With under three weeks until I leave Brazil for another 6 months my neighbour dropped a bombshell on me! I have been here over 5 months, but he only tells me this now. My sewage pipes run under his property (they have been there since his father built the house, which I bought from him over 7 years ago) and he is planning to built there so I need to relocate them. Unfortunately there is no way I can re-connect to the main sewage pipe (though this is an untreated system) without crossing his property, so my only option is to build a septic tank somewhere on my land. I am more than a little annoyed as over 2 years ago a worker clearing his garden fractured my pipe, and we discussed it at the time and he assured me it was fine to leave the pipe in place as he would never build where it was located, so I paid for it to be repaired!
After 5 days trying to find someone who would construct a septic tank for me (in under 2 weeks!) yesterday evening I finally succeeded! I had to leap out in front of a motorbike ridden by the man who was supposed to come and see me about it at lunchtime the previous day to achieve this - he brought another man round later who will do the job for me.
He kept saying "o senhor sabe o que queres" - "you know what you want", but I kept saying "no, I don't , that why I need you to tell me what I need", and eventually he told me what I needed (the guy who brought him works for the Water Company so between them they worked it out!), and quoted a price ... to dig the hole! I told him I needed a quote for the complete job, explaining also about the time constraint, and I wanted a completed tank, connected up to my house waste pipes. More discussion between them and a revised price, but this excludes any materials - something I find strange is that when you employ any workman here he just charges you for his labour and expertise (well, you assume he has some of the latter!), but everything else you have to order and pay for separately, when I would have thought that he could work a deal with the Builders' Merchant so he collects the discount as well! I know that they will always quote "Gringo" prices, but if I am happy with the quote I never haggle as it is always a fraction of what you would pay "back home" and a lot of the time is probably too low as Maths is not a strong point here - by agreeing to their original price it is unlikely they will come back and try and renegotiate later (and I had a witness this time too!), and generates some goodwill too. We shook on it and he agreed to come back this morning.
8.30 he appears with a "mate", who is a builder, but no tools, and say they are going to measure up and mark it out and start the following day. I say I will need a list of materials so I can make sure they are delivered in good time and they start by saying I need "half a load" of sand (wonder if that will be collected from our river?) and another "half load" of "xarem" (not sure of the spelling, and have no idea what it might be!) - apparently I won't need that much but they only deliver a "half load", or a "full load"! I ask them if they will order that and I will pay for it on arrival, as I have no idea who to order from anyway! We will need some plastic pipes later, but for now they ask me to order 300 bricks and 3 bags of cement, which I do after they leave.
I show them where I think will be a good place for the tank, but explain that I will rely on their expertise in the matter if this location is unsuitable (I want my kitchen waste to also be connected to this so this does limit the location options too as my property is on a steep slope), but they say I have chosen well. First thing they ask if I have something they can clear the area with, like a mattock, so I fetch that, then they ask if I have a machete, so they can cut a measuring stick, and finally ask for some rope so they can measure a circle. The irony of 2 workmen arriving and having to ask for tools is not lost on me! The builder "mate" finally marks out a circle, and they tell me the original guy will be back tomorrow to start, and he assures me it will all be finished by Sunday, which is 4 days away (though I am taking that with a huge pinch of salt!).
Will update this as it progresses.
Circumstances made me move to Brazil in 2009, and I spent 6 months of the year there, and the remaining time in Peru, until 2020 when the Covid hit, trapping me in Peru for 14 months, before I managed to return to the UK, where I now reside permanently. I see the world through slightly rose-tinted glasses, but maybe because I have been fortunate in not suffering too many hardships along the way, and maintaining an optimistic, but realistic outlook on life.
Wednesday 22 February 2017
Sunday 19 February 2017
The Eternal Optimist
Despite having lived in Brazil for the past 7 years I still maintain the very British hope that tradesmen will turn up on time! Yes, I know I shouldn't be so naive after all this time, but I still have ingrained in me the very British notion that you turn up when you say you will. Similarly I still expect a good standard of workmanship - despite being disappointed time after time - one has to live in hope or else wallow in despair!
As I write this I am waiting for a man to come and talk to me about putting a septic tank on my property. A neighbour, who he did the same for, called him up yesterday and he agreed to come to my house, which he knew as he originally installed my sewage system some years ago (before I bought the house), at "mid-day". Now, in a land where very, very few people wear watches, mid-day could just mean "in the afternoon", but my neighbour assured me it would be noon.
