A job to improve elf-esteem!
I’m one week in to my very unique Christmas job, the position about which the media frenzied! As soon as I posted the news that I had the elf job, I received a barrage of phone calls from varies magazines or newspapers, and given that I want to work in magazines and newspapers and have an unwavering optimism, each call went something like this:
Them: “Hello, I’m calling from XX magazine, we’ve been reading your blog, and –”
Me: “When can I start?!?!!”
Them: “Erm, well, actually…” *Insert awkward pause here before the heartbreak!* “We actually just wanted to write about your situation. We’ll pay you £small sum…”
Me: “Can I write the article?”
Them: “No.”
Me: “Instead of you paying me can I write the article?”
Them: “No.”
Me: “Perhaps I could just come and do some unpaid work experience?”
Them: “No.”
Me: “I could be the tea girl?!”
Them: “No.”
And so on!
My current position is Toy Factory Elf, although I am very much hoping to broaden my elfish horizons as far as Mother Christmas’ Kitchen, or even to the honourable shades of the Magic Pathway! Although I have no acting experience whatsoever, I am one of the more convincing elves, which I put down to my teaching experience. I think that teachers are actors, in a way, and I am certainly putting the skills I learnt teaching English as a Foreign Language to excellent use in the Toy Factory!
The strange part is acting like a complete and utter loon in front of the parents. Whilst I can play the fool in front of a large group of wild and rampant rugrats, I am too shy to make eye contact with the parents. They are terrifying! Not only do they frequently dispel any elfin magic by referring to me as “the lady” and not “the elf,” they have the most unfounded complaints imaginable! One lady loudly complained that the snow wasn’t cold enough! I had to somehow break it to her, whilst remaining in character, that the snow had to be fake because, although she had come down the elves magic teleporting pathway, she was in fact still in Kent, where it hasn’t snowed. Even more bizarrely, perhaps, was the parent who angrily remarked that not one of the reindeer had a red nose!
Anecdotes to come, I must get some sleep, it is exhausting singing and jumping day in day out!
