Arbeit Macht Frei
Those are the words that used to run over the gate at Auschwitz. It translates to “Work Will Set You Free”. That slogan was stuck in my head all day as I suffered and slaved through my first day of work at Amazon. Nothing from the night before or morning of boded well for the rest of the day. I woke up at 2am and my anxiety decided to run me over like a fucking train. I spent the next 2 and a half hours trying to get some more sleep before the alarm brought my hideous nightmares into reality. This, of course, was a loosing battle. Better yet, at about 3:45 it started to thunderstorm...something that continued until after the end of my brutal 10-hour shift. So now I'm driving on unfamiliar streets to reach a place I've never been...and now it's storming.
The resemblance to a militant operation willing to sacrifice as many living people as possible in order to achieve their goal gains strength because I park in a space and then try to figure out which of the multiple doors I should walk through. Once I pick the wrong one and get that small debacle taken care of, I hike around the building in the pouring rain to go stand under a cheap tent. There were easily 50 or more of us crammed under a line of three tents. There we stood in the damp cold herded under these tents like sheep waiting for the signal to begin our final trudge to our inevitable, inescapable collective Doom. Herded under the sopping canvas fear began running wild. Someone started talking about the employment agency's policy of “overbooking” and that's when it started. The person running the orientation prior to this dreary morning threw out a hypothetical situation to simplify the concept. He said that Amazon would tell Integrity (the agency) that they needed 20 people, but they would send 40 or 50 and they would just take the first 20 in the door and send everyone else home. This sparked all kinds of comments about how people would react if they were the unfortunate ones. I was dwelling on the fact that the orientation was nothing more than 90 minutes of brow-beating us about how horrible the work is going to be.
Then the doors opened. The condemned plodded in. At this point I feel it necessary to point out that the other thing they repeatedly hammered into our skulls at the orientation was that there are absolutely no cell phones allowed in the building. So, upon venturing out of my car this morning I was completely disconnected from all but the horror that was the rest of the day. We formed two lines and mindlessly shuffled towards three people who would determine our fates. Here we gave them our names and forever surrendered our identities in exchange for our “log in”. And, yes, this came with a barcode. Why does this sound familiar?
From here we were sorted and seated. Then we began our instruction in our fates. Here we were greeted with bright smiles and friendly energy, but you could tell it was all fake. The refrain running through all of this was the statement “We're so glad you're here!” They're happy because they believe we are the ones who are going to kill ourselves working way too hard in the hopes of actually getting a hold of that carrot Amazon callously dangled in front of our noses: the potential to be hired on by Amazon. I don't understand why you would want to suffer like this year round, but it's an accurate commentary on our fucked up consumer culture. We kill ourselves for the opportunity to do it again.
We shambled along playing some fucked up game of follow-the-leader all over the monstrous facility. We learned the ins and outs of the various positions in the building despite only doing one for now. During this process the people from the various stations continue to strong-arm us like they did in the orientation. Here they snaked in a few more stories about how hard the work was, but they all caught themselves and quickly reverted back to the smiley-faced poseurs they were and made sure to end every spiel with the refrain: “it's great to have you here! Have fun!” Yes...because my definition of “fun” is slave labor for a paltry pittance. Next week I'm going to hook my genitals to a car battery because I want to have even more fun!
We finally take our break. Here the job starts to show its true nature. The breaks don't work like in other jobs. Since we don't clock out for the two breaks they count every second we're not working as “out for break”. We hike half-way across the building, a process that takes an average of 5 minutes, to stand and wait to walk through the metal detectors so we can get into the break room. In order to get through the metal detectors I had to take of my belt (now I'm in danger of dropping trou) and take everything out of my pockets. Once I go through I have to take off my hat and open my wallet. I also don't get to go to the restroom unless on a break. Now, I'm not a massive fan of taking a piss when I'm shoulder to shoulder with two other dudes. Needless to say, I didn't have too many successful trips to the can today. After getting a walloping 4 minutes to sit down after 3 hours of traipsing all over fuck and creation I have to get right back up and get right back to it.
After the break it just gets worse. We start our job-specific training...with faulty equipment and half-assed instructors getting frustrated with us when they're ineffectual instructions coupled with the malfunctioning equipment were the real reasons it was taking so long. After slaving and toiling in the heat and then looking for our instructors (as we were instructed) and then not able to find them.
