"Can you hear me?"

It has been a busy and eventful week. My grandma was in the hospital for a surgery, so our whole family has been busy getting in and out to take care of her. The surgery was vey successful and she is recovering in an incredible rate. Her pugnacity – no doubt an indicator of vitality and strength – was evident the very next day of the surgery. I pity whoever shared the room with her – victims included at least two fellow patients and a caretaker. And my grandma stayed for only five days at the hospital.

On a Friday that I was visiting her (okay, more like idling unwillingly and reading uninteresting stories of some family brawls over a gambling tycoon’s fortune), my phone rang and I jumped, because A) I was happy for any beep and ring from my Blackberry because I was on the verge of needing medical attention for my boredom, and B) the number resembled those from Cathay Pacific Airways.

I answered at the second beep with a professional and controlled “hello.”

(Below conversation was in Cantonese)

“Can I speak with XXX (my full name)?” the female caller said.

“Yes, speaking.” I answered. Attentive.

“I’m calling from … ssssss…oouu…we’re…hiiishuji,” she said.

Damn.  The lousy reception made the call inaudible. I dashed out of the room, still clutching the phone at my ear with my brows locked. I could smell the importance of this call.

I said something, kept asking her whether she could hear me, but all she said was that she couldn’t. Then. She hung up.

Phone in my hand, I stared at it for a brief second before calling back. She picked up. But again, same thing happened.

Because of my abrupt department earlier, my family bombarded me with concerns and questions when I returned to the room. I told them that I suspected the call was from CX because they should have called by now if they were going to hire me. In the room, I called again, twice, but was only greeted by the voicemail of extension 2830. Okay, fine. They’ll call again, I told myself.

Indeed, they called on Monday – while I was on a bus. She asked whether I was free to talk and I said yes, because luckily, the bus was quite empty. She said it was going to be a long call; I said okay. She said (more like commanded) I needed to write everything down; I said I was all ready.

She spent the next ten minutes detailing when I’m going to start, what I have to do before the training (such as dying my light brown hair black – hell no! Dark brown is the best I can do – but of course I didn’t share this thought), what I have to wear to the training, how long the rumoured harsh training is for, all the documents and materials I have to bring when I sign the contract, etc.

Even though I said I was all ready when she started, all I had were two pieces of scrap paper with my stuff-to-dos scribbled all over the place.  I had to scrawl all those important commands by my caller at wherever I could fit them. And writing on such flimsy paper on your lap while holding a phone in one hand is certainly not easy. Not to mention your neck will complain after three minutes of that.

So I slid down my seat, turned my body to face it, crouched on the floor and kept scribbling away on the seat-now-turned-table.  As I jot more and more notes down, I began to worry I might run out of writing space before she could finish. But to my great relief, the call did end. As I sat back up, I finally had a moment to reflect on what had just happened – I’m so glad I was wearing jeans and the bus was not full, I thought.

And oh yes, I’ve got the job.

A new beginning...

I always wonder why some medical practitioners have to be so downright overbearing. 

“Are you taking any long-term medication? Including Chinese medicine?” My medical examiner asked.

“How do you define long-term?” I said.

She snorted and said, “of course the medicine you took ten years ago doesn’t count!”

“But what do you mean by long-term? Two weeks? Six months…”

“Okay! Are you NOW taking any medicine?” She cut me off with increased exasperation.

“Yes, recently, I'm taking some Chinese ones for better bowel movement.”

“Have you been admitted to a hospital?”

“Yes, for pneumonia when I was 11 and for removing some stones in my saliva gland in 2003.”

She scribbled everything down. And after a few more questions about my medical history, she proceeded to check my eyes.

“Are you shortsighted?” she asked.

“Not anymore, I’ve done Lasik.”

“So didn’t you go to the hospital for the surgery?” Another snarl.

Dr. Impatience, I’m sorry that I’ve missed that as a hospital admission and I’m sorry that I didn’t answer all your questions correctly, as an eager medical intern should.  But for Christ’s sake, I don’t have a medical degree – I’m only here for the medical assessment required for my flight attendant application.

This assessment was the last stage that stays between me, an un-employed free-spirit, and the job, a fun-loving, globetrotting flight attendant of Cathay Pacific Airway. The many procedures today – a chest X-ray, an urine test, a blood test, tests on eyesight, colour-blindness, hearing, arm reach, reflex, and flexibility, measurements of height, weight, blood pressure, and an elaborate disclosure of personal and family’s medical history – accentuated the gravity of this job.

When I filed my application online a month ago, the very next day of my last day as a Public Relations intern, I was just acting on impulse. I didn't think much. Well, that's a lie – I'd been thinking about applying for a few weeks ever since I saw an advertisement about CX career day in early January – however, I hadn't given it any serious thought. 

I guess at any point in her life, a fun-loving and adventurous girl must have thought about being a flight attendant; whether she really acts on it, it's another matter. I first thought about being a FA when I was right out of college. I still remember one of my close friends, Pat, and I were playing with the idea of applying together because neither of us wanted a mundane, boring nine-to-NINE job. However, that was just a dream. After being challenged repeatedly by people around us about our height (both of us were petite), and discouraged by our own indeterminations, we took the easy way out - she became an accountant and I a broker. So much for exploring the world and having fun.

For the past few years, whenever I hinted the faintest possibility of being a FA, my Dad would just shut me up for wasting all my good grades and education. But I guess his dismay was spawned more by the fear of disgrace for having a daughter as “stewardess” who asks people “coffee or tea?” – his ego just wouldn’t accept that.

On a visceral level, I hate being in one place – travelling is my blood and soul. The world is so big and there’s so much to see and experience, so why would I want to settle in one place while I’m still so young and agile?

And I love physical hard work so much that my definition of dream jobs means A) having to walk six to seven kilometers a day, practise in baking sun or howling rain for hours, and squat with 60kg of weight on my 42kg body, or B) having to suffer from bruises and chafes and agony during practice, spend most time being upside-down and sideway, stretch until there’s tears in my eyes, and groan through the n^th set of push-ups and crunches – like a golf touring pro or a pole dancer.

I’ve never once sprained my ankle or cracked a bone doing sports (thank God for that), but I would end up with strained muscles and arthritis symptoms with just a month of being fixated at an office desk. When the only movements require only those by my fingers and eyeballs, I feel my whole body degenerate into a dead pile of stones. My mind feels suffocated and suppressed. That was what happened with my last job. Right there, I had an epiphany that if I ever want to be happy, I will need a job that gives me lots of opportunities to travel and move.

Therefore, just a few days after my birthday and at a ripe age of 31, I applied for the FA position and competed with other twenty-year-olds. How cool was that?

After an arm reach test (for those who thought I wasn’t tall enough, I can reach 208cm! Okay, with tiptoe, but still), a group discussion session, an English proficiency test, a debate session, a psychometric test, a 30-minute individual interview, a dreadful mandarin test, and a 90-minute medical assessment, I’m now waiting for their final decision. Fidgeting.