2865. Summer work © Bruce Goodman 5 October 2023

Niruben’s excitement lasted only for a short time. She had been given a work permit for the summer and after a week of picking apples her back had given up. Her intention was to make a heap of money and send it back home to her country. But now she had barely enough to live on. She needed a job that might go easy on her back. An opportunity came to be a waitress at a diner. It was a particularly up-market diner (who would have thought there was such a thing?) Niruben had an advantage in her application. They wanted someone who could speak Hindi. Her acceptance was almost a certainty. A reply came in the mail: Thank you for your application. The successful applicant has been accepted and notified. We had 327 applications. In desperation Niruben went to the nearby highly-regarded Industrial Research Centre. Perhaps they might want someone to clean the labs or something. She was employed immediately. It’s not every day that someone with a doctorate (Summa cum laude) in Nuclear Physics applies for a cleaning job. She fully intends to “work her way up”. Contact Author Back to Index Next Story Previous Story