Gainfully Employed

Montrealers have got to be the most employable Canadians. We just have to be. We enjoy the country's cheapest tuition and have the most educated population. Perhaps we're more likely to call our employers on bullshit as a result. We take more days off than the rest of the country, but that's just to keep us sane. It's difficult, after all, to turn up at a bullshit job everyday when you realize what it is. The more education you've got, the more likely you are to realize it's bullshit.

We speak at least two languages. You'd think that this would give us an incredible advantage, but that all depends really. If you are fortunate enough to have a passably French last name in Quebec, you're likely to do well. Though Bogue is passably French, it is also the term for a computer virus ... perhaps not the impression I'm trying to make. In English Canada, if you have a passably English name, you're also likely to do well. If you're a French Canadian with a last name like Leblanc, fear not, all is not lost- just pronounce it 'Le blank' and try not to shutter. Being bilingual also allows us to curse our employers in the language that they are least familiar with. This is important.

Montrealers are adept at navigating mazes of red tape and accept that we will be paid poorly for it. This also ensures that we will complain more than other Canadians, but at least we're accustomed to making a hundred calls just to get our address changed on our driver's licence. You'll find us pleasantly surprised if we're able to do it in one phone call- and suspiciously shocked if we aren't charged 50$ for such a service.

We are the fastest driving Canadians, and are thus likely to be on time for work. I say that, but we're actually painfully unreliable. And quite likely to speed away from work an hour early at the end of the day. We drink the most, leading some people (myself) to believe that we are happier in our work. We also gamble more than other Canadians, which should serve as assurance that we will continue to turn up at our mind-numbing jobs (until we win big, that is). Montreal men and women alike spend more money on their appearance than other Canadians. This makes us seem better looking. Screw the filles des roi theory- it's all about not wearing your sweatpants to work.

I don't know where I'm going with this. I just got home from an interview at a temp agency and was struck by the differences between working in Calgary and working in Montreal. Years ago, I saw an ad in the paper in Calgary for a temp agency looking for bilingual receptionists. I faxed in my résumé, sure that I wouldn't get a response since I had extremely minimal knowledge of Word, or any other computer program. I got a phone call the next day. The woman on the other end asked how good my French was... I hesitated. How do you answer that, I don't know. What do you want? A rating from one to ten? She passed the phone to her colleague and we finished the interview in French. She offered me the job and told me I started on Monday. In closing she asked if I was familiar with Word. Of course, I lied.

This morning I dragged myself from my bed bright and early. I made my way down to the temp agency and presented myself at the front desk. The young woman behind the desk passed me two thick packets- ten pages each, one in English and one in French. She pointed me to the exam room and set me to work correcting the grammatical errors in each packet. It screws with your head. They had a list of mispelled words in each one- confusing as hell when they've spelled words in the French packet the English way and vice-versa. They know damn well it reaches a point where you can't remember one way or the other. After that ordeal they sat me in front of the computer and called me on my claim that I 'knew' Word and Excel. By now they must know I lied. Just like that fancy restaurant in Westmount figured out real fast that by 'knowledge of wines' I meant I could tell red from white. In any case, the long stream of testing finally came to an end and I interviewed with the owner. It was refreshing to be able to be totally honest in an interview. She looked down at my cv and asked if I was just looking for work until I found a teaching job. I said yes. Like most French Canadians, she marvelled at how I was able to work abroad and totally misunderstood what the imminent French test was for. She seemed to think that as a requirement for further teaching in Asia, I was being asked to write a French test. Only in Quebec would such an error be made. After careful review of my grammar tests, she gave me a passing grade in both languages and informed me that I would hear from her soon.

The process took me over two hours, and I walked out shocked that I had to go through so much to get a job temping. In no other Canadian city would you be asked to do so much work, with so little in return. As I left the office, I checked my voice mail and found I had a message from the school. After all that, I start teaching on Monday. My days of lounging about are officially done and I'll have to get up at what my mother calls 'a reasonable hour'.