Why I hated being Unemployed

I've been unemployed for most of my adult life, and the worst thing about being unemployed is having to go to this stupid job centre. If you don't know what the job centre is, it's basically a place that you go to and they give you money if you don't have a job, which kind of makes you think to yourself, what's the point in getting a job if they're going to give me money anyway? The first time I went to the job centre was 11 years ago when I was 18, and my mum dropped me off there. I had this conversation with this lady called Carol, who was this slim middle-aged woman who had Short blonde hair, and she was very nice and friendly. She talked to me about what kind of job I would like to do, and I said I wouldn't mind doing anything. So she went onto her computer, and she quickly found me a job as a kitchen assistant in this pub. She phoned them up, said that she had this guy, me, who's looking for a job, and she set up an interview. And I went to the interview, and I got the job. I worked there for nearly two years as a kitchen assistant, and that's that's mainly where I learnt most of my cooking skills. After working there for about two years, I finally quit that job, and I changed jobs and I started working at my dad's company, my dad's office, for a few months before going to Japan for the first time. After I came back from Japan for the first time, I found it very difficult to find another job because I lived in the countryside and I didn't have any qualifications. I couldn't drive, I didn't have any skills, and it's very difficult to find a job if you don't have any of those things. As soon as a new job opens up, a new job vacancy opens up somewhere, hundreds of people apply for that same job. And if you can't drive and you don't have experience or qualifications, then it's very difficult to actually find a job. So when I came back from Japan for the first time, I signed back onto the Job Centre for unemployment benefits straight away, and they tried to find me a job. They sent me to a few interviews, which I went to, but I didn't get the jobs at any of those places, and they couldn't find me anything, and I couldn't find myself anything. And after a few months, they started to treat me differently. When you first start going to the job center, they're really friendly and nice. And then after a few months pass, they start to treat you like you're a naughty school kid. They start talking to you in this condescending, patronizing way, and I couldn't take it anymore. So I went back to Japan for a second time, and I managed to find a job in Japan in a convenience store. I went to Japan on the working holiday visa. That was how I was able to work in Japan, and I was supposed to stay in Japan for a whole year, but I couldn't take working at the convenience store anymore. It was driving me crazy. and I didn't want to teach English. So after about 5 months, I left Japan and I went to Korea for the first time. And then when I came back home to England, I couldn't find a job again, so I had to go back to the job center and sign up for unemployment benefits. From 2012 until 2016, I was unemployed and I couldn't find a job, and I was stuck in this cycle of going to Japan, coming back home, going to the job center, and then going back to Japan, then coming back home, and then going to the job center. And this repeated itself year after year. They made me go on all of these stupid courses where I had to learn how to write a CV or learn how to do interviews. And they sent me to one course which lasted for about 12 weeks. I had to go to this college and it was 5 days a week, 9 o'clock in the morning until 3 o'clock in the afternoon. And every single day we had to learn how to write our CVs and do job searches. And it was so boring. I had this personal advisor at the job center called Pauline, and I hated her so much. She kept complaining about everything. She kept whinging about my CV. She kept nitpicking tiny details saying, why is this like this? Why is this underlined? Why is this in capital letters? This should be here, this should be there. And then she accused me of not looking for a job properly because I kept going to Japan. She said, why do you keep going to Japan every year when you're supposed to be looking for a job? What is she, my mother? And then she tried to put me on this work trial where I had to work at McDonald's for 40 hours a week without pay. And I said, how come I don't get paid? And she said, you are getting paid, you're getting your unemployment benefits, which is like $500 a month. I'm not working 40 hours a week. For $500 a month? People in third-world countries get paid better than that. So I refused to go, and I went back to Japan for a third time. And when I came back home, I had to go to the job center again, and guess who was waiting there for me? Bloody Pauline! She said, Hey Daniel, how was Japan this time? And I said, Yeah, it was pretty good. And straight away, she put me on this stupid 6-week course where I had to learn how to write CVs, and I had to learn interview techniques, and I had to learn how to do job searches. It was so boring. The instructor was just spouting out all this rubbish that I've heard 100 times before when I went to another course which was just like this. And I didn't even listen to what he was saying. I just sat there in the classroom drawing pictures on pieces of paper, doodling. And the instructor saw me drawing and not paying any attention, and he got kind of upset. He said, Daniel, can I talk to you outside for a bit? And he took me to another classroom and we had a private chat, and he said, Don't you think it's kind of rude that I'm trying to teach you something and you're not paying any attention? You're just doodling the whole time. Yeah, I guess that is pretty rude. And then he said, Daniel, would you like to go home? And I said, Yes, I would like to go home. So he sent me home. And then the next week I went back to the job center and bloody Pauline started whinging again. She said, she said, Daniel, I got a phone call from the instructor and he said you weren't paying attention during class. And I said, I know, that's because he wasn't saying anything. that I didn't know already, and I refused to go back to the course, back to the class. So bloody Pauline decided to put sanctions on my unemployment benefits, which means I don't get any money for a few months. So I decided to go back to Japan. I did manage to finally find a job in 2016, which is when I got the petrol station job, and I worked there for nearly a year. I just hated the whole job centre experience so much. They treated you like you were scum. They were hopeless at helping you find a job. They couldn't even set up interviews apart from That first time with Carol. They kept sending me on these stupid courses which were just a waste of time and didn't help me in any way. And they kept trying to send me on these work trials where they wouldn't actually pay you money apart from the unemployment benefits. And you couldn't refuse the work trial because if you refused, they would put sanctions on your benefits. So you had no choice. It was like being forced to do slave labor at some place like McDonald's or KFC or Pizza Hut. And they wouldn't even pay you a wage or anything. You would just get your unemployment benefits, which you were getting anyway. Look up, look at me. Air for me, dai. We're in a shopping, shopping mall now, doing some shopping. And we're going to do some more shopping when she comes out of the toilet. We just had some juice and snacks over there, and now we're going to do more shopping. It's been 5 minutes, she still hasn't come out of the toilet. That's not her. We're going to buy a tiny plate and we're also going to buy shampoo. I think that's it. It's a Coca-Cola shop. Coca-Cola Museum. Lots of Coca-Cola. Hey, and welcome back to Cooking with Daniel. Today we're going to be making a simple pork and green pepper stir-fry. We have some Rock salt that we're going to sprinkle in for seasoning. And it's a very easy dish to make. You just cut up some pork, some green peppers, and you fry it in the frying pan. And we also have some black pepper, and then we're going to stir it around in the frying pan. Just wait until it goes golden brown, then you know it's cooked.