Monday, October 02, 2006

The récipissé

OK, finally I got the récipissé, a receipt to get the real carte de séjour. That means that I can legally work in France starting from today.

It's a happy and sad moment. Happy because finally nobody will tell me that they can't hire me because I don't have the right to work here. Sad because I just lost an opportunity to work. Adecco, a job agency called me last Friday about a job briefing session, and it has to be exactly the time my appointment with the Prefecture. I went to the prefecture to see whether I can delay the appointment, the people worked there tried to look at their schedule, but it was full the whole day. Don't want to jeopardise my chance of getting this récipissé, I have to give up the chance for a job.

A friend works in Adecco in another city, she posted my CV to an company who request someone speak English. This friend called me today, and said that I wasn't picked because this company wants someone who speaks French perfectly. In this case, I won't have chance, at any sense. How am I going to compete with the French who has speaking French all their live, and have writing training since the day they are at school? It gives me signal that I need to switch domain.

Last week my good friend here found a job as a receptionist in an hotel. Again, its happy and sad. Happy because finally someone have the similar background like me can find a job. Sad because with her qualitification, she doesn't need to be a receptionist. She told me that her coworker has master degree. So the requirement to be a receptionist in France is quite high I presume. This kind of position in Malaysia is for someone who finished highschool and don't want to continue study. Anyway, what gave me hope was that her boss is very nice. She defended my friend when the other boss said that my friend's French is weak. She said that when they (the French employees and the bosses in the hotel) speak good English (they are taking English class), my friend will speak good French. At least she is willing to let my friend try.

2 comments:

  1. Anonymous1:02 PM

    It's not that you need a master degree to be a receptionist. There are a lot of highly qualified people in France but not enough qualified jobs for them hence some people who has master degree ended up with a receptionist job simply because they couldn't find anything that fit their qualification.

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  2. It is just a sad market, more supply than demand.

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