If you own a coffee shop, restaurant or retail store anywhere between Big Sur and Long Beach, I have probably showed up at your door to ask if you're hiring. (You weren't).
Usually, I was either handed a job application and then ushered out the door, or simply ushered out the door. So when the owner of Our Café, Pipo, instead offered me a free lunch ("You can't work here if you don't like the food!"), I was pretty sure I'd found something special.
Pipo refused to discuss business until after we'd eaten, and even then there was no application. We just talked. He learned about my injury that led me, indirectly, to his café; I learned that he was fluent in three languages but not entirely comfortable speaking any of them-hence, his vague accent and constant gesticulation. It was a little like a good first date-all the necessary questions were answered without it feeling like an interview.
He'd like to hire me, he said. But he'd have to talk to Fahrez, his business and life partner, and apparently the financer of Our Café.
When I came back the next day, Pipo still hadn't asked Fahrez. "We had a fight," he said. "Not about you, don't worry. But I didn't want to ask while he was angry." This went on for almost a week-Pipo hadn't asked his partner for the funds to hire me with, but continued to feed me lunch in the meantime. When Pipo finally admitted that he couldn't afford to hire anyone right now, I wasn't too surprised.
It was his follow-up that surprised me. "You should try modeling," he said, looking me up and down. "I used to work in fashion in Paris and I think you could do it."
Someone else had suggested modeling the last time I'd been unemployed-my mother-and the suggestion sounded as ridiculous now as it had then. Pipo's motives suddenly became clear to me: He didn't need any more help around the café. He just wanted some eye candy at work. And he needed his boyfriend to fund it. And that clearly wasn't happening. So Pipo delayed as long as he could before letting the dream die.
This, I thought, is what women must deal with all the time. And once I tried whoring out my coffee-pouring services at the Novel Café, a coffeehouse/bookstore, I also, for the first time in my life, envied their place in the job market. "I can ask the manager if we're hiring," said the woman at the counter, a stunning, dark haired girl who, like every other barista, must have been a struggling actress. "But, frankly, he only hires chicks."
I'd already learned from Pipo that hiring eye candy doesn't necessarily make one a bad person, so I spoke to him anyhow-as expected, I was politely turned away. When my girlfriend happened to drop by the café, however, the manager approached her, asked if she was new to town, and offered her a job on the spot. And all she'd wanted was a latte! You might say I shouldn't want to work at a place like that. But I did-the great food, intellectual atmosphere, reading materials and absurdly attractive baristas were not easily found elsewhere.
More importantly, after two weeks of fruitless job searching, I was ready to take any job I could get.
It was all well and good to live idealistically while I was at Amherst: I avoided chain stores and belong to the "Wal-Mart Always Discriminates" Facebook group. Dishonesty, in fact, remains the sin among sins in the academic world-the only crime that never failed to earn an expulsion at my high school. For all the other rules I've flaunted at school (mainly due dates), I have never played sick to get an extension (I simply turn everything in late); I have never plagiarized (hence, the chronic lateness of my assignments); I even cite proper sources1.
But I was starting to get desperate (i.e. broke), and, apparently, honesty made my broke ass unemployable. Perhaps when applying for chic consulting jobs, potential bosses would care about things like my GPA, Amherst's top-notch academic reputation, all my noble works in the anti-Wal-Mart Facebook group. Not so with unskilled labor positions: I don't think most of these café owners even knew what or where Amherst is.
These potential bosses care about how many years I say I've spent making espresso-a skill, by the way, that takes about 8 minutes to completely, utterly master, which begs the question of why "experience" is so highly coveted. That's not to be confused with the number of years actually spent making espresso (zero).
It took me a while to figure out that no one checks references-of the application's four sections, I eventually (thankfully) realized, only your personal information need be even vaguely true, and that only so they can pay you. Armed with three years of fake experience ("barista" for café applications, "American Eagle Outfitters" for retail) and a "former manager" (old high school friend) in my references, I suddenly earned interviews everywhere I applied.
My interviewer at Panera Bread, in fact, couldn't stop gushing about "all my experience." When that "experience" netted me an extra $0.75 an hour, I cursed my honesty for having so prolonged my search, and took the job-now I just have the brainless employee handbook, sweet uniform and early morning wake-up calls to contend with.
As Ian looks to utterly master the art of making sandwiches, he will continue to investigate what else he hasn't learnt at Amherst. He welcomes comments, questions and sandwich preferences at iglovett@amherst.edu.
1 I'd like to thank my girlfriend, Neda, for spoon-feeding me that last line.