Saturday, July 08, 2006

The job hunt, the fake accent and the dreaded PR

It's day 18 here (it's quite sad that I'm keeping count of that, isn't it?), and the job hunt continues largely fruitlessly. Have been all over the place and hear one response more than any other: It's too quiet to be taking on staff. Tenerife seems to attract less and less tourists every year, and yet the resort area continues to grow up the coast regardless as more hotels, bars etc get built. Mental.

I did have an interview on Wednesday for a bar called The Irish Times that I was pretty confident about getting. Didn't though, and I think I know why...

You see, when I had that job last week, occasionally whilst serving people I would fake an Irish accent. It was amusing to do in the middle of an 8 hour shift, and I noticed it would make a slight difference to how much I took in tips. People like getting served by the Irish type it seems.

So, extending this logic, when I went into this pub The Irish Times to ask if they had any bar work going, I put on said Irish accent again. It might of given me a better chance of getting a job there, right? They said they'd take my name and number, and get back to me if anything became available.

The next day, 2pm in the afternoon, and I'm lying on the beach. My mobile rings, it's Darren from The Irish Times, could I come in some time for an interview? It's about 5 seconds into this conversation when I realise I'm not talking in the Irish accent. So, in blind panic, I gradually put the accent back on again as the conversation goes on. Oh yes.

We arrange an interview for 8pm that day anyway, and I go along having decided to drop the accent completely. It went pretty well, but they haven't got back to me, so I guess they weren't interested for some reason, hmm?

So, with no real leads left, I've been offered PR work at a couple of places (for those that don't know you try to draw in punters off the street into the bar, and get usually 1 Euro per head for each success). I'm going to give it a go I think. People often say I'm a good salesman, so I might just get rich from it. Especially if perhaps, I fake an Irish accent for it?

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