Interview ABROAD..🙇🤩-1

January 12 - midday, 

I got a call from one of those half a dozen schools to which we had forwarded my resume so frantically. My pleasure knew no bounds. It had just been a fortnight since I migrated to Abu Dhabi with my husband after six months of our marriage.  I had been advised by many of my friends, colleagues and well-wishers that it would be easy to get a teacher's job in gulf countries. With that array of motivation, my husband and I went to the nearby schools to drop my resume. 

No school let us even inside the campus; rather they suggested us to send the resume through email. Some received the resume with due respect and placed them on the table in security cabin. That wiped my hope completely. "We are not gonna be hired any sooner!", I said to myself and left home. 

But this call came totally out of the blue. I was the least prepared for that. When I got the call that greeted me, "Good morning! Abu Dhabi Indian School...", I started to quiver. When the call was redirected to the person concerned, she told me the timing, venue and the topic to deal with for the demo class. To which I could barely respond except for saying a puzzled "Thank you, ma'am!"

With that started a night long anxiety. "What if I am not selected? What if I stand blank in front of the panel members? What if I commit a silly spelling mistake while writing on the board? What if they ask me if I really possessed half a decade of teaching experience?....." , the questions started unfurling one by one. "But it's not the first time you are going to teach. Just half a year of gap will not affect your flow. And teaching comes more as a reflex to you ", said my practical mind. That made sense. 

Yet, a little insecurity haunted me that I headed to my book shelf, pulled out my reference books and started working out the grammar samples fervently. 

The next day dawned. I had to reach the school on or before 9am. So did I , but to be stopped by the security at the entrance. 

As a candidate who was nervous about the day, my heart started to palpitate when he asked me for my contact number which I had not memorized by then. I fished out the mobile from my handbag, dictated the number seeing the message that my husband had sent me. It didn't stop there. He went on to ask me for my "Emirates ID". That got me off my feet. Only the previous week had I applied for the same and was waiting to get one, through post. So I handed over the stamped application form with a puzzled look and stood rooted to the land. He peered through his specs and directed me to the reception. 

When I entered the cabin, the receptionist was busy answering the intercom with her shrunken brow that made her look so tense. On seeing me approaching, she kept the receiver down and enquired what I wanted. I introduced myself as a candidate to be interviewed. 

"Oh hello, Mahalakshmi!" she greeted me with an amiable smile and instructed me to wait in the next room as I had to first undergo a written test, then to give my demo on the topic mentioned the previous day. 

Having said that, she thrusted a bunch of papers into my hands. I was given an hour's time to finish that off. The question paper was really a piece of cake. There was a complaint letter about a malfunctioning refrigerator in the writing part. Incidentally we too had been having a problem with our refrigerator at home by then, that the question brought a smile on my face. Grammar, literature and writing parts were all simple alike. The only trouble was time constraint. Wee.... the hour flew away within a batting of an eyelid. She came to remind me that I was running out of time. Only then did I realize that I had been carried away by the choice of vocabulary to be used for the writing part. So needless to mention, I had to scribble and wind up the last question in great rush.

After that one hour of writing, I had to go to an eighth grade classroom for my demo. I was as excited as a kid to face a class full of students after half a year of that family imposed "career break".

(To be continued...)