Un autre question de la semaine (that's your actual French, mind)

Identify a "childhood game": how do you play it, when and from who did you learn it, and why do you not play it anymore?

And, to be clear, I don't mean "games for children" like Dora the Explorer's Monopoly, or anything mass-mediated like that. Seriously: think.

Answers about work

Hey sexy peoples: let's see you work it!

yes,I did. When I worker in a Chinese retaurant kichten, the boss wanted me to get familiar with everything as soon as possible. But that is really hard to do so in couple of days, so my co-worker--a older lady help me to learn lots of knowledge like how to cut vetable and meat, how to deep frie food,and how to use all the facilities in the kichten.This activity she did to me was realy help me.

I formerly worked as a cook at Dairy Queen, Sydney River. Part of the job was to have the kitchen entirely cleaned up after each shift, and to close the kitchen down properly at night. This meant washing all of the dishes. However, some of the dishes which needed to be washed were the pans used for holding hamburger patties, technically you were supposed to wait until kitchen was closed at midnight before you could wash these dishes, meaning you wouldn’t be finished until around 1 – even if your shift ended at 12 (also I don’t think they were much for paying overtime). In any case, one of my co-workers showed me the trick of putting the patties in little cardboard containers for the last hour of the shift, so that you could do the dishes in the meantime and be finished at a reasonable hour. Being young and foolish, I did this while the managers were around only to receive a tongue-lashing for my efforts. Later on, my co-workers told me that this was only to be done when the managers weren’t around, as it ‘dries out the burgers’.

I currently work at Tim Horton’s and one thing my co-workers have told me to make my job more efficient is to smile at the customers. We all know people can have their bad days and may come off as a little cranky sometimes. Providing an easy-going attitude helps them to ease off. However, there are the odd customers who could be just plain nasty at times. That’s when we sometimes have to go out back and laugh at how mean people can be at times. However, my co-workers were trying to explain that we sometimes get cranky people coming into work—don’t let their bad mood put you in a bad mood. Not letting people’s bad mood get to me is definitely a better (and sometimes a funny) experience.

I spent many years as a consultant under contract to a variety of government agencies. One of the techniques passed amongst consultants is: the client is always right, in fact, all credit for any successfully completed project should be immediately assigned to the client. People new to the consulting business are immediately apprised of this rule with stories of people whose contracts ended abruptly because they cross their clients by either going over their heads or not keeping them informed. It is understood and talked about amongst consultants that it’s a tough business and if you can’t let go of the need for recognition, you will never succeed. One of the rules: never argue with the client, instead find someway to ‘persuade’ them into believing an idea is their own. A consultant’s greatest assest is their ability to ‘manage’ their clients. This can make the difference between a single one year contract and eight one-year renewals, the difference between $100K and $800K. This can be stressful particularly if the consultant cannot find anything to respect about the client, which happens more often then people realize.

I was working at a cream-puff shop in Japan. The work was not only making cream-puff but also selling them to the customer. It seems to be an easy job, but in fact, it was so hard work. We have to carry heavy boxes. It was a physical labor. There were manuals for making custard cream, paste, packing them to the boxes. All of the processes have knacks to do it. For example, when I made cream, I made two bowls instead of one. When I stirred the custard cream, it was easy to use my weight of my body to stir. All of the tasks, I have to do as fast as possible. It is taught by my co-workers who worked before than I. When a new comer came, I taught the easier knacks to her. It works well. My co-worker taught many things to me that was not taught by the manual book.

With every job I have had, including informal ones such as university or volunteer work, there has always been informal training or ‘techniques’ taught to me from co-workers. I personally think that those ‘techniques’ are just as important to any job as the formal training provided. The formal training is really just a tool to make sure the employee have a basic understanding how what is going on and how things are done. The ‘techniques’ however, give meaning to the training itself. This shows that not only do the employees understand what their job entitles but can also gives off a more relaxed environment. With my first job in high school there were many techniques shown to me through co-workers on how to count money or sell the product faster and more efficient this helped not only in getting my work done faster but also helped me to feel more comfortable in my surroundings. If one feels comfortable at their job then their confidence in what they are doing as well as themselves rises.

When I was employed at Musicstop on a temporary term last year, I started out helping with shipping and recieving and eventually sold products. At first I was very intimidated at the prospect of trying to sell a a product to a customer or answer all their questions. Then a co-worker of mine said to imagine I was selling blueberries to my grandmother. I was already a musician and had the product knowledge, so the only thing I needed to learn how to do was to control my nervousness. I used the "blueberry" technique and it all came with ease!

