Online Job-Hunting in Japan
As a self-employed individual I am always on the lookout for
new opportunities that will pay me for my creativity (such that it is). My wife
might beg to differ, maintaining I am always on the lookout for opportunities
that will get me out of doing the dishes.
Regardless, my vigilance recently paid off when I discovered
an employment site here in Japan called YOLO.
Already you’re certainly wondering: ‘Kevin, what sort of
lucrative creative outlet did you find?’
Answer: Are you kidding me?
YOLO may be a great job resource for some
people. And I wish them well. But for me, YOLO is a gold mine of another sort.
I ran into yet another foreigner the day who said he was
looking for pretty much anything besides teaching English. He was the kind of
guy who, in the space of twenty seconds, could shift from that to the cost of
living in Japan to his screaming extroversion to his friends’ opinions of him
to the Rape of Nanking. It was all I could do to keep up. So I never got around
to telling him about YOLO and how he could work outside where there are always
tons of people to talk to as he took his aggressions out on the pigeons for
poverty-level pay.
I just noticed the picture next to this ad. This pigeon-coping work looks like serious business. And how about the job listed right below. How exciting it
would apparently be to work in a convenience store for up to $12 an hour!
I’m sorry. For some people – college students or illegal
visa overstayers from China, for example – this would be the perfect
opportunity. Easy, part-time work for some pocket change (or, like, food), where all the
Japanese you need to know are numbers, a few standard bits of politeness and
“Do you want this piece of processed shit warmed up?” Since this is Japan
there’s no Christmas bonus, but also since this is Japan there’s pretty much
zero chance you’ll get held up at gunpoint.
Speaking of not getting held up at gunpoint, here’s an
interesting gig.
The uniform for this job in Tokyo’s hoity-toity Shinagawa
neighborhood evidently includes a one-size-fits-one-size necktie, possibly the
one used by the last employee who we might guess was fired for patrolling his
nethers in the bathroom on company time.
As I look through these job postings I’m starting to think
that somewhere there’s got to be a need for a marketing consultant. Not for
this place in Osaka, where the employees enjoy a yellow safety vest and lenient
facial hair rules and are therefore happy…
…but for this place, where at least one employee looks about
ready to puke in her box and chuck it at her boss.
The companies I suspect will get the most applicants are the
ones who can show that the job involves sombreros, booze and little gothic
mariachi voodoo dolls – clearly a winning combo.
So maybe I’ll track that guy down and tell him what I found.
Meantime I should keep a closer eye on YOLO myself. This opportunity was just
posted two days ago.
Six articles. Six hundred bucks. My kind of gig.
Posted two flipping days ago - and the application period has already closed.
Maybe they’ll bump up the hourly on that gig with the
pigeons…
