International school drama Pt.2

Teachers at the international school in Myanmar were advised that they would receive their October salary in the second week of November. Second week came by and there was no word from the school to advise their teachers that the salaries would be paid late… again.

In the third week, teachers started contacting each other to check if others have been paid. Two out thirty teachers (both local and expat) were paid because they had made a lot of noise about the last late payment.

The head teacher, Sam, then contacted the school’s manager, Mr Greg, and asked if he was aware that teachers have not been paid. His response was short and simple, “I got mine so I assume that everyone got paid as well.” The next day, another teacher, Mike, asked Mr Greg when salaries would be paid as he needs to pay rent in the coming week. Mr Greg’s answered, “I am sorry. I wasn’t aware that the salaries are late again for this month.” Mike then contacted Sam to find out what the story was. This then got unloaded in the school’s WhatsApp group. They found out, not only the expat teachers have not been paid, the locals have not been paid either.

After teachers found out, Mr Greg suggested that teachers stop contacting him about salaries. They should be addressing their concern with the school’s finance officer as this has nothing to do with him. HE IS THE SCHOOL’S DIRECTOR, ACTING AS A PRINCIPAL!!!! This is part of his job!!!!! This is the same guy who suggested that teachers move to countries closer to Myanmar to minimise the time difference.

To date, only one additional teacher has received October salary. We all speculated that this teacher has been paid because she is the lead teacher and if she were paid, she can’t encourage teachers to go on a strike.

We are not holding high hopes that November salaries would be paid when they shoud as well.

Happy One Year Anniversary

As the title says, this time last year, we got out of quarantine in Brisbane. In that one year, hubby and I have achieved quite a lot.

In one year, we have…

• gotten entry level jobs,
• bought a first car,
• upgraded our first jobs,
• bought a second car,
• put on quite a bit of weight thanks to mum’s amazing food,
• gotten Whiskey back from quarantine,
• secured a home loan,
• bought a home,
• and bought our first home furnitures.

We are happy and grateful of what we have achieved within one year of being in Australia.

Every now and then, we do talk about being an expat again and we agreed that if we were to do it again and came back to Australia in 5 years time, we may not have the same success that we have now. And with what we have, we would do our best to think less of what we would be if we continued to live overseas.

International School drama

A friend of mine works as an online teacher at a school in Myanmar, called Leading Asia Myanmar International School, also known as LAMIS. From what I know, it is a new school, been around fora year or two. As we are in COVID time, all their teachers are not in Myanmar and deliver lessons following Myanmar school hours. They all have a valid working contract and only receive a salary without any benefits that an international school teachers would normally get. The owner of the school is saving tons of money on visas, air fares, health insurance, housing allowances, as well as contract completion bonuses.

Recently the school sacked their head of school (HOS) because they found out that ontop of being a HOS for LAMIS, he is also a HOS for a school in Europe. He did this because he hasn’t received his full salaries for the months he worked there. There were times where he had to pay other teachers’ salary with his own money as the owner rarely pays foreign teachers’ salary as agreed. Let’s call this HOS Adam.

LAMIS now has a new education consultant acting as the head of school. As all new head or manager, Greg wants to leave his mark at this new school. He has made some interesting suggestions and let out a few secrets he shouldn’t have. One of the suggestions he made was for all teachers to move to a country closer to Myanmar to reduce the time difference. One of the secrets he let out was his personal feelings towards one of the current teachers and that he has thought of replacing existing teachers with his own crew.

Going forward, I will call this friend of mine Anya. Anya and her husband work for LAMIS since the start of 2021 academic year. They live in Europe, with 3 kids. They were unemployed and needed this job to make sure they don’t continue being homeless. According to Anya and her husband, Adam sent them 500USD to help with the set up of online teaching. They all agreed that this would be deducted from their first salary.

A few days ago, Anya told me that 2 months into their employment, they have yet to receive their first paycheck. She and her husband asked Greg about it. His answer was, “I haven’t paid you your salary because HSBC can’t do the transfer. The first one bounced back and I don’t know what happened to the other two I made. HSBC said they can’t do a bank transfer to an alphanumeric account number.”

Now, Anya and her husband need that money so they can continue paying rent and put food on the table. With winter coming, her husband started to contact Greg almost daily to find out if they would be paid at all. He may have used flowerly language to express his frustration and desperation.

