Yesterday I took one boring photo of the black and white copy machine at my office. I meant to take others; it just didn't happen. I've decided to make some lemonade, so to speak. It's what I do.
This photo reminded me of a time in my life where I was intimately engaged with copy machines. I was not yet twenty-three and in my first salaried job. I was working on a project that was based in Doha, Qatar and got to travel there twice, for a total period of about three months.
It was pretty exciting - I got to travel - first class! to the Mideast! - for my first "real" job. Of course, it really wasn't that glamorous. We worked ridiculous hours and lived and worked on top of each other. (Although I did become friends with some truly excellent people.) I was basically a glorified gopher - I was everyone's assistant and I took it upon myself to be everyone's cheerleader too. Work was hard and we were far from home - I figured it was an unwritten part of my job description.
We did a *lot* of in-house printing. I remember babysitting one of the smaller printers (not unlike the one above) and sit and write my friends epic letters on scraps of paper. And there were a couple of ugly episodes involving labels and me not yet understanding how to mail merge.
I thought I'd post a mass email I sent during my first 2-3 week stint in Doha. Clearly I was blogless at the time (and camera-less - can you imagine?). It's slightly edited, but enjoy.
Claire In Qatar : Episode Two:
“A horse a horse, my kingdom for a horse –or—How I angered the Label gods”
In which Claire visits the desert and meets a camel—
Follow her as she becomes consumed with consumerism and buys not one, but two!, rugs—
See how she endlessly makes labels—incorrectly—and wishes to the heavens for a Staples or Office Max—
Tune in next time for her homecoming and watch her sleep in past 5:30 or 6 am everyday and loves it!
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Hello all,
I felt like starting this mass email like the beginning of a Rocky and Bullwinkle cartoon… yes I realize I have problems.
Since my last email, as the precursor to my email suggests, I went on a desert excursion with some of my co-workers. Our tour guide took us 40 km to the south to some sand dunes (past a huge oil refinery) and to an inland sea. Once we reached the sand dunes, our guide, a young Iranian-Indian guy who has lived in Doha all his life and is quite obsessed with the desert, stopped the car and let some air out of our tires. Then he (somewhat crazily) drove us up and down sand dunes. It was great. Better than any rollercoaster, maybe because the fear was just a little too real. I was in the front seat for most of the ride—so I got a more intimate view of what was happening. He drove us down to an inland sea and from there we could see across to Saudi Arabia . Isn’t that nuts? On our trip out of Doha , we were driving on the rode and past a Camel Crossing Sign.
Our guide told us about how camels just sort of wander about, but we didn’t really believe him. Then, lo and behold, in the distance were some camels. So our guide took the Land Cruiser we were in off the road and we drove out to join the camels. The first group we saw wasn’t very big—only a handful. Their front two legs were tied together with a rope—indicating they were owned by someone—so they couldn’t run off too far. They were pretty skiddish so we moved on and met a huge group of camels a little further down the road. This time they were very friendly, one in particular, who was quite obviously a little self-involved and loved to be fawned over and photographed. My boss Charlene fell in love with the camels—it’s really funny. I half expect her to pull a City Slickers, but instead of coming home with a calf, she’ll come home with a baby camel.
(The next paragraph is going to be me complaining about labels—probably not too interesting but I need to get it off of my chest.)
The title of my email refers to my two horrible days making labels and trying to find labels and re-doing labels after information has changed, rendering my labels obsolete. So, I am a peon, right? Truly, no huge deal for me—I don’t mind doing admin work, because I’m learning a lot and I know I won’t be a peon forever—plus I’m in the Middle East, that’s awesome. But when it came to the fiasco with labels, I am going to drawn the line. First off, every time I was making labels in the beginning of my stay here, each time I asked for more labels, I got a completely different kind—different size and shape. Which is obnoxious, because then you have to lay-out the label,etc. And before I learned mail merge it was a terrible task, with all the cutting and pasting, especially because my laptop doesn’t have a mouse. But anyhow, so I was making all these labels for the 280 schools we are enumerating. And I had to re-do it 3 times because things kept switching around, and I ran out of labels. No big deal in the states—just go to the supply closet or to Staples or something. But here, we send a driver to go try and find some in a bookstore. Once they scoured the whole city and couldn’t find any. I mean, they are labels not Faberge eggs! So anyhow, I am going on much too long on this stupid topic. All in all, I needed labels—3 sheets only—and couldn’t find any! I was going to have to tape on pieces of paper, when a driver miraculously appeared with two boxes of labels.
Anyhow, my trip is rounding up. Sunday and Monday nights I spent in this Pakistani gift shop buying a ridiculous amount of things (including two rugs!). My co-worker Brian totally suckered me into buying them and I have miraculously fit them into my luggage. (I’m so happy I brought an extra bag!) I actually called my mother from the store to ask her if I should buy this really cool, long runner rug for her and my dad. I did.
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