Have you ever just stared at a mirror, and just question every decision you’ve made. Questioning whether you’re really happy now, or just trying to make the best of the situation. Questioning whether it’s really worth it, should you just give up while you can, or just push through.

No one really understands what you are going through. Maybe it’s because you don’t communicate well with words, and instead, you are typing in this notepad, while waiting for the train to bring you to the place which literally sucks your soul out of you.

Maybe you’re just a weakling, been sheltered from the real world for far too long. Is this what the real world looks like? Maybe it is, and it’s something you can’t run away from. Sooner or later, you have to face it.

People say true happiness comes from doing something you love. But if the lines become so blurred that you start convincing yourself to like the situation you are in, and somehow you assure yourself that you are, in fact happy, the feeling is worse than not feeling happy.

Emptiness. That’s what it is. Perceived happiness put bluntly is just emptiness. Like what you are feeling now. At a point in life where spending the whole day on your devices feels too wasteful. But you aren’t in the mood to do anything else either.

Maybe your hobbies aren’t hobbies. If not, why haven’t you really been doing them? Every time you procrastinate the situation becomes bleaker. At the end of the day, the feeling of accomplishing nothing weighs more than the stress you experienced while studying.

Is this how burning out feels like? Or just having not enough rest. Maybe just overworked (and underpaid). 12 years of education didn’t prepare you for this. Nothing will. That’s why you took up the job in the first place. To get experience. Even when everyone else is having a simple, carefree life, you choose to put yourself through this.

But on the plus side, you notice the smaller details now. About your surroundings. About the people around you. You are more attentive. You put away your devices, just because they add on to your burden. They constantly scream at you to get your attention, and you feel that you can’t deal with it, at least not right now. You feel more contented than just staying at home. And waking up at wee hours has its advantages too. The dark sky slowly turns into soft pastels, adding colour to the sky, and your life.

Okay, I shall cut to the chase. Working for Century Evergreen (CE) for 3 days has been an emotional roller coaster. And here is my experience, if anyone wants to work part-time for them. I was introduced to them by a friend, who was working for them, together with some other friends. The sign up was pretty inconvenient, as you had to go down to the office (at Far East Shopping Centre) to set up your account. You will be notified of any new job posting (via WhatsApp or the Telegram bot). From what I know, CE employs part-timers to work for the restaurants in MBS. During my time with CE, I was posted to work in a restaurant in the lobby of MBS hotel (take a guess lol). My job scope was initially to just clean drinking/wine glasses and wipe them dry, as written in the job posting, but it turns out most of the part-timers were aunties and the few other guys which turned up (less than 4) were all tasked to do the more physically demanding tasks. These included – clearing tables, serving the guests food, pushing the cart with dirty plates back into the kitchen, emptying the cart for the uncle to wash the crockeries, setting the tables, stacking coffee cups and wine glasses. I mean my friends did give me a heads up the day before, but I was still shocked. Well, they did provide gloves and aprons so cleanliness wasn’t that much of an issue. Communication was mainly done in English, but there were conversations in Mandarin, Hokkien and Tamil as well. It was like working with a team in PW all over again, except this time, office politics were involved (or rather, kitchen politics).

I agree that we were overworked and underpaid, that is a fact. Even the aunties were telling me to give my bare minimum, and to ‘escape’ when it’s time to clock out. On my last day, the manager even almost forgot to let us sign out until some of us went to ask him for the pen and paper. I wouldn’t want to cast the permanent staff at this restaurant in a negative light, because some of them were really nice, but when it comes to sensitive issues, like break times, assignment of tasks, and working hours, we are after all only temporary staff, which could be replaced by CE with a signature, so there was still a level of authority and with that comes with fear. The fear that you have to agree with what your manager says. The more seasonal staff would know loopholes and how to sweet-talk the manager, while the newcomers will be blind sighted.

I worked for almost 6 hours each day, and there is complimentary lunch (and breakfast if you come early) at the staff canteen. Lunch would be 30 minutes starting from noon (if you extend/OT till 3 pm). The food served is average as the taste and options are no better than a school canteen, but they offer a free flow of drinks and food (like a buffet I guess).

CE is quite fussy about the attire as well (especially on your first day). Their instructions (to me at least) was very ambiguous. The message I received read “black pants and shoes”. But in reality, the message should have read “black leather shoes (no lace), long black socks and black pants”, as seen in the requirements by the restaurant. Maybe they should have just sent a photo of the restaurant’s requirement, and made my first day there less chaotic.

The bulk of my time was spent clearing the carts with used crockeries, so I guess you could say I was paid to clean up after (rich) people. I would dare to categorize all the customers as rich because the food served is really not cheap (I’ve seen the menu and how the food was prepared). The customer demographic is as follow: hotel guests for breakfast and family/colleagues/couples for lunch.

As usual, there are lessons learnt from this. Firstly, food waste is a huge issue, especially for ala carte buffet-style breakfast. I don’t know if the breakfast was complimentary to their hotel stay, but the guests almost always over order and there would be plates of uneaten food. For example, dim sum, bread, muffins, sausages, scrambled eggs and cereal. Beverages were no exception either, full glasses of orange juice, coffee and tea all poured away by yours truly. There is a very stark contrast between the amount of food waste I dump for the breakfast shift compared to the lunch shift. And this is worrying. I know the taste and preferences for different people differ, and thus they may choose not to consume certain food, but what I observed was heaps of untouched food, and my only conclusion is that they were too full to finish the food they ordered. I'm not saying everyone that walks into the restaurant wastes food, but instead, the majority of hotel guests are guilty of wasting food during their complimentary ala carte buffet breakfast. Gosh, I can’t imagine if this was pre-covid, where breakfast was normal buffet style. It’s just so sad that I have to be the one to throw so much food away, and I can’t do anything about it.

Secondly, how one dress can tell a lot about themselves. Just from observing guests for roughly 15 hours (in total), it's not that difficult to deduce the plans of the guests for the day (or at least the next few hours). And also they are a good place to get some fashion ideas from. Thirdly, would be to ask if unsure. The people are usually nice to you if you ask for help. Make it look like you actually want to learn how something works, and remember your please and thank yous, and you should do just fine.

Overall, I would not return to work there, unless it's during a public holiday and it is $11 (or more) per hour. What an eye-opener for my first job. I hope the insights help someone someday when they choose to work with CE or in a position similar to this.