Visiting Strangers, Dogs Barking, "Women" Wailing
I'm going to use this post to share a little more about my new job with the Academy--as resident guardian and overseer to 28 kids over 18 rooms in the Academy's dormitory, known as The Residencia.  The Residencia is on the second floor of a stock block grey building that also doubles up as the school's administrative block and classrooms.

I have 20 boys and 8 girls under my care, with ages ranging from 12-17 and they come from all over the world.  The kids come from Russia, Israel, China, Uzbekistan, Liechtenstein, Germany, Romania, Ukraine, Malaysia and the UK, to name a few.  It all sounds pretty cool but when you factor in the fact that many of them are rebellious and going through that often problematic puberty-adolescent stage, my "job coolness" factor gets notched down. 

My job scope follows such:

1. Being on night duty at the Residence from 8pm to 8am, Mondays to Fridays and a full day on Saturdays.  Aside from
2. Doing call every night at 10.15pm, making sure that all are present.  This includes menially asinine task of asking/getting them to brush their teeth.  This is something especially tiring (and trying!) after a long day of training, particularly when they don't want to listen.
3. Locking up the building and switching on the alarm system every night.
4. Throwing out kids who don't live in the Residencia, and who aren't supposed to be there (sometimes a tiring task).
5. Checking their rooms in the morning to make sure all are in school/at training, and that none are loafing around/oversleeping.
6. Switching off the security alarm in the mornings.
7. Giving weekly updates to the administrative manager during my precious lunch hour, on what's happening at the Residencia.  Often, this includes telling her about problem kids, unpleasant incidences that have happened. 
   Aside from all this, I also have to
8. Stand guard at the restaurant during dinner to make sure they don't throw food across tables (has happened before)...
9. Collating feedback on the food from the kids, and giving suggestions to the restaurant on ways to improve its menue selection.
   
   

I've been at the job for a total of one month now, and it was initially very, very stressful juggling a full day's worth of practice, having no time to relax, and then starting work almost immediately.  My first night at the Residencia was pure rot--the older boys decided to see how far they could go with their limits, and so at 1am in the morning, they all went into cahoots and started screaming and banging their doors together.  The problem with the Residencia is that the walls are very thin--so you can effectively hear many many things from one end of the corridor, to another.  If that wasn't enough, some of them started playing porn movies in their room and cranked out the sound really really loud.  A few others went down to the boy's locker room downstairs and started screaming/wailing at the top of their lungs.  After a while, I also heard what sounded like a dog barking.  Yeap... all past mignight.

I didn't get much sleep that first night.  None at all, actually.  Curled up in my new room, my tired body was unspeakably tense in this new... environment.  No, it honestly felt more like a hell hole.  With past midnight bloodcurdling screams, deafening shouts, doors banging and a host of strange noises, for the first time in my life, I simply didn't feel safe.  I didn't feel safe, so I couldn't sleep.

In exchange for this, I get free room, board, meals, and a grand total salary of EUR300 a month.  Numerically, it's worse than a cleaner's pay back home!, and I initially honestly felt pushed between a rock and a hard place to accept the job.  I had to because I wanted to keep my chances of training here.  But I didn't want to because I knew it would affect my training.  I get interrupted sleep and less hours, simply because I am on stand by and have obligations and duties to fulfill.  Sometimes during roll call, I feel so tired I feel feverish. 

The plus side to all of this is obviously the full room and board, and the fact that I can use the extra 300 (though not much) to offset my steep training costs.  That and that the room I have is a nice spacious one with big windows and a big cupboard.  Minus the horrible walls and the often antagonistic kids, the job would be tolerable.... :(