And now that I've worked myself into a husk of a human being I must be off so that I may awaken way too fucking early to return to my shitty job in which I have absolutely no friends to help alleviate the suffering, nor anyone whom I could even see myself befriending. On the plus side: I've decided to stop suppressing the urge to hurt myself. And Kroger has 10 razor blades for $1.69. I've already got my stock. Even now that it's over I still have this feeling like I'm totally disconnected, like I'm not in my body. Like my subconscious is clinging to this naive hope that this was all just some bad dream...that I haven't really fallen so far that I'm completely screwed, starting from less than square one.
The resemblance to a militant operation willing to sacrifice as many living people as possible in order to achieve their goal gains strength because I park in a space and then try to figure out which of the multiple doors I should walk through. Once I pick the wrong one and get that small debacle taken care of, I hike around the building in the pouring rain to go stand under a cheap tent. There were easily 50 or more of us crammed under a line of three tents. There we stood in the damp cold herded under these tents like sheep waiting for the signal to begin our final trudge to our inevitable, inescapable collective Doom. Herded under the sopping canvas fear began running wild. Someone started talking about the employment agency's policy of “overbooking” and that's when it started. The person running the orientation prior to this dreary morning threw out a hypothetical situation to simplify the concept. He said that Amazon would tell Integrity (the agency) that they needed 20 people, but they would send 40 or 50 and they would just take the first 20 in the door and send everyone else home. This sparked all kinds of comments about how people would react if they were the unfortunate ones. I was dwelling on the fact that the orientation was nothing more than 90 minutes of brow-beating us about how horrible the work is going to be.
Then the doors opened. The condemned plodded in. At this point I feel it necessary to point out that the other thing they repeatedly hammered into our skulls at the orientation was that there are absolutely no cell phones allowed in the building. So, upon venturing out of my car this morning I was completely disconnected from all but the horror that was the rest of the day. We formed two lines and mindlessly shuffled towards three people who would determine our fates. Here we gave them our names and forever surrendered our identities in exchange for our “log in”. And, yes, this came with a barcode. Why does this sound familiar?
From here we were sorted and seated. Then we began our instruction in our fates. Here we were greeted with bright smiles and friendly energy, but you could tell it was all fake. The refrain running through all of this was the statement “We're so glad you're here!” They're happy because they believe we are the ones who are going to kill ourselves working way too hard in the hopes of actually getting a hold of that carrot Amazon callously dangled in front of our noses: the potential to be hired on by Amazon. I don't understand why you would want to suffer like this year round, but it's an accurate commentary on our fucked up consumer culture. We kill ourselves for the opportunity to do it again.
We shambled along playing some fucked up game of follow-the-leader all over the monstrous facility. We learned the ins and outs of the various positions in the building despite only doing one for now. During this process the people from the various stations continue to strong-arm us like they did in the orientation. Here they snaked in a few more stories about how hard the work was, but they all caught themselves and quickly reverted back to the smiley-faced poseurs they were and made sure to end every spiel with the refrain: “it's great to have you here! Have fun!” Yes...because my definition of “fun” is slave labor for a paltry pittance. Next week I'm going to hook my genitals to a car battery because I want to have even more fun!
We finally take our break. Here the job starts to show its true nature. The breaks don't work like in other jobs. Since we don't clock out for the two breaks they count every second we're not working as “out for break”. We hike half-way across the building, a process that takes an average of 5 minutes, to stand and wait to walk through the metal detectors so we can get into the break room. In order to get through the metal detectors I had to take of my belt (now I'm in danger of dropping trou) and take everything out of my pockets. Once I go through I have to take off my hat and open my wallet. I also don't get to go to the restroom unless on a break. Now, I'm not a massive fan of taking a piss when I'm shoulder to shoulder with two other dudes. Needless to say, I didn't have too many successful trips to the can today. After getting a walloping 4 minutes to sit down after 3 hours of traipsing all over fuck and creation I have to get right back up and get right back to it.
After the break it just gets worse. We start our job-specific training...with faulty equipment and half-assed instructors getting frustrated with us when they're ineffectual instructions coupled with the malfunctioning equipment were the real reasons it was taking so long. After slaving and toiling in the heat and then looking for our instructors (as we were instructed) and then not able to find them.
And now that I've worked myself into a husk of a human being I must be off so that I may awaken way too fucking early to return to my shitty job in which I have absolutely no friends to help alleviate the suffering, nor anyone whom I could even see myself befriending. On the plus side: I've decided to stop suppressing the urge to hurt myself. And Kroger has 10 razor blades for $1.69. I've already got my stock. Even now that it's over I still have this feeling like I'm totally disconnected, like I'm not in my body. Like my subconscious is clinging to this naive hope that this was all just some bad dream...that I haven't really fallen so far that I'm completely screwed, starting from less than square one.