For the past two days I've been working as crew member at Stage 3 area of the two day Peranakan Festival held at Singapore Management University SMU. It's a temporary job offered by my friend, Melvin who is part of the Organising Committee there.

The people I worked with are friendly which is very important in making my first work experience an enjoyable one. I find it very cool to have the "Crew" tag hung around my neck as I run around the campus in a white polo tee and jeans. It's the exclusive feeling.

A little about my workplace. Stage 3 is actually located just in front of the Subway in the School of Economics (SOE) and School of Social Sciences (SOSS). It is actually placed in a not very strategic location as it is very far away from the main stage, Stage 1 where all the happenings are. What is happening at Stage 3 is a series of live Peranakan food demonstrations by great Chefs. The ironic thing about Stage 3 is that itself isn't a stage as there are no evaluated platforms but rather it is just like some

Day 1
Being a newbie to the whole event, I arrived on time at 9pm at the School of Economics. I thought I saw a acquittance of mine there and I actually did. To my surprise, he is also involved in the same event as I do.

I admit I was very blur that day, as I was unfamiliar with the whole programme. Even though I asked many questions, I still remained quite unclear of the whole situation and of what is actually happening. I just follow whatever I am ordered to do and try my best to complete the task well. After I had set up the stage, my job is left to handling out brochures informing them about this Babazzar, inviting people to sit down to watch the food demonstrations and maintain the order of the "stage" in terms of the arrangement of items. Other than that, I'm just Melvin's runner. However, Melvin seems to be very busy that day as he is running up and down, through and forth with his phone ringing half of the time. Indeed he is doing more work than I am and I felt really bad about it. Later in the day, I had many visitors coming to ask me about where is the event being held. "Is what is happening her (Stage 3) the only event? I heard there are over a 100 stores and how come I can't see them? Where exactly is the whole event held; I did went the the basement area but all I see was bunches packed with students studying." Are the few common questions asked. Only a small handful are interested in what the chefs are cooking. As I've mentioned, Stage 1 is positioned at the basement area which the school termed the place as a concourse, which is quite a distance away from Stage 3. Those who came from the Dhoby Ghaut usually don't have the idea of where to go in SMU for the festival as there are no sign boards along the way to guide them along. I'm quite sure that for some lost sheep who didn't manage to find Stage 1, gave up and went back home. In a sense, Stage 3 is kind of like an information counter.

After the list of demonstrations ended by the chefs, its about 5.30pm. We (Melvin, student helpers from TP and me) packed up and cleared the stage, pushing the inventories back into the Gallery where we first took them out. John and Gabriel came to meet us at around 5.50pm when we are about done with the packing of the stuffs. After everything is being settled, we went for dinner at The Cathay Orchard and meet up with our friends before going to ei8ht cafe.

It is absolutely a tiring day for me.
Just a question. Do I have the blur look? O.o

Day 2
I thanked God in the morning that He didn't bless me with a hangover from drinking so much alcohol at ei8ht cafe yesterday. As usual, I reached SMU SOE at 9am with a stomachache. Since they are not there yet, I decide to clear my stomach first. After I've met up with Melvin, we went down to Stage 1 area to collect some stuffs before I was instructed to go back and set up Stage 3. When I reached back, Chef Calvin and Phillips had already arrived with the mobile kitchen being set up by them. I rushed into the Gallery to hid my bag under the table and trolley out all the things. Within 30-40 minutes I had finish the set up of the "stage" with some help from the chefs.

Hmm..Chef Phillip looks familiar to me though. I think I have seen him somewhere in the media before if I am not mistaken.

It rain on a lovely Sunday morning when our first demonstration by Chef Calvin started. It is obvious that Chef Calvin was nervous as he was stumbling through his words. However, the non-hala dish he made was really nice. I took a look at the programmes listed out for Stage 3 today and realised that there are only 2 main important people coming down for the demonstration today, one is Chef Phillip and the other is a Food Technologist Baker Samuel. Seems like to me, the last day is rather a relaxing one but for some reasons I don't know why, I'm feeling a little blue.

Food Technologist Baker Samuel demonstrated how to bake pineapple tarts which was really cool! He also taught the audiences quite a few technical facts about baking. After filming down the whole process of his first demonstration, my phone battery went flat.

Time zoomed passed and its almost knock off time. After Food Technologist Baker Samuel ended his second demonstration, we prepared for pack up. There were a few hiccups in between the packing up and the collection of my pay. I don't know why, no matter how refresh I try too be, I still cannot wipe off that blur look on my face. Anyways, I shan't disclose how much I earned here, all I can say that I shall put that amount to good use as to spend it for a occasion. Part of the earnings also goes to my mother.