I have infact learned a technique from a fellow coworker thathelped me improve my efficency. I had a job as a cashier at Wal-Mart. One day I was releived of my checkout duties to help essemble patio furniture.The only tools that were provided to assemble these sets were those thatwere provided with the furniture. This consisted of an allen key and somebolts. The only other tool that was at my disposal was a rusty old pair ofvice grips. It took much longer than the twenty minutes that it wouldnormally take to assemble these patio sets using the hardware provided.After struggling for an hour with the first set, I finally managed tocomplete it. It was at this time that a more seasoned Wal-Mart employee cameto join me and he showed me a good little trick. By securing the allen keyin the vice grips, it made it much easier and quicker to tightened thebolts. The vice grips made it much easier on my hands and I did not have tostop as much. This cut the assembly time in half. This was several yearsago, but when I find myself assembling having to use allen keys, I make surethat I have a pair of vice grips with me.

When I started my first waitress job I defiantly learned many techniques from coworkers that helped me opposed to the formal training that made my job a lot easier. The other women that I worked with gave me several types of personal advice on how to deal with customers and how to multi-task without making too many mistakes. The formal training taught me the basics like how to write on the tab and little things like that, but the actual job experience and help from the more experienced waitresses is what helped me in the long run. One of the most important things that I learned from co-workers is that in order to give good service you must treat the customers like you would want to be treated when sitting in a restaurant, for example always making sure that the food is good and refilling drinks without the people having to ask you. Having good personal skills and being friendly was also a big factor they emphasized to me. They’re advice and help benefitted me well with positive comments to my boss, and of course good tips.

I have had several jobs where I have learned more from my co-workers than I have from my supervisor or trainer. The one that comes to mind is my experience last September when I took a job as a deckhand on a whale watching schooner ( a 55 foot, Double Gaff Rigged Square Topsail Schooner) in Ingonish. I had to learn a fairly complicated job quickly, and the help of my co-workers made the transition from landlubber to deckhand much easier. I learned every detail of my job from my crewmates. They me the formal aspect of the job as well as the little nuances associated with my job. For example it isn’t easy for someone my size to raise the mainsail, he showed me a trick to use my body weight in conjunction with the hand over hand haul to get the sail up. Tourists were always impressed to see “a young girl” doing such heavy work on a sail boat. Occasionally I would be given the wheel and that’s where the most techniques came in handy. I am not very tall, and I cannot see over the bow of the boat, so that made it difficult to stay the course. My crewmates taught me how to use landmasses as markers and how to keep it steady, trust me was nothing like driving my Civic. Without the subtle techniques shown to me about how to turn the boat and sail against the current and the tide, I am not sure how those sails would have ended for the tourists. Other techniques like how to ride the bow sprit without falling off, and how to climb the up the ladder to watch for spouts with out going over when the boat would heel over. Even things like terms and slang I learned from the crew, for example its not jiving the sail, its jibing the sail. The most important technique I was taught was how to spot a whale. It is not an easy task, there are tricks to telling the difference between whale spouts and whitecaps. My crewmates taught me the types of birds to watch for trying to spot spouts, and how to tell one species of whale by the height and shape of the spout. I learned more in those ten weeks then I ever did in any job I’ve had. It was an amazing experience and possibly the coolest job ever.

Over the past two years I have learned a lot of different skills from the people I work with. Since I work in a clothing store, I have been able to identify the different types of fabrics and synthetic materials. I can tell the different between leather and synthetic shoes just by the feel of them. We aren’t taught anything like this when we are originally trained, just the basics: basic information with how to interact with the public, knowledge of the collections, and use of the registers. I am currently being taught how to open and close the store myself, but find a lot of the techniques other co workers help me to make this easier, as opposed to what I have been taught from my manager during training. I have picked up tricks about how to clean faster, deal with customers who get mad and try to make a scene so they can get their way. My job has been made more efficient for me since I have learned how to clean an entire store within 10 minutes, counting cash has helped improve how fast I can count. There are so many different things I have learned from this job.

I have had several jobs but none of which that have been more rewarding than being a student. There really isn’t any formal training to be a university student unless you count high school. However I have learned several techniques from students and professors that have made my life somewhat easier. An example comes to mind of when I switched to the BA program in my third year of university. It was like being a first year student all over again. There was more reading and paper writing to do. So my History professor gave me advice that was common sense but never occurred to me before. He said that you can’t read everything so you have to learn to be selective in what you read. Concentrate on the parts that are important to the theme of the class discussion and have a general understanding on what it is you read. This was the best tip and it didn’t come from any type of formal training.

