will make all of us proud, but more importantly, yourselves proud. It's going to be hard and there will be many challenges to come, but as long as you stay strong and never give up, you'll make it through. And hey, we're all in this together and I'm sure that if there is anything that any one of us can do for whoever is in need that we don't hesitate to help out. So don't worry and be happy my loves :)

Anyways, I can't wait for our Port Stephens adventure! While nothing has been officially planned yet, it still feels surreal and at times I am doubtful about whether it'll still be on but i really really really hope that it is. I mean c'mon, soon I'll be buried under thousands and thousands of homework, sheets of paper, assignments and exams, I HAVE to go out and have some fun before I can fully commit myself to such a horrible situation and what better way to do that than to spend it together with my lovely sister and cousins somewhere where we are not constantly nagged at by parents, where we can relax, have fun, smile and laugh together. Ahh...just thinking about it is making me all excited!!

Okay, now, I suppose I should give you guys a little update about myself while I am at it. Well, I just started working today at Aunty Meiyee's father-in-law's bakery as extra help since her father-in-law and mother-in-law are going to go overseas for a while and thus Aunty Meiyee will be left to take care of the shop, which would be hard on her. So basically I decided to go help out to lessen the load which she has to bear. And man, what a load of work she has to do. She has to wake up at 3am to go with Uncle Peter, her husband, to make bread, then afterwards she comes home to take her children to the child care centre before going back home to sleep and then waking up at around 1 to get ready to go back to the shop at around 3 till 6 or 7 when she has to close the shop and pick up her children from the child care centre and the whole process starts again. That's a very busy day don't you think? To top it off, she hasn't been able to sleep well, which is really bad. Plus she is kind of sick. Hopefully she'll be able to get better soon and sleep well. And I hope that I will be able to help lessen the load for her.

Anyways, my first day...well, I have been there to work for a bit once with Jay, Jackie and Queenie. But that was much easier since we were working together so there wasn't as much pressure. The first thing I learnt was that 'first impressions are very important' as quoted by Aunty Meiyee. Thus, turning up to work with my hair down was a no no. I had to borrow a clip from Aunty to clip up my hair, which is quite foreign to me since I usually just tie my hair up, so that was quite an..interesting experience. Plus, I had to put another clip to clip up my fringe. So I must have looked quite interesting..not that I looked to see what I looked like. Haha...thankfully I didn't scare any customers away.

It was quite hard communicating though because everyone that worked there knew Vietnamese except for me. So while they happily conversed in Vietnamese, I just stood around awkwardly. But they were nice nonetheless. For the first hour or so, I just stood around trying to remember the prices of the various items in the store and let me tell you, that is quite an overwhelming thing to do. It was a little better than the last time I came, as there were more price tags on the various items, but there were still some which did not have any prices and which caused me to be quite embarrassed when I had to keep asking the customer to wait while I asked the other lady working what the price of the item was. It was even more embarrassing when the customer knew the price and I didn't. I also felt bad for the other lady because there were many many orders for pork rolls or chicken rolls which I had not learnt how to do yet, so I had to keep calling her to do them, especially when she went to eat her lunch. I felt so bad when I had to stop her from eating to go and make some kind of a roll. I could only laugh it off awkwardly. Another embarrassing which happened was with the microwave. I could put stuff in and turn on the timer to cook it for a certain time period but for quite a while I could not figure out why the food was not getting hot. Finally, I summoned up the courage to ask the other lady and it was only then that I learnt I had to turn on the timer AND press 'cook' for it to actually heat up. Silly silly me. At this point, let me give a shout of to the poor man who waited awkwardly for his cheese and bacon roll to be heated up. I'm so sorry but the wait was for nothing as the roll was not hot after the long awkward wait.

Oh and let me just say, I am NEVER EVER wearing flats to work again. My feet were killing me by the end of the day and I had the strong urge to just walk around bare footed, it probably would've been more comfortable. Man, my feet were all red by the end of the day and they still hurt right now. My legs are tired too. Standing around for 5 hours sure does wonders to legs don't they? I take my hat off to all those people who work for such long periods of time.

All in all, today was a great experience for me all day, although tiring, it was an exhilarating day. I am absolutely beat even after having a nap straight after coming home. I really need to somehow gain more energy.

Okay. Enough from me. I blabbered on for quite a bit. Just wanna say, I miss you heaps Jackie love! And I can't wait for you to come back so we can have a fun outing together again. But make sure you have lots and lots of fun in America. Don't worry too much and just enjoy yourself. Smile heaps, laugh until it hurts and be safe!

Signing out,

~Viv