From Pacific To Atlantic In One Day

It's been a while, but I am finally hooked up to the internet long enough to hammer this out. So much has happened since I arrived for the job conference in Anaheim last Wednesday. Here's a recap:

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Thursday, September 29

Although the conference began on Thursday, the career expo part of it for which I came for didn't actually start until Friday. Thus, having Thursday free, I hooked up with some classmates who were also attending the career expo, and we hit it up in Downtown LA and Hollywood rather than spend the whole day roasting in the sun while waiting for rides at Disneyland.

Once again, I didn't bring the USB cable for my digital camera so I can't post any pics. No, not that I forgot, but bringing the cable also meant I had to bring the USB 2.0 adapter card with my laptop, and frankly, that's way too many electronics for me to carry. Like my photos from Japan, you're going to have to wait until I come home.

Anyways, back to the field trip. The first place we went to was Hollywood, and we tried to actually go up to that "HOLLYWOOD" sign on the side of the mountain. Unfortunately, there is no access to the sign, at least by car, and a smaller road sign saying "No access to Hollywood sign" confirmed it. Perhaps the only vehicles that are able to go up there are maintenance trucks for the weather instruments installed at the peak of the mountain. I surmise that the reason they restrict access is to keep idiots from driving up there, getting drunk (or vice-versa), and pushing those big white letters over or smashing them up with baseball bats.

So as a compromise, we took a picture in front of the "No access to Hollywood sign" sign and went on our way to Hollywood Boulevard. We only had enough time to see Alex Trebek and Vincent Price's star on the sidewalk, and I resisted the urge to take my photo next to one of the stars for the purpose of Photoshopping my name on it. Not long after we started walking down the street do a couple of smart-looking guys jump us and try to pull us into their scientology testing center to get a personality test. I was tempted to follow them in and jump on their couch like a madman, but in the end I restrained myself and pulled my group away from the two nutbars.

Then it's off to watch the sunset at the beach, via Santa Monica Boulevard. It was neat driving towards the sun, but it eventually got boring and I slept most of the way, a good idea seeing how we were submerged in the rush hour onslaught. The beach was surprisingly empty, even considering that most people would be coming home from work at that time. The sunset was beautiful, and a large cloud, carrying the smoke from the wildfires at the nearby mountains, was able to play with the hues of the sunbeams in ways that it could never do by itself.

But in a more spectacular sight, a pod of dolphins appeared near the beach. I've never seen them in the wild in my life; the closest thing I've seen was wild orcas on the ferry to Victoria. They didn't leap from the water, perhaps because they were busy foraging the sea floor for food. I used up one of my batteries trying to get the perfect shot with my digital camera without getting it wet. The last time I've seen more blubber than this was during my "bad day" at Miami Beach.

After the sun went down, we settled for a Thai dinner and took the long drive back to Anaheim to prepare for a busy day at the career expo tomorrow.

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Friday, September 30

I had to admit that I didn't take anywhere near as many free samples as I did at last year's conference at Forth Worth, Texas. Back then, I had brought a large suitcase and only occupied 1/3 of it with my stuff and left the rest of the space for the free samples. Despite the space I allocated, I still didn't have enough room for the samples, which included a bottle of wine from the Diageo.

This year, I only managed to bring one bag full, and I plan to give most of it to my aunt and cousin's family. There were two reasons why my haul was so meager compared to last year. Firstly, if my suitcase is full of free samples, it's going to reek of "trade fair" to the customs inspectors, and I may be detained by customs. As a terrorist, you may be able to sneak your grenades and AK-47's though, but you'll have hell to pay if you try to bring pitted fruits, agricultural products, and trade fair goods past Canada Customs.

The other reason why I couldn't loot the career expo is because I actually got job interviews this time! The first was with Johnson & Johnson, so now I'm only marginally angry at them for wasting 30 minutes of my life and studying time in a phone interview last year, when there were actually no positions for me. The second interview was with Bank of America. I'd be happy to work with the latter and help bring down Citigroup, which snubbed me off in the most disrespectful way. It sucks to have me as your enemy.

Therefore, my experience with recruiters that day could be divided into the following categories:

1. Interviewers: The people who are most serious about considering to hire me. In fact, so serious that they're willing to use up a time slot to talk with me one-on-one. I spend the most energy focusing on pitching myself to these people in hopes that a job will come out of this, and I keep in contact with them.
   
   
2. Correspondents: Although I only manage to talk to them at their expo booth, these recruiters are serious enough to give me their business card or contact info, and request that I send my resume to them so they can personally forward it to the proper recruiter.
   
   
3. Mindless Drones: Unfortunately, they make up majority of the recruiters in the career expo. Perhaps more accurately called clones, where the progenitor has a shit-faced grin and a tendency to collect resumes, tell candidates that they'll forward their resume to the right people (aka the shredder) and to go upload their resume on the company career website (aka the e-shredder). Then, they will proceed to hand you a pamphlet/card/CD of their company's job site, which you will take to your home (aka the shredder). Some are even rude enough to look around while you're talking to them, and others even have the balls to give a lame excuse to snub you off, such as "all interview time slots are full". A bunch of useless people, a complete waste of time to talk to, and I hope they all go to hell and die.

The Johnson & Johnson interviews took most of the morning because I had to interview with two recruiters in a row. The Bank of America interview took up the rest of the afternoon because after the interview, I was asked to attend an information seminar about the company.

I'll try to get more samples and interviews tomorrow.

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Saturday, October 1

I pretty much tried to pitch myself to the other companies I had marked down. Although I did land a few Category 2's (see previous day's entry), the rest were Category 3's. In the mid-afternoon, I got so sick of talking to Category 3's that I decided to make one round through all the booths to collect samples, then head straight to the Molson/Coors booth, where they seemed more interested in dispensing free beer through the bar they have set up rather than recruit new hires. I'm cool with that. It is usually the most crowded place at the end of the day. Well, second to only the Mattel booth at the end of the career expo, which finishes with a huge toy giveaway raffle to get rid of the wall of toys they have on display at the back of the booth.

After getting reasonably smashed, I decided to go harrass the Category 3 booths with my slurred speech. Among them were General Mills:

"I fffffed my rrrrabbit Trrrrix and it dieeeed. You werrrrre rrrrright, it's only forrrr kids..."

and the marketing section of the Coca-Cola booth:

"Okaaaay you basssstarrrrds, I got a quesssstion! What iffff I think your Dassssani flavorrrred water beverrrrrage as being more like waterrrrred-down juuuuice?"

Who cares!? I have no interest in working for them anyway, and I'll be long sober by the time my aunt and uncle pick me up tomorrow morning.

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Monday, October 3

So here I am at my aunt's house now. Nothing interesting happened yesterday, except for meeting my cousin and her family, which includes my niece and nephew. I feel sorry for them if they ever use me as a role model. Even though the career conference is long over, I'm supposed to stay here until October 7, or this Friday. That's because this is a contingency plan, in case something that I didn't expect to happen would happen.

And it happened.

I found out about it last Thursday, which was really "last minute". I got an e-mail from General Electric that they would like to interview me for their Financial Management Program on October 5, which is this Wednesday. This is the job that I really want, my way into GE. The only catch is that the interviews will be held on-campus...in Miami.

So then, I had to book a ticket on the fly. Fortunately, Expedia.com issued e-tickets so I didn't have to wait for the tickets to arrive by snail mail. I have a buddy and former classmate who's willing to give me the couch for the next couple of nights, so I owe it to him to see if I can hook him up with any jobs.

Too bad I won't have enough time to check out the boobs and/or blubber at the beach.