There is an added element here in that I leave Brazil in little over 2 weeks, so need to get this work completed before I head to Peru.
You have to look out for them to arrive as unlike many countries where they will come and knock on your door (or ring the doorbell) here (and in Peru, for that matter!) they will stand at the gate and clap, whistle, or possibly call out. Just before 2 pm I heard my name being called, but it was the neighbour who had made the arrangements saying the man could not come that day, but would come Sunday "morning". It is currently 11.30 am and I am still waiting, jumping up at every noise in the street outside!
It got me thinking about my other experiences with workmen here in Brazil, and how in fact almost every one was, in some way, unsatisfactory.
1. When I first bought my house I needed to have some work done - particularly exterior painting, a new front door (the existing one was actually an interior door and was in a very poor state), new access (as the existing one was across a neighbouring property), both pedestrian (which also involved having steps built up to the road) and vehicular, and having some canopies built over several windows that were allowing rain ingress. There is no such thing as Yellow Pages here locally but there were some builders across the road constructing a large wall round a vacant lot there so I spoke to them and they agreed to do my work "part-time", which meant weekends and after they finished each day for an hour or so. I ordered all the materials they said I would need and once it all arrived they got started. I had offered the main builder (they were a team of 4) an "entrada", or deposit, but he said that wouldn't be necessary as they were being paid for the other job so it would be nice to get the money at the end (here you just pay the tradesman for his labour, all other expenses like materials you pay separately).
They started mid-week and the first few days it was fine - until Friday afternoon, when Juvenal asked if I could pay him a little in advance as he needed to buy a big bag of dog-food. I duly obliged - I had after all offered a deposit originally - and he said they would be back on Saturday and would work both then and Sunday. I didn't see them until Monday afternoon (they didn't even work across the road on Monday - it is Market Day here and often is considered a "day off"!) when I was given no explanation, other than one of his "mates" implying he had been too drunk to work! This was the pattern throughout the work, but as progress was being made, and I was in no particular hurry, and was told it was the norm here!
Part of the work required him to sub-contract a carpenter, namely the front door and the canopy supports - and the first day he was here the carpenter took me to the local hardware store to get the hardwood door. He measured them up, looked carefully at all they had to make sure they were "true", and selected one, which I paid for. This was the first example of unsatisfactory! Within 6 months the door started warping - but it was the hinge stile that was warping, pulling the hinge outwards, not the flat plane of the door warping! It means I have to occasionally sand down the opposite side, the lock stile, so it doesn't jam!
About a month after the work was completed one of the canopies also fell off (also done by the same carpenter!), ripping the timber supports out of the wall. When I contacted the builder about repairing it (at my cost, of course) he immediately knew which one had fallen off, as he had queried the fact that the supports were too short! Since he was supervising the work I asked why he didn't say anything at the time, and he just shrugged and said it was the carpenter's responsibility! He also said the man was a little crazy and needed hospitalisation!
2. There must be a thing here with carpenters as I had another strange experience with them. The local radio station was running adverts from 2 new carpenters who had started up a joinery (furniture making) business, so I went along to see them. I particularly wanted a new sink unit for my kitchen, but also some storage shelves for my "spare" (junk") room, and some dis-mountable bunk beds, which could be used as 2 single beds. I carefully drew up scale plans and talked through them with one of the carpenters, and he agreed they would be easy to make using local hardwood, which he assured me was sustainably sourced!
I had asked for 2 one metre shelves, but when I went to collect it they had made 1 two metre shelf! Not a big deal, I suppose, and it fit where I wanted it so no real problem.
The sink unit had to fit into the space the old one was in so when I gave them the drawings had explained that the rear left leg had to be half a centimetre shorter for it to stand level and flush. When I collected (it comes in pieces as they don't have transport so you collect it yourself and re-assemble at home) I asked if they had marked the "short" leg, but he said he didn't know which it would be so had cut the all the same!! The unit is symmetrical - open shelves - so front and back are the same, so all it needed was one leg being cut shorter - something I couldn't do as it is very tough hardwood, so eventually had to have the backing tiles cut so it would fit under them!
