Dilemma turned Fulfillment: An Early Realization in the Online Teaching Industry

I have often frowned upon the idea of getting into the call center industry. I have graduated without even a thought of becoming a call center newbie. It was perhaps the idea that such industry is meant for the unemployed, and I didn’t want to be included therewith. I earned my degree, and it’s something that I have to make use of in my future career. Having known that the minimum requirement to be in the call center workforce was just two years in college, I didn’t want to be part not only of the ‘unemployed’ but of the ‘underemployed’.

I have most times heard of the ongoings in call centers, and I didn’t want to be in it. During my job search, my frustration grew that I was pushed to resorting to applications at 3 call centers. But with much diligence for online job searching, out in surprise, I found two jobs that sounded promising. The first one, which was my first option, was working at an online advertising company for copyright. And the other one was at one company catering to online English instruction. I was utterly new to both, but I had opted for the first one. However, terms seemed to be not as expected, so taking the second one was rather the only option.

Getting into online English teaching was much of a dilemma, quite accidental, to say the least. There was some speck of doubt as it was no different from the call center given the shifts and early morning and late night schedules. The only consolation I got was first, one has to earn a bachelor’s degree, and second, employees teach. It’s better to say teachers rather than employees even. There was ascendancy in this industry. “I am now a teacher,” I did say to myself then. But still, there was something holding back.

I took the training. I had some test calls. And next I knew, I was already working, teaching Koreans to speak in the language that I very well know of. And now, I have been working for more than a couple of months, and it’s going well I may say.

During the first days of online teaching, it wasn’t like the call center, well, based on testimonies by some colleagues outside the company, who were call center agents. The shifts were set, like the usual classes in regular schools. There were books and manuals to use. Everything was structured like lesson plans, and yes, like in regular schools. It was a whole different industry, or rather story. It was modern day education. It wasn’t business or sales; it was rather imparting something to the students, not so much on profiteering.

It may be too soon for me to give testimony to what this modern education is, but I think my encounters would serve to be the very essence of it, the reason why it was put up in the first place.

In this online teaching, there is that element of encouragement for the student. Not all can be propelled to learn a new language, but encouraging one is more than just any reward or incentive. One student thanked me one time, not for teaching her, but for letting out that interest in her, for encouraging her. And that was my first encounter, thereby making me stay longer. It was beyond anything that we receive as employees. It was different.

My second encounter involved a student who can talk about different issues. After taking up one module, and with some minor conflict with the academy in Korea concerning about change of modules, it was arranged that her class be based on news columns and articles online. And that was where our classes revolved. One thing I gained here was being able to let out the best in every student. My student could talk so much an issue. She expanded topics from family to society, from economy to politics. She had a lot in mind. She took the class seriously. It was the first time that the company had such case. But all in all, seeing the student go beyond horizons and boundaries was just everything.

Lastly, talking to different students of different backgrounds was more than any fulfillment especially for those in the online instruction and modern day education and for those still aspiring to be in it. Trying to let the students talk about their lives in the language they are less adept with was just more than fulfilling. Entrusting the events in their every day lives, letting out their frustrations, and sharing their joys and achievements were the things that set online teaching apart from the rest in almost the same line of industry. I have taught and known mothers, businessmen, teenagers, office workers, fathers, artists, and I can even have a long list of who my students were. There was some human sense here along with teaching.

It wasn’t so much getting something out of every month in pay rolls or incentives. It was that intangible exchange in the form of what we give to every student. Being pushed, being brought out in the open, and being made to open up about their lives couldn’t be commensurate to what we have been paid with. A simple appreciation, that assertion in class during discussions on different relevant issues, and the many faces and lives being spoken by every student are the things that couldn’t be paid in pecuniary means.

Getting into the call center was one idea I would say an option for those who couldn’t find the right job. But sometimes, taking some time to think, look, and search over is all worth it. Online English teaching wasn’t the first job I had in mind. I do still want to make use of my degree. But now, seeing and understanding its purpose and essence, with my experience with different students, I have to say that it’s not any business-related and profiteering industry. There is that “human” in it. The interaction, the appreciation, the encouragement, the growth in every student, the boost to even teach more students every day, and that idea that it’s not just any call center make this “story” or modern day means of educating utterly unique and lasting. After all, we don’t happen to be employees or call center agents. We are teachers.