Personally, I have never had a job outside school and things around the house. I have also never had co-workers per say, but there was one time in school that someone showed me a quicker way to do a type of problem in math. The teacher had shown us a formula that used five or six steps, but there was a way that you could do it in three steps and the teacher couldn’t mark you wrong because everything worked out. It was also quicker and made more sense.

For the past seven summers I have worked at The Scott Mission Camp in Caledon, Ontario, about 45 minutes outside of Toronto where I live. At the beginning of every summer each staff member is expected to attend a week of staff training where we learn many technicalities, rules and regulations. However, what I have found is that the most crucial and meaningful things that I have learned over the years were many things that go beyond what is taught during that week of staff training. Working with these inner city kids one of the greatest techniques I learned was taught to me by a co-worker pertaining to the job, who told me never to take anything that the campers may say personally. I was assured that in doing so my job would be a lot more fun and even easier, especially emotionally. This turned out to be excellent advice that has certainly helped me over the years working with these kids at camp and a technique that I myself have even passed on over the years to other new staff members who may themselves have even passed the technique and advice on to others as well.

Yes, many times before I have been taught a different technique or way of doing something by a co-worker to make the work much more easier and efficient. Anyone would appreciate being given some extra advice on how to make their work easier but at the same time still being done in the correct manner as it should be done. Some formal training is still very important, but for instance if someone was working at a busy restaurant I’m sure a new waitress would appreciate some helpful tips to aid in serving all customers in an efficient manner.

I used to worked in a barky [bakery] in Toronto, it is a normal barky which sell Chinese style and western style mix bread, and they taste good. The barky located in center of china town, it busy everyday all over the week. The barky only have two cashiers, but usually they not enough in the busy hours which it’s most time of a day. In the busy hours there is more then 4 sales person in the counter, but only 2 cashiers. When I was training, the manager said when I get the total amount of the customer’s payment, I should type in the money the customer gave me in the cashier, then let the cashier do the calculation, after that, the receipt will have all the number the boss need on it, like the payment, the money I receive, the change I give back. But it impossible in the busy hours that customers have to wait in line, the sales people have to wait in line for the cashiers. so one my co-worker told me, I don’t need to type in the money customer gave me, just do the calculation in my mind, therefore, I don’t need to go to get the money and then back to the cashier to type in, then get the change and receipt, when I got the total amount of payment, just push the receive button, then finish all the cashier job in one time. After I work in the barky for half year, my heart calculating become much better than before.

This past summer I worked for Aliant as a customer service tech. Before I could start working on my own I had to take a three week training course in Halifax followed by a two month ride along with an experienced employee of the company. This employee communicated his wealth of knowledge in order to help make the job easier for me. He showed me the most efficient way to carry a ladder and place it on a pole or truck, the safest way to belt in on the pole, and the easiest way to use the Ditch Witch. He used his experiences from over the years that he was shown by other employees, and learned on his own to make my time spent working more enjoyable.

I work at stream. More specifically, I work on the iBahn contract. Basically, in hotels that use the iBahn service, when a guest can’t get connected to the internet, they call us in screaming and whining. I hate to say it, but there is a great deal of things they don’t teach you in the formal training. So I learned a great number of skills after I got on the floor in order to make my job more efficient. A few examples include a few settings that seem to interfere with certain secure websites that connect to a company server. I learned how to adjust them to let them online. No where is that in the workflow they teach you in training, but everyone on the flow eventually learns how to do it. There also seems to be a particular guest who travels a lot who always has this problem on a website called gay.com. I’ve never had this guest, but everyone’s heard of him. The settings I spoke of supposedly locks guests out of that website. An agent sitting right next to me did have this mythical guest once while I was there, however. If I ever get him, I know how to get him online anyway. Also, quite a few people call us trying to get some other connection they can supposedly get through their TV. We don’t support it, so they’re supposed to call some other support group. The first time I got this connection, I spent 13 minutes trying to troubleshoot this guy until I was told he was connecting to a different service and he was given the wrong support number. Since then, I’ve had a number of these calls. All I’m supposed to do is tell them they need to call somebody else. I can go on listing all sorts of techniques I learned, but by then this would become an extended, and no doubt boring, essay. So the short answer to sum it up, is yes. I have learned many techniques.

My program is hospitality in CBU. This Saturday and Sunday my friend and I went to DELTA hotel to finish an assignment. In two days I learned more knowledge about housekeeping and I met some nice people. They taught lots of thing, but the most important technique is term- work. In this hotel there are many employees. They work very hard and logistic. Professedly they did their own job but in fact they were doing term-work. The process is when a guest checked out one employee went into the room and took out all dirty things (sheet, pillowcase, and some garbage). Then the other people walked in and clear up, make bed and put new stuffs on the table or bathroom. At last the manager came in and checked the room was ready to rent or not. If those works just a employees to do. He or she must felt very tire. Every floor have 22 rooms. He or she must make some mistake or forget clear one room. It is not good for hotel. So I think term-work is most effect way. In the two days my friend and I work together, we did not feel boring. I think two people work is better than one person. So this is my opinion.