Greg did not take kindly to the messages and told Anya’s husband that he is done. He then removed both Anya and her husband from the school’s WhatsApp group. He also told Anya that if she wants to keep her job, she needs to tell her husband to stop harrasing him.

As we all know, there is always two sides of a story. I freelanced at the school when I was looking for a full time employment in Australia. To date, Adam, myself and the curriculum coordinator are still waiting for the money we are owed.

This Greg guy is new and after he took over from Adam, he sent a message to the group WhatsApp account telling everyone that he is the new Adam until LAMIS appoints a new HOS. Any problems or questions should be directed to him and not Adam. I did as he asked and he told me to speak to Adam as he has no knowledge of the issue (missing salary). From the one interaction I had with him, he seems to be working off a script and lacks in forward planning. No attention to details.

Questions I would love to ask him…

1. If the money transfer bounced the first time, wouldn’t you check with Anya and her husband to make sure that you have the correct banking details?

2. Did HSBC tell you why the transfer failed and if they didn’t, did you ask why?

3. You said you tried to send the money again and this time, you don’t know what is happening to that money. Have you contacted the bank to find out more?

4. I was a customer of HSBC when I worked in Malaysia. When I wanted to send money to Indonesia, they asked if the account I was sending the money to is a foreign currency account as they don’t send Rupiah. HSBC will tell you if something isn’t going to work.

For those who are reading this. what is your take on the issue? What advice would you give to Anya and her husband?

UPDATE: Anya got her last month’s salary yesterday. Her husband was told he would get his next month.

Whiskey made it home

After 8 month in Brunei, we received news that Whiskey had a spot at the quarantine centre in Melbourne. The date they gave us was the day after Ramadhan. Managed to change her arrival date with very little drama and the count down began.

Flight to Brunei booked and we also finalised her itinerary from Melbourne to Gold Coast. All seemed smooth sailiing and we continued to get updates on her departure progress.

On the day Whiskey was to fly to Gold Coast, we received a call telling us that her flight has been cancelled and they were trying to put her on the next available flight. Whiskey got on another flight and we were told to be there earlier as her flight took off 90 minutes earlier than scheduled. When we got there, we saw 3 other families waiting to pick up their pet as well. We were relieved because that means we were at the right place.

Whiskey came out disoriented… she was tired, dehydrated and very thin. We used the wet wipes we brought to help clean her up a bit and took her for a short walk before we drove home.

Five months later, Whiskey gained weight and is looking a lot healthier. She enjoyed winter and is struggling with the heat. Whiskey is learning not to lick cane toads and enjoying the beach more than we thought she would.

Five countries and she is now home for good. Thank you to everyone who helped bringing Whiskey home. It was worth the wait and we didn’t have to play the ‘what if” game.

Post quarantine

My first job after I came out of quarantine was being a Customer Service Specialist at Stellar. It is a call centre and I believe some of their clients include Telstra, TransLink, and My Aged Care.

The interview process begin with an online AI interview and a typing test. I guess I must have done alright since they called to do a non AI interview. I was waiting for my online students to come and I did have about 10 minutes before the lesson started. They asked the usual kind of questions such as working under pressure, meeting KPIs, computer skills and dealing with conflicts and agressive customers.

I received a formal offer 2 weeks later along with some readings to be done before the starting date. Training was hard and I must say quite tiring. There was a lot we had to process in such a short time and the trainer reassured us that most of the skills and knowledge would be picked up when we are on the floor.

Now, those who are unfamiliar with call centres, let me tell you what their expectations are. Average call time should be within 600 to 700 seconds, this includes authenticating the caller and recording what the call was about. You can do this if the caller is already a client and has their client number, and not requiring an assessment of any kinds. However, if the caller is a new client, required an assessment and would like to nominate a family member or a friend as a representative, you could spend at least 15 minutes on the call.

The next part of the KPI is about how on time you are. From the time you logged in to the system, taking your break and ending your shift. The calls you get on the day does impact on your tardiness. Say you were scheduled for your first break at 11am. You took a call at 10:30am and the client wanted to have another assessment, register her husband and had him take an assessment following the suggestion of an aged care worker. When you finished the call, you were 15 minutes late. This 15 minutes magically became 30 minutes…. WHAT???? Yes…. the first 15 minutes at the start of your break and 15 minutes after your break. As a result, you messed up both your average call time and break time.

