Being Part of the California Workforce

SINCE last April, I have already started working at the FoodMaxx supermarket in Pinole which is a six-minute drive from my house here in El Sobrante, California.

This is the first time in my life that I am working with a regular punch-in and punch-out time compared to my days as a sportswriter back in the Philippines when I occasionally worked from home. And mind you, being part of the California workforce is a difficult adjustment I had to make.

And as you see from the photo above, I wear a blue shirt as uniform -- something I haven't done ever since I graduated from college at the University of Santo Tomas.

My schedule usually starts in the mid-morning and ends in the early evening just  before sunset and this is perfect for my body clock because I normally wake up at 6 am and sleep at about midnight. I have two days off but I work a lot during the weekends which can be stressful at times because there are many customers while on weekdays, most people go to work and most shoppers are the stay-home moms.

Some of my duties at FoodMaxx include sweeping the floor, cleaning the checkstands where the groceries are placed, removing the trash bags (even in the comfort rooms), pushing carts (which is the most difficult because you have to deal with the weather) and putting back groceries left by customers to the shelves (those products are called go-backs in grocery lingo).

My most memorable experience in my new job came when I found a Golden State ID card near the fruit stands and when I gave it to my superior, the card was returned to its owner, an African-American mother who was crying when she saw me return the card. I later found out that the Golden State ID card is not because she is a Warriors fan, but that's the name of an important card that most California citizens use to get food stamps and other related necessities.

And I have seen a lot of customers from various nationalities. You have to show a lot of patience dealing with every customer especially those who are impatient and demand quick results because they are busy trying to provide food and other necessities to their families. Being friendly with them makes their shopping experience less stressful.

The pay is reasonable -- $11 an hour under the California minimum wage law. And that's a lot of money here compared to the P2,000 I used to earn monthly as a sportswriter.

And since I don't know how to drive yet, I use the Lyft app to go to work. It's only a few dollars since I'm the only passenger.

Don't get me wrong, though, I do miss the life of a sportswriter. But my mother and sister had to make that important move to send me here to California before Donald Trump became president because if my petition wasn't approved in December 2015, coming here would have been very difficult under Trump's immigration policies now.

And I just found out that the house where I used to live in Pasig is being sold by my auntie after her husband died last year. She is going to live with her family in Cebu, meaning that if I were still back there, I would have been homeless.

Not too many people know that even though I was born in the Philippines, I'm not a Filipino citizen. I was born with a Taiwanese passport which has already expired, making it difficult for me to come back to the Philippines because probably, I would have been deported to China.

As I have said before, living abroad does have a lot of sacrifices, such as missing your old job and your old friends. But being in FoodMaxx does have its blessings.

For one, the store manager is a Filipino and there are three other Filipino employees. One of them even talks to me in Tagalog sometimes and I'm beginning to develop some rapport with them.

FoodMaxx is actually part of a major supermarket chain here in California, Save Mart, which also includes Save Mart and Lucky Supermarkets. They have branches all over the state, just like the SM and Save More chain back in the Philippines.

And since it's summer already here in the States, FoodMaxx is expected to hire more employees especially college students who want to work in order to pay for their tuition fees when the new school year starts in September.

When I was a kid living in San Juan, I used to go to the old Unimart with my parents and this was my first supermarket experience. And now that I'm working in a supermarket here in California, this comes full circle for me.