It's a bit of a relief when he walks away to go talk at some other student. My friends and I have a couple of bites of food...and then the next manager comes. She's nice and friendly, and after briefly asking SY and I about our interests, she proceeds to tell us about what her division does. I try not to flinch at the thought of spending my days figuring out how to kill mosquitoes, cockroaches and lizards while the lady from finance who's joined us tells us about the time she couldn't figure out why she had to approve money for buying lizards. Eww. We ask a question or two..and dam it's getting hot; another big gulp of the lovely chilled wine. And then as I try to pretend to care about what she's talking about, things start to go a little dark. I think I might faint. Have I really been drinking all that much? I excuse myself and head for the bathroom. The moment I step inside the air-conditioned hall from the patio, I feel a lot better. Once I get into the bathroom, I lock the door and sit down for a bit. Never have I been so happy to just not talk. And apparently I'm not as narcissistic as I thought...talking about myself over and over again does get tiresome.
The bunch of us weren't really crazy about the jobs we were being offered. In fact I think we were all pretty fuzzy about what exactly we were being offered. I wasn't there to ace an interview. I was there to hang out with my friends with some free food and good wine on a Saturday night. But that wasn't happening. These people were serious about talking to us. By the end of the evening, I'd been asked countless times what I study, where my interests lie, where I see myself in the future...I'd been given more advice than I could or even cared to process in one evening.
What I learnt? Work-related cocktail parties and schmoozing aren't as fun as they seem on TV. What else did I learn? Perhaps I shouldn't become an event planner or PR person if it means every party is work.
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