I do learn a technique from a wage job. The technique which I learnt is “what whatever my own job is, and finishes it properly.” I remembered when the first time I went to work, I want to finish it very fast. And the supervisor always gave me more jobs. There was one guy he was doing very slowly. So every time my supervisor at that time always sent me to help him to finish it. Since I finish my job fast, some thing I did not finish it properly. And at that time I think that is not important. But THAT IS NOT THE WAY I AM TNINKING. What I learnt is every person in the team has his own value. The perfect job comes from every position’s perfect job, even very small and simple one like cleaning.

Yes, back when I worked at a VERY slow gas station, which I worked only Saturdays and Sundays all myself. I was told to try to keep myself busy in anyway possible weather it be via cleaning or taking out garbage or even doing homework just do something to keep my mind off of being bored. After about 6 months of spending Saturdays reading various papers and Sundays mopping the floors I decided to start bringing my portable DVD player to keep me busy then eventually I started to bring my Nintendo GameCube both days to keep myself busy.

I currently work at the Dollarama; I have been working there for over a year. When I began working there I was taught the rules and regulations of the job, like merchandising, handing large mounts of cash and costumer service. There were many employees opening the store that had experience in retail or they even worked at another Dollarama, those were the co-workers that would give you tips in how to do your work more efficient and quicker. Some tips like when stocking if there are a few items that can not fit you can pile two or three high on the top shelve, or when on cash you should always try to keep small change in your till because small bills tend to run out fast. Another trick is an easier way to change the receipt tape. Now I find myself telling other employees’ especially the new ones the trick of the trade I suppose.

Working in the fast food industry, much of my training was learned from my co-workers rather than formal training. That being the case many of the techniques which were taught to me were short cuts or ways which made it easier to do the work. They learned these techniques from the workers who trained them or simply by experience.

In my life so far I had 3 different jobs that I worked in for a long period of a time. My first job was a summer job that began 5 years ago in which I was a tennis instructor for kids. I continue to do this job every summer and I enjoy it very much. My second job was an employee for Sobeys. I started this job in September of 2005, but eventually quit a year later because of disliking of the job (pushing carts was not my thing). Finally, I just received a job this past month as a coordinator of an After School Physical Activity Program for some troubled kids. I basically try to help them have a home away form fun and plays some games from them. I like this job because I am used to working with kids and its enjoyable. Overall, I probably learned most with my tennis and After School Program job than my other Sobeys job because my co-worker helped me learn how to make this easier for me when working with kids. My co-worker helped me use some techniques on how to make my job better and still maintain a fun time and environment with the kids. My co-worker is also my co-worker in tennis and a close friend of mine so he was glad to offer me some tips. He said some things like making sure you maintain a small personal relationship with all the kids so they feel good about themselves and they will be able to stay in involved because of this. This doesn’t mean to take it easy with them; my friend also told me you have to be stern at times, like to “let them know who is boss.” This is a key factor because it makes the job with kids a lot easier. The kids will not goof off in front of you if they know you are in control and are willing to discipline them if they break a certain rule.

My word: what a lot of jobs.

The books are in! The books are in!

Ummm... rather self-explanatory, I think. Buy/shoplift/borrow yours today!

Question the third

Here it is, the question for the 30th (it might not be worded the same way as in class, but the intent is the same).

At your job, have you ever been taught a technique (a way of doing something to make the work easier, more interesting, more efficient) by a co-worker as opposed to more formal training?

You know what I mean, right?

Some answers to the "religious" question

Interesting group of answers this time: asking about religion is always intensely personal (and a danger in this age of religion being ensconced ion the private sphere), but all of it is food for thought.

In all cases I think my religious identity is a part of my folk identity
because without my religious background, there wouldn’t be all of the great family traditions and customs to follow, especially those that my family and I have at Christmas and other national holidays. It makes it easier too that my family consider both identities and both are practiced with great respect without one over-riding the other in any way.

I know that is is possible to have the fact that you are not religious part of you folk identity, but I do not believe this is the case in my situation. In my opinion for religious identity to be part of your folk identity you must relate to others of similiar religious beliefs based on your shared beliefs, wheither these beliefs be formal, non formal, or non existant. My religion and my religious beliefs are one of the last things that would either bring me together of seperate my from others on my behalf.

