Dear Mister Lord of the Flies.
I want to first apologize to the great people at Ernst and Young. I was totally out of line and my anger was just the result of the negative associative transfer when I immersed from the sea and had my initial breath of salty air in the corporate world. In the last 19 days on this island I have learned new survivial techniques. Cultural norms. Met foreign locals and enjoyed their food. They have given me tours and promised me a future. Im learning a lot everyday, and besides adhering to their dress code, I consider myself the newest addition to the society. The Accounting Island, and Its my turn to hold the conch shell.
In any organization, team building is encouraged. They found the number 1 reason kids are staying in school, is because of their friends. In higher education, from the administrations perspective we call this learning groups. In this society we meet twice a week (of course I never can make these conflicting meetings), to the tune of food and usually a speaker from the accounting industry. On this island, it’s like the once a week visit from the food provider, and we make none of our own food. I have met many of the locals and I have built a hut amongst them. As human beings we long for acceptance. The locals may fake that they like you, and want you to succeed, until the food provider makes his/her rounds and it’s again a free for all for food. I really love economics, because it reminds me of physics and sociology drawn from a business mans fountain pen. Economics deals with scarcity, and the fact that humans have to eat. I get hungry every 3 hours and Economics will explain how I keep myself nourished. I draw from William Golding’s Classic book as I explain how we students interact in our newfound surroundings. When you set up children onto an island, they create economics in order to survive, its natural, and its human nature. A systematic behavioral system based around scarcity and natural roles are created. The hunters are responsible for the food, which would be the production of the product. Ralph and Piggy distributed the product to the children, who then consumed. In economic terms my relationship with the accounting society can be explained through the SCARCITY of jobs in this struggling economy. Naturally we are out for our own, and either I accept it, or I end up kissing ass for a lot less money. Is a kiss -ass world, and my spaceship ship landed sooner than the aeuronaughts predicted.
Networking is a skill that I need to learn, I should. I have a stack of business cards and a pad folio, I should learn how to distribute. I should, and it may be essential to my success, but what if it wasn’t in congruence with my values, my personality. What if this new style of networking doesn’t commiserate my destiny? I have been questioning that for about 2 weeks now. There are courses, and seminars teaching me how to achieve through networking. I am encouraged to attend to the tune of “How will you stand out this recruiting season? The elevator speech”
The elevator speech is a speech where you have to get somebody to like you on the basis of nothing. The end result is a job for you, if they haven’t given it away to somebody undeserving, but established repouir Its about standing out, being the mechanical pencil, the red scantron, or the livescribe echo. I must prepare myself to do this the right way, or there is my way. I was invited to go to Disneyland with the locals from the island on a Friday. I respectfully declined because of work. Although I like going out and meeting new people. I was encouraged to hang out with people who already got jobs in the industry. Somebody invited me to go to Disneyland and hang out with people on the basis of he or she had a job, and I need their job. Its absolutely nuts that I would want to hang out with somebody to get an advantage in the job market. I would want to hang out with these established individuals to hang out, and find out their situation later, ideally learn from them, and hopefully give them something to draw from. It’s called love, and its undefined. I have no tattoos as yet, because I feel the love, im undefined. If you didn’t understand the last paragraph, here it is again.
People are hanging out with people who work at deloitte at Disneyland because they work at deloitte, and not trying to have a good time. That fucking frustrates me. That’s like removing the soul of a human being. What’s left?
I’m not saying the job market is filled with non-qualified ass kissers, but maybe the hardworking individuals who deserve slice of the warm apple pie are getting crusted because maybe they couldn’t develop these skills. Maybe they had a kid and are juggling work and school in their 6th year of college. Maybe while I hit downtown Fullerton, they are the guys picking up my plate, and serving me my drink. Sometimes when I finish work, I venture off to go somewhere to eat, and get served just like I serve. I know that my job puts me in a horrible mood once I clock off, but I can confirm it could be a lot worse. My social life takes a hit, but what about the guy that’s serving me, it’s like midnight and he’s still working. What about his social life? What’s his motivation?
Last weekend I almost clocked 40 hours though 3 shifts. I would say I hit 36 hours. By the time hit the victory lap on Sunday, I was ready to quit. Convinced that I couldn’t hold up in this political battlefield, or should I say farm. The Tangy Tomato has boiled my blood, but I draw from appreciation to keep me sane as my ego takes a hit every weekend. My tongue is chiseled with bite marks. I remember to never bite the hand that feeds me. Im already producing more than my peers, I don’t necessarily need the support of anybody. I look at a calendar placed into the future. The year 2011, the date is January 24th, and the calendar box reads a day as important as the day Im trapped in now. I did deem the possibility of resignation, and full focus on my studies (which are as liquid as money in the bank). It even involved state money I can have through a grant. $7,000 to be accurate. It ate at me, every time I was ordered to do something. Every suggestion that ended up blowing in my face. It was a thought that would re-allocate the blood sweat and tears. Into a less diversified effort and enormous focus on studying. I kept thinking about it. I sat and thought about it. Slept on it and dreamt about it. I looked myself in the mirror Monday morning, brushed my shoulders off and accepted the challenge of another week. My plan is to stick with my job and get smart. As an islander, I see the characteristics between the natives and myself. I hate to be sounding cocky, but I feel like I can do it. I can do it, because I got myself to where I am right now.
When it feel like living's harder than dyin/ For me giving up's way harder than tryin
-Kanye West.
A picture drives me in my head. A Mosaic. Moments in time of the many times I felt a stimulus of negative energy attempting to sway me. Included are the reactions, and ways I channeled it weather wrong or right. Individual frames of my life to paint a mosaic of a White man and myself with a White Collar shaking hands after a set of interviews. And his belief in me. His great investment into the mind of Neil Raj Syal. It’s a picture I see vividly. In that interview I gave my boss me. The real me. I didn’t kiss any ass, but then again, it was all a dream.
A second picture comes to surface in my brain. It’s not a mosaic, but its in vivid colors, to remind me its still intangible. But within it, I see myself on a Friday evening around 7:15pm with my work shirt, tie loose and a new watch. This new watch sits on my left hand and attracts the assiduous bartender. In a crowded bar I look to my left and right calculating, and before I give him my request of 20 shots of patron (or anything else that’s top shelf). Im buying everybody at the bar a shot in celebration of my first weekend and how im just resting my head the next day (Saturday). I just realized I was not at any old bar. I was at T.G.I. Fridays and I just made 19 new friends. The time is 7:20 and the night hasn’t even started.
As I conclude, I don’t want your job if it is going to be easy. I feed off challenges. That’s how I am defined. Don’t look at me like you did the people in front of me or behind me because we probably tick to a different rhythm. I don’t want this job if it wont facilitate my growth. I gotta make my momma proud.
I know this is a lengthy cover letter, and I may not have followed the grammatical rules. Sir, I just wanted to say, I want to show you that I can write, and sometimes it ignites passion within me. Instead of trying to kiss your ass, I want to let you know that im destined for success. I can swim off this island, I need the exercise. I can’t draw or sing, but this healthy expression of my life is turning me into an artist. It helps me exercise my emotion, and strengthen my beliefs. My life is beautiful and I cherish every opportunity to learn. I understand that you can control me working in your office on this lovely island but you don’t have free will over my life. You can’t change me, but an opportunity given, I will help change your work environment My Professional Resume will follow, thank you for your time and I want to remind you that my Destiny is out of your hands.
Sincerely
Neil Syal
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