During my time on the floor, I sat next to a guy named D. He worked for Stellar before, left and came back. He gave me great tips such as putting our calls on after call time (Stellars’s terminology for on hold) if our break or home time is about 5 minutes away. He also said that Stellar, like any other workplace, favours connections. The friendlier you are with the upper management or people who matters, the easier it would be for you to get noticed and promoted.

I didn’t think too much of this as it is pretty much the same in a lot of workplace. You can do no wrong as long as you are chummy with the boss. But he was right… He received a promotion not too long after he came out of his probation.

As for me, I left the call centre af the end of my probational period. I heard that out of 9 people that I started with, only 3 are still at Stellar. I know one is planning her exit as I wrote this.

I had no regret working for the call centre. It made me appreciate the work they do to solve our queries. The training they went through and the KPI they had to pass every month.

My first job post expat life

Looking for a teaching job for me was quite a challenge as I have never taught in Queensland after I have completed my teaching degree. I decided to give it a go anyway. I applied to any teaching, child care, and teacher aide jobs advertised, both state and private. I also applied for tutoring jobs. I heard back from 2 out of all the posititions I applied for. One went as far as an interview, the other collected my referrences but both never came back with any offer.

I then decided to apply for office jobs, such as students admin officer, working with refugees, and call centres. Out of all the jobs I applied to, I heard back from the call centre. They sent me an interview request, which was done by an AI. I didn’t have high hopes as I did not have a clear idea on what the job was. I think I may have gotten it mixed up with another job that had a similar JD. A couple of days later, I got a call just before my online tutoring class started. I decided to take the call, thinking that it could be from the Medicare people. Turned out is was about the call centre job. They did a more thorough interview, asking me questions about how my previous experience as a teacher would help me in the job, etc. The most interesting question they asked was if I were going to do any traveling in the next 4 months. I kinda chuckled after she asked the question and said that I have no plan to travel as we are in COVID time. I can’t leave the country and if I could, I wouldn’t be able to come back. Only after the interview, I realised that she was talking about domestic travel…

A week before Christmas, I received another call to inform me that I got the job, starting date, probation time, onboarding salary, basic salary, over time pay and security screening that I had to complete. A few days after, I received the employment package and completed the mandatory eLearning before the onboarding.

The job wasn’t bad. Once you have completed the onboarding, completed one month on the ‘rockpool’, you would have a pretty good understanding of the processes, the interface that I worked with, and how to meet the company’s KPI (Key Performance Index). The quality people would listen to 5 of your calls a month and you get to find out what areas you could improve on. After working there for 4 months, I managed to meet all the KPIs and managed to get a green scorecard for my last full month there.

I handed in my resignation letter a week before the end of my probation and left the job after my probation has ended. I was getting comfortable with what I had to do and there were days where I really enjoyed what I did, but I saw that there isn’t a lot of room for me to grow. I would be extremely lucky if I could get promoted to either a team leader or quality control or any other positions within the company. I watched how someone with very little knowledge of the processes got promoted over someone with 15 years of experience, who had done quality and led teams with good results. I have heard and witnessed an employee with poor personal skills got taken off the floor and promoted to a trainer to avoid getting constant negative feedback from her clients.

One good thing about the company, it values punctuality. If were to finish your work at 8PM, but got held up in a call and logged out at 8:03PM, you can claim that 3 minutes as overtime. Later I found out that the reason for it is to make sure we as a whole can keep our ‘adherence’ at a certain percentage.

Road to finding a job

Finlay and I started looking for work as soon as we had all of our paperwork in order. The process for Finlay and I are different. So let me tell you what he needed to do before he could apply for a job in Australia.

Finlay first needed to have a Medicare card, bank account, tax file number and convert his UK driver license to an Australian one. To apply for most things in Australia, you need to have 4 points of ID. This could be a combination of a passport, driver license, bank card, Medicare card, a letter with your name and address on it, birth certificate, marriage certificate, etc. This is a new concept for him because as an expat, a passport is the highest form of ID you could have, depending where you live.

We tried to open a bank account online while we were still in quarantine. However, we were advised to go to a branch to validate his identity before it can be completed. We went after we got out of quarantine, and in about a week, Finlay received his bank card. 2 points of ID collected. By far this was the easiest process we had to go through.