Uncertain

I fled into the wilderness of the streets of the metropolis. I quickly went down and used the mobile stairs going up. I merged with the pool of supposed and presumed workers of the area. I merged with my idea of being lost, of being not able to determine where I must go. I never felt lonely. I felt willed to pursue paths as chosen. I finally have myself, in solitude, in the midst of my thoughts disoriented themselves, in flashes, in dramatic fading and recurring, and in endless coming through. How disturbing this state could be. No one else endures, but myself, I am, uncertain.

Questioning without the slightest human interest and desire, I went on traversing the various pictures of superficiality and wealth, of people undyingly living up to the deceit of opportune commercialism. Goals kept occurring in my thoughts. I ended up going undetermined of the flow of what my own desire itself is.

I went back. I traced the ways have my thoughts left. And I stopped. I sufficed the inevitability of the physiological necessity to take something to churn, to put to waste. I did anyway. I succumbed to such drive. And I was brought in a strange ubiquitous scenario of what is and what is not. I didn’t have much time to narrate a whole ludicrous and pitiful story of the recent past that I have somehow gone over with. Still, the nuanced and strange moment was one of uncertainty.

I went over this knock-off, communicative device. Pity me. I tried to show that I can also be like them, but I couldn’t. I am different. I am myself. I can never pattern a life of an individual with a different story. I have my own story. I have to live up to it. I should be in it. Again, I myself am uncertain.

Like some vagabond, I went up. Sat.    I felt the cold. I can sense the frayed leather coverings of the seats. It’s my daily regimen of a life that leads nowhere else but merely some material desires. Some uncertainty.

Uncertain.

Defining Existence

Who one is in the midst of so many adversities, in the middle of so many turns and twists, on the verge of so many interactions and encounters reflects the very being that he/she can be. Life definitely has a lot to offer, as they say. Life has many surprises, at times unacceptable ones. Life seems to hone the very being that one can be. Life is objectively a whole spectacle, a whole amazement. But nothing could be more of an awe than the individuals that one can and has become. Life aided in that structured and crafted being. And up until now, one is still synthesized and being brought into so much.

It will take some time to give meaning to subsistence. At times it entails experience and unending processual undergoings of life. It entails one to go through so much before he/she can utterly see his/her being. But how could this existence be laid down and understood?

One could define it phenomenologically. Personal ideals and principles could be brought to play to get the whole image of that being. Individuals can view his/her life in his/her mind reflective of experience. How he/she puts meaning in things that define that existence. One may be open to changes, acceptable of any situation, or that he/she could be repulsive given that whims and visions are not fulfilled. Existence at this point is symbolic, so to say. The subjective entitlement of it is given. Here, existence and its essence is at the disposal of the life bearer. One could see himself/herself living for hopes, for something unknown and surprising; or he/she could live in nihilism and self-denial. Existence is in one’s own.

However, other people can give meaning to others’ existence. Seeing the purpose of one to so many people can also be valid given that the working individual is in the duly process of Be-ing; there is activity amidst Be-ing. Seeing this meaning through other people’s perspective objectifies the very meaning of one in life. One may be some saving grace or hero to another, or simply a source of misery and sadness.

How can then existence be define? It’s a coexistence and embedding of reasons, purposes, decisions, choices, and outcomes. Existence is the synthesis of the ongoings of life, of some else’s life, and even everyone else’s life. It’s the product of so many interactions and reactions. Existence is one’s definition. It is also reflected upon one’s significance in the lives of many. But overall, it’s an interconnection, overlapping, congruity, compormise, and harmony of all set meanings. It could also be the other way around.

One can say he/she is the most intelligent. But others may say otherwise or nothing at all. One may say that he/she has not been graced with beauty, thereby annihilating herself, living with a heavy heart and bitter mind, but others may say that he/she is an utter epitome of beauty. In some cases, there is agreement in definitions. There is totally match of one’s existence. One may actually be pushed to believing on others’ view. One may also be convinced of his/her existence.

Existence is that moment where one can say that there has been so much done and that there is still more to do. Setting boundaries for one’s very being may not be that easy, deepening thoughts and essences. But if one knows the why’s, how’s, and who’s of his/her existence, that’s one time that his very being is in transcendence of being not. There is existence by then.