I would consider religious identity to be part of my folk identity because I feel that a person's beliefs makes up a large part of who they are. I am catholic and in being so, it effects my folk identity in the way I have been brought up, in the way I interact with my family as well as other groups and it also influences the way I act in every day situations. Relgion is present everyday and without it I feel my identity would be very different.

My final example, is how I got caught up in the controversy that raged over Boularderie and the diocese that serves the parish there. Last year they wanted to take the kneelers out of St. Joachim’s Catholic Church in Southside Boularderie. People who hadn’t been to church for years, including myself were up in arms. How dare they try and change a long standing tradition of the church. I would have thought people would be happy to get rid of them, however, the irony however, is that most people including Catholics detest the kneelers, they are hard to kneel on and hard to get up and down from. Yet it was enough to divide the community and get people from all religions weighing in on the topic.

I consider my religious identity to be a part of my folk identity. My religion is part of who I am, which also ties in with the folk identity aspect of my life. This narrows down where I stand on my beliefs as a Christian. Atheists consider their lack of religion part of who they are, and in part, a part of their folk identity. Religion is just another aspect of the many I have of who I am in connection with my religion as a part of my folk identity.

I don’t very belief any religion, but I belief there is some one watching what are we doing everyday. But in Chinese tradition, most people belief Dao which start from thousand years ago. Some of the traditional festival is from Dao. Like by the Chinese lunar calendar, the seventh day of the Chinese New Year, it’ s considered as the birthday of human being in Dao, most southern Chinese will go to the temple of Dao to celebrate this day and make a wish for the new year. In my family tradition, on that day, we will climb to the top of a hill or a mountain in or near our city, to wish we could get to the top in our lives or careers in the New Year. Dao and Buddhism have the most significant influence to Chinese, but most Chinese are not pious follower of Dao and Buddhism. For instance, Dao and Buddhism are prohibiting marriage, drinking alcohol, eating fresh, but we don’t follow these rules.

No, I do not. I do not think i have a "relgious identity". My religion is not a way in which I define any part of myself. Not being a spiritual person who prays to a God or attends church services on a regular basis it is not something that makes me who I am. Religion is not something which has been preached in my family, nor is it something my family uses as a way of distinguishing themselves from another group. It is a nearly non-existant quality in both my personal life and my life within my family and other groups.

Considering that folk may be defined as people who are the carriers of culture, and especially as representing the composite of social mores, customs, forms of behavior, etc., in a society, it is without a doubt that I consider religious identity as part of my folk identity. My religious identity is a part of my culture and who I identify myself as. It is my faith that I consider perhaps my most significant self-identifier. My faith shapes my decision-making and even perception of the world and so therefore shapes me as well. Thus, it is without a doubt that in answering a question such as who are you that my Christianity would be an essential factor in my response to such a question. My faith makes me who I am!

Personally I do not feel my religious identity is a part of my folk identity but then again I do find it difficult to identify what falls into my folk identity. The Catholic religion was a part of my identity when I was a child, perhaps because it was forced upon me. Even then I cannot say with certainty it was a part of my folk identity. What should be considered a part of my folk identity would be my families Polish, Scottish, or Irish background. However in my family this is neither celebrated nor acknowledged. It is not something we experience through the food we eat or the parties we throw. Therefore to state what part of my folk identity is would be difficult, but it does not include my religious identity.

I have to say that I didn’t really understand what the question is exactly asking, being as I lack the religious requirements for the question. However, if I were religious I would think that yes it would be a part of my folk “identity”. Religion can be looked at as a common factor that brings people together. Some religions themselves seem to be more “folk-ish” than anything. Like Native-Canadian religions they are more narrative than anything. There is no real text saying how and what to believe, it is based more on the information passed down to you by people who already have knowledge on the religion. Even looking at more “Americanized” religions there are parts that have nothing really to do with the religion itself but has become a tradition within that group. For example one of my friends is catholic and her church puts together this huge feast for the church members a week before Lent, and has done this every year for as long as her family can remember. It is usually the same people who put the event together and the event itself has unspoken customs attached to it that are followed every year even if they are not mentioned before hand. So even though the religion itself is very structured, the events that co-exist with it are not. Those events are what connect the “religious” identity to folk “identity”.

Religion identity is in close relation with folk identity. The folk draws material on religion, influencing the evolvement of religion its spreading inversely. In my life, I think “religious identity” is a part of “folk identity”. When I was a child, I heard the folk story from my grandfather. From that time, I knew Buddha at the first time. He is a god in Buddhism. Day after day, I knew lots of information about Buddha. He became a god in my heart. When I want to do one thing , but I have not the assuredness. I will utter a prayer to him, and hope for helping me can through this challenge.