Next we went to Centrelink. Those who lives in Australia know how frustrating Centrelink can be, though that depends on who helped you. We visited the Nerang branch as they can help us with the Medicare card application. They gave us good information, and sent us off with a certified copy of Finlay’s passport, highlight which part of the form needed to be completed and evidence to submit. We did have to contact Medicare to confirm that the option highlighted is the right one for him. This is a not a very complicated process, but took the longest to get. 1 point of ID collected.

Once we have 4 points of ID, (passport, a bank card, a letter with his name and current address, and a Medicare card), we went to get his driver license. He brought in all the document, including his UK driver license and a completed application form to the Department of Motor and Transport. This is when we started to hit some speed bumps.

Finlay had a paper license, the size of an A4 paper. When he went and handed in all the document, he was questioned about it, and had a to write a statement about why he never updated his UK license. First they said no as it is not a typical license. Finlay said that his license is valid for life and it is accepted anywhere else in the world. The lady at the counter was very patient and understanding. She checked with her supervisor, came back and asked Finlay to write a statement as to why he never had or exchanged his license to a newer one. At the end of it, his application was approved, paid the fee and had his photo taken and was told to wait for the license to come in the post.

The last thing Finlay needed to go was his tax file number. He applied for one back in 2019 and never heard anything back. So we called the tax office and gave all the details they asked for. Unfortunately, I had to tell him the answer for one of the questions and it wasn’t accepted, as it was coming from a 3rd party. The advice given to him was to apply for a new one. The process was easy enough and he got his tax file number soon after.

This is one of the advantages of living in an English speaking country. We have a full understanding of all exchanges, including what the problems were, what we could do to correct it, and the timeline. Such a different experience compared to what we were used to.

Life in Queensland during quarantine

After arriving in Brisbane, we were whisked into Four Points by Sheraton after completing security check at Brisbane airport. We didn’t do any swab (PCR) test after landing like we thought we would, after hearing what other travelers had gone through to go back to their home country or enter their host country. They didn’t even ask if we had done the test before flying out of Malaysia. We did however get a daily phone call to make sure we are mentally and physically healthy. The swab test we were so looking forward to came a few days before we were due to come out of quarantine and we received the result not long after.

Now, lets talk about the quarantine itself. Our group had quite a lot of families, they were also staying at the same hotel as us. However, after advising the quarantine staff that the room is too small for a family of 4 or more, they were moved to a service apartment accommodation. Their food was delivered earlier so the little ones don’t have to stay up past their bedtime to have their dinner. Food for us adults was great for the first week, the second was a repeat of the first week. No more excitement, no more worrying about whether or not we would have enough in between meals. We enjoyed most of them, especially when it was a meat pie day. They were quite generous with their serving portion too.

The view from our hotel room was windows to other office blocks or hotel rooms. We weren’t able to open any windows, however, we had access to a workout program and outdoor/fresh air time if we needed it. We were curious about it, so we decided to go for it. We went 3 times before deciding it wasn’t worth it. Our hotel doesn’t seem to have a rooftop facility, so we were taking our outdoor time in the car park. We had to be mindful of cars leaving the car park and there wasn’t much sun coming through…. there was a gap on the roof, so that was the only sunshine we had when we went outside. If they did have a rooftop facility, it wasn’t made available to us.

From some Facebook groups related to quarantining in Australia, we read about the amount of dust in the room. Yes, it is very true. Dust build up so quickly that if you don’t wipe the surfaces daily, it looked like your room is covered in Parmesan cheese shaving. Some people posted a checklist on what we could or should have, which helped. We brought in some sauces, chilli paste, as well as our favourite tea and coffee. Our parents also sent us 2 Coles bag worth of food, including 2 bottles of wine, adapter and Australian SIM card. We could order alcohol from the hotel if we wanted to, but they rationed it. I guess it is to prevent us from being drunk and damaging public properties. Having lived in Asia, we are so used to having food panda, Grab, or Gojek for deliveries. We learnt that we can have alcohol delivered, but not to our hotel address. Oh well, we live and learn.

We are very grateful that during our quarantine days, we still had jobs (online tutoring). Our days were filled with lessons planning, creating power point presentation for the students and teaching. When we weren’t doing any of that, we applied for jobs, set up mygov, opened a bank account for husband, attempted to do yoga, did HITT training, downloading and watching Fringe, doing laundry, and taking turns picking up our food and recycling our rubbish.

