I'm Back...

No apologies for the lack of posts over the past week and a half or so. I have been on holidays of a sort. The first day was spent driving some 650 kilometres from home to Moree for a couple of staff development days.

As some may be aware, I have been appointed to a permanent teaching position at Collarenebri Central School. If you are wondering, it is about 140 kilometres to the west of Moree. I had never been to Collarenebri, so Dyah, Will and I made a point of driving out there last Friday to see what we were in for when we moved there sometime in January 2011.

To say that Collarenebri is a small town does not really provide those with no experience living in a small town an accurate idea of what it looks like. Collarenebri, despite town signs to the contrary, is a town of about 250 people. The town and the surrounding areas allow the school to have an enrolment of somewhere between 80 and 100 students. Nevertheless, it is a really small town. Yet, it seems a logical progression in the “scaling-down” that we have been doing of late; Jakarta, Sydney, and now Collarenebri.

I guess the point of emphasising small town is that the main street has a pub, a supermarket, a newsagent, and a post office on one side and a service station on the other. That is pretty much the main street. Oh, the post office also doubles as a bank, the Commonwealth, and a few other services as well.

Some of the things that we have learned during our recent visit have been interesting to say the least, but have not dented our enthusiasm to pull up stumps and move there. Apparently there is no mail delivery in Collarenebri. Everyone has a post box at the post office and collect their mail from there.  As we were walking up the main street we learned from a poster in the community health / welfare shopfront that it is also necessary to boil one’s water before drinking it. Hmmm, I wonder where we have had to do that before?

Anyways, the staff development days were an excellent opportunity for me to meet all my new colleagues and to learn a little about what is in store for 2011. I am pleased that I was invited and glad that I made the effort to get there. I learned quite a bit about where the school is with regard to things like Naplan and how the school is working to improve outcomes for all students. The staff are a dedicated bunch, and I am looking forward to getting out there and into the classroom and doing my bit.

In the ‘what goes up, must come down’ category, getting to Moree was only half the story. Once the staff development days were done and dusted it was time to make that 280+ kilometre round trip to Collarenebri. The following day, we were off on “holiday”. This required another short trip of some 550 kilometres from Moree to Fingal Bay.

And, now a further short jaunt of 220 kilmetricos has seen us arrive home. Now, the wait for Santa begins in earnest.

Most office workers would be better off in prison

I have gotta say that I rarely cut and past full articles of things that I find on the Internet.

This is not because of copyright (although perhaps I should be more conscious of this) but because it is not usually the case I need the whole piece to illustrate a point.

This "opinion" piece is written by Nury Vittachi. Nury is the writer of the "Travellers' Tales" column in the Far Eastern Economic Review (or at least was at one time).

This particular opinion piece was published in the Jakarta Post here.

The whole opinion piece sounds like a sociological study waiting to happen. My view is that Nury should volunteer to spend a couple of weeks or a month in prison. This would give him a valuable insight to what prison is really like.

He then could write a follow-up piece titled, "Why Office Workers Are Better Off Not in Prison".

My guess is that if a prisoner is waving at you through the bars and giving you the full salute with something other than his hand then this is likely not something that is indicative of happiness but a gentlemen with no other outlets to express himself. Although, Nury states that looking through the bars helped to put his life into perspective. I am hoping that perspective is that no matter how much working in an office might suck, it sure as hell beats doing a stint in prison.

Nope, I somehow doubt that as an office worker I would prefer to be in prison.

Anyway, my view is that this Nury taking the piss, a tongue in cheek look at the things he hates about his office. Nevertheless, it is called an opinion piece and it follows here in full:

I used to live near a prison. There was a guy on the top floor who used to wave his hand at me through the bars. Actually, it wasn't just his hand.

But the thing that struck me was that he always looked so happy. For some reason, this annoyed me intensely. I wanted to shout:you: Stop being happy." But then I realized that I would sound like my former employers, who were always hollering that at me.

Looking through the barred windows as I walked past, I absorbed numerous lessons which helped me put my life into perspective.

In prison, he spends most of his time confined to a space measuring three meters by three metres.

At the office, I spend most of my time confined to a cubicle measuring 1.5 meters by 1.5 meters.

In prison, he gets a healthy, early night every night.

At the office, I work late so often I'll probably end up with an ulcer.

In prison, he gets time off for good behavior.

At the office, I get extra work assignments for good behavior.

In prison, he gets all the food and drink he needs prepared for him by trained catering staff, three times a day, seven days a week.

At the office, I can help myself to free water from the water cooler.

In prison, he can watch television and read through a library of books.

At the office, I'll get sacked if I get caught watching a clip on YouTube.

In prison, he'll spend a lot of time in quiet contemplation about the important things in life.

In the office, mindless inconsequential activity fills my every second.

In prison, he gets a toilet to himself.

At the office, I share a toilet with a building-full of people less toilet-trained than my pets.

At the office, I spend more money than I can afford making sure my clothing matches that of my colleagues.

In prison, everyone gets free, color co-ordinated outfits.

In prison, there are sadistic, evil creatures called warders who will torment him.

In office life, there are sadistic, evil creatures called employers who torment me.

In prison, one's working days are short and sweet.

In my working life, I arrive at the office before the sun has risen and leave after it's dark.

In prison, he doesn't have to take work home with him.

In my job, I arrive every morning with a fat briefcase and leave with a fatter one.

In prison, he never has to worry about paying bills for utilities and other things.

In the life of a modern office-worker, I worry about paying bills all the time.

At the office, I spend hours every day wading through a sea of spam.

In prison, he just gets one small square of Spam a week, on Tuesdays, with a side salad.

In my work life, I pay a fortune for a gym membership, but never have time to go.

In prison, the gym is free and he has plenty of incentive to keep himself in good shape, especially when taking a shower.

In my office life, I often feel pressured to be in three different places at once.

In prison, this is probably not really an issue.

The writer is a journalist and columnist. He can be reached at www.vittachi.com