The bunk beds!! I wanted standard single bed size, which in Brazil is 88cms (24.5 ins), and my plans clearly showed this. Again the beds were in pieces when I collected them so I put them together at home, and then measured them before going to buy mattresses (in the only shop here that sells them!). I couldn't help noticing that instead of 88cms, the bed was only 84cms across, so asked at the shop if they had 84cm mattresses - he looked at me strangely and said they did 78 and 88 only (78 being child size, common in bunk beds!). As it happened one of the carpenters was in the shop (I hadn't actually seen him before as all my dealings were with the other one),and he said that he had been unsure about my measurements so had come to the shop before they built them and measured up a bunk bed (child sized!) in the shop, but then added a little to that measurement! So my beds are 4cms, or around one and a half inches narrower than the mattresses I bought!
3. The old tiles on my kitchen floor were breaking up and though tiling is something I can easily do, and have done in my guest bedroom, I needed this doing fast as it was the kitchen. So I called my builder and asked if he could do it quickly, and he said it would take 2 days! I stripped the kitchen area, removing everything including the sink (we don't have fitted kitchens so all the units had been free-standing), leaving him an empty space to work in. It didn't take him long to remove the old tiles and start marking out for the new ones I had bought, along with a couple of packets of tile spacers, which he said he didn't need! By the end of the day about half the floor was tiled, though the lines were a little suspect, and he had used a tile saw to cut the adjoining tiles (it is open plan) where the lines got too close together!
The second day he completed the tiling by lunchtime, but said he would return the following day to do the grouting as he needed to go to the hospital now as he had the flu! I didn't see or hear from him for the next 2 days so decided I had to finish the grouting myself, and saw then how badly the tiling had been done! The lines weren't straight, the gaps were all shapes and sizes, and there was even a chipped tile! The grouting didn't take that long and I soon had the kitchen back into a functioning state.
A week later there is a knock at the door - it is his son (who was on the original team with hi when they did the first lot of work), saying that Dad had sent him to finish the job! According to his son he had damaged his back, and had been in hospital, which was why he couldn't come back, and looked surprised when I asked him about the (non-existent!) flu! I told him I had finished the work, though was not happy, but wanted to speak with his father and needed to pay him as well. He did appear 2 days later, shrugged at my complaints about the standard of workmanship, collected his tools - and payment - and left!
(Still no sign of the tradesman I am waiting for, over an hour later!)
As I write this I am waiting for a man to come and talk to me about putting a septic tank on my property. A neighbour, who he did the same for, called him up yesterday and he agreed to come to my house, which he knew as he originally installed my sewage system some years ago (before I bought the house), at "mid-day". Now, in a land where very, very few people wear watches, mid-day could just mean "in the afternoon", but my neighbour assured me it would be noon.
There is an added element here in that I leave Brazil in little over 2 weeks, so need to get this work completed before I head to Peru.
You have to look out for them to arrive as unlike many countries where they will come and knock on your door (or ring the doorbell) here (and in Peru, for that matter!) they will stand at the gate and clap, whistle, or possibly call out. Just before 2 pm I heard my name being called, but it was the neighbour who had made the arrangements saying the man could not come that day, but would come Sunday "morning". It is currently 11.30 am and I am still waiting, jumping up at every noise in the street outside!
It got me thinking about my other experiences with workmen here in Brazil, and how in fact almost every one was, in some way, unsatisfactory.
1. When I first bought my house I needed to have some work done - particularly exterior painting, a new front door (the existing one was actually an interior door and was in a very poor state), new access (as the existing one was across a neighbouring property), both pedestrian (which also involved having steps built up to the road) and vehicular, and having some canopies built over several windows that were allowing rain ingress. There is no such thing as Yellow Pages here locally but there were some builders across the road constructing a large wall round a vacant lot there so I spoke to them and they agreed to do my work "part-time", which meant weekends and after they finished each day for an hour or so. I ordered all the materials they said I would need and once it all arrived they got started. I had offered the main builder (they were a team of 4) an "entrada", or deposit, but he said that wouldn't be necessary as they were being paid for the other job so it would be nice to get the money at the end (here you just pay the tradesman for his labour, all other expenses like materials you pay separately).
They started mid-week and the first few days it was fine - until Friday afternoon, when Juvenal asked if I could pay him a little in advance as he needed to buy a big bag of dog-food. I duly obliged - I had after all offered a deposit originally - and he said they would be back on Saturday and would work both then and Sunday. I didn't see them until Monday afternoon (they didn't even work across the road on Monday - it is Market Day here and often is considered a "day off"!) when I was given no explanation, other than one of his "mates" implying he had been too drunk to work! This was the pattern throughout the work, but as progress was being made, and I was in no particular hurry, and was told it was the norm here!