It was an experience and I must say that at the end of the day, you do what you need to do to keep you and your family safe. We could have stayed in Malaysia but with Whiskey already in Brunei, we thought it is best for us to start the journey home. We don’t regret it and we are continually adjusting to life in Australia.

Almost home for Whiskey

Whiskey has had a long “holiday” in Brunei, since October I think. About 3 months ago, it was confirmed that PetAir Malaysia has secured a place for her at PEQ Melbourne.

She was scheduled to fly to Melbourne on the 13 May. Our agent wasn’t happy with the date as that is the start of Hari Raya celebration, New Year celebration for our Muslim friends. Nothing much would be operational in Brunei during that holiday period. We had to contact PEQ and requested for an earlier date, which we did get, 12 May.

Yesterday, Bryn, Whiskey’s host parent showered her, making sure she is clean and pretty. This morning, she sent us a photo of Whiskey in her crate, ready to fly back to Australia. We were also told that we will receive an update once Whiskey has landed. The cost of her stay at PEQ will be sorted by the agent at the end of her 10 days.

We have also organised a flight for her from Melbourne to Brisbane. We will be picking her up at Brisbane airport on the 22nd. We are really excited about it and hoping that she will get along well with the other dogs.

Other dogs? Yes, we are staying with my parents after we left Malaysia. We haven’t found our own place yet and that would be another story in the near future. My parents have 3 dogs, unfortunately, 2 of them are quite territorial. We will be introducing her to all three one at a time. Making sure that when we go to work, all of them would get along well. No fights and they would not invade her space either.

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Hope Whiskey will be okay during her 10 days at PEQ. We have heard stories from a Facebook group about pets coming out from the facility with minor injuries/infections or pets who had throuble adjusting to the dry food they got given. So far, everything has been great, praying that it will continue to be great on her last quarantine.

Touched down

After a lot of doubts, worries and emailing, we finally made it back to Brisbane. Day 2 of quarantine.

So here is the recap.

The chartered flight organised by Singapore Air charter got taken over by CapaJet, also known as Trips Exotica. Those who have made bookings with Singapore Air charter were able to transfer their payment to Capa Jet. The original route was from Jakarta – Port Moresby – Brisbane. It was suppose to fly on 3 November at 4pm. A few days later, we received an email that the flight would be leaving from Jakarta to Brisbane on 4 November at 2am.

We were worried that we might not be able to get a boarding pass in Kuala Lumpur, but thanks to the Australian embassy in Jakarta and High Consular in Kuala Lumpur, we managed to get our transit permit at 6pm, the day before we were due to fly.

Arrived at the airport after 2 police checks. Good thing we had gone to the police station to get the interstate travel permit. Before we left our apartment, we still hadn’t received our eTicket yet. We were told that we should get it within 24 hours before the flight. Check in counters were open, we contacted our organiser to let her know that the eticket hasn’t been emailed. Just before 1pm, we received our eticket. We looked at it and took Capa Jet’s version of an eticket to check in. Took 6 of the Garuda check in staff to check us in. We made it to our gate before it got closed.

Arrived in Jakarta with no problem. We were escorted by 2 airport staff and an airport police. We got through all the checks with no problem and were deposited at the Garuda lounge. Not long after, someone from the embassy came to welcome and watch over us. He stayed until the last passenger from Bali arrived and asked if we could help watch over her after he had left.

That woman was on another level of panic. She is old and was not very hopeful that the flight was going to happen. We had to ask one of the staff to help us calm her down. She did and thankfully, our boarding pass for the next flight arrived in less than an hour before the plane.

We arrived in Brisbane at about 3pm-ish. Went through all the custom checks and filled in all the paperwork for quarantine. Got in our hotel at about 7pm and ate dinner at about 8pm.

So far, everything has been great. The room is not the same as the apartment we had, but enough for us to continue with our work. Food has been great despite everything we had read. Queensland government and Queensland health have been checking on us since day two to make sure we are all OK. Room break is around the parking area so it is not something I look forward to. My husband said that we would not go just for the sake of going out of the room because as soon as we were out, I wanted to go back in.

I hope all other Australians who are still overseas and want to come home will be able to come home soon. I still believe that if Australia hadn’t put on the cap, we would not be in this situation. I don’t understand politics and I don’t pretend that I do, but it does make me wonder if the government and the Australians are really benefiting from the cap.