Part of the work required him to sub-contract a carpenter, namely the front door and the canopy supports - and the first day he was here the carpenter took me to the local hardware store to get the hardwood door. He measured them up, looked carefully at all they had to make sure they were "true", and selected one, which I paid for. This was the first example of unsatisfactory! Within 6 months the door started warping - but it was the hinge stile that was warping, pulling the hinge outwards, not the flat plane of the door warping! It means I have to occasionally sand down the opposite side, the lock stile, so it doesn't jam!
About a month after the work was completed one of the canopies also fell off (also done by the same carpenter!), ripping the timber supports out of the wall. When I contacted the builder about repairing it (at my cost, of course) he immediately knew which one had fallen off, as he had queried the fact that the supports were too short! Since he was supervising the work I asked why he didn't say anything at the time, and he just shrugged and said it was the carpenter's responsibility! He also said the man was a little crazy and needed hospitalisation!
2. There must be a thing here with carpenters as I had another strange experience with them. The local radio station was running adverts from 2 new carpenters who had started up a joinery (furniture making) business, so I went along to see them. I particularly wanted a new sink unit for my kitchen, but also some storage shelves for my "spare" (junk") room, and some dis-mountable bunk beds, which could be used as 2 single beds. I carefully drew up scale plans and talked through them with one of the carpenters, and he agreed they would be easy to make using local hardwood, which he assured me was sustainably sourced!
I had asked for 2 one metre shelves, but when I went to collect it they had made 1 two metre shelf! Not a big deal, I suppose, and it fit where I wanted it so no real problem.
The sink unit had to fit into the space the old one was in so when I gave them the drawings had explained that the rear left leg had to be half a centimetre shorter for it to stand level and flush. When I collected (it comes in pieces as they don't have transport so you collect it yourself and re-assemble at home) I asked if they had marked the "short" leg, but he said he didn't know which it would be so had cut the all the same!! The unit is symmetrical - open shelves - so front and back are the same, so all it needed was one leg being cut shorter - something I couldn't do as it is very tough hardwood, so eventually had to have the backing tiles cut so it would fit under them!
The bunk beds!! I wanted standard single bed size, which in Brazil is 88cms (24.5 ins), and my plans clearly showed this. Again the beds were in pieces when I collected them so I put them together at home, and then measured them before going to buy mattresses (in the only shop here that sells them!). I couldn't help noticing that instead of 88cms, the bed was only 84cms across, so asked at the shop if they had 84cm mattresses - he looked at me strangely and said they did 78 and 88 only (78 being child size, common in bunk beds!). As it happened one of the carpenters was in the shop (I hadn't actually seen him before as all my dealings were with the other one),and he said that he had been unsure about my measurements so had come to the shop before they built them and measured up a bunk bed (child sized!) in the shop, but then added a little to that measurement! So my beds are 4cms, or around one and a half inches narrower than the mattresses I bought!
3. The old tiles on my kitchen floor were breaking up and though tiling is something I can easily do, and have done in my guest bedroom, I needed this doing fast as it was the kitchen. So I called my builder and asked if he could do it quickly, and he said it would take 2 days! I stripped the kitchen area, removing everything including the sink (we don't have fitted kitchens so all the units had been free-standing), leaving him an empty space to work in. It didn't take him long to remove the old tiles and start marking out for the new ones I had bought, along with a couple of packets of tile spacers, which he said he didn't need! By the end of the day about half the floor was tiled, though the lines were a little suspect, and he had used a tile saw to cut the adjoining tiles (it is open plan) where the lines got too close together!
The second day he completed the tiling by lunchtime, but said he would return the following day to do the grouting as he needed to go to the hospital now as he had the flu! I didn't see or hear from him for the next 2 days so decided I had to finish the grouting myself, and saw then how badly the tiling had been done! The lines weren't straight, the gaps were all shapes and sizes, and there was even a chipped tile! The grouting didn't take that long and I soon had the kitchen back into a functioning state.
A week later there is a knock at the door - it is his son (who was on the original team with hi when they did the first lot of work), saying that Dad had sent him to finish the job! According to his son he had damaged his back, and had been in hospital, which was why he couldn't come back, and looked surprised when I asked him about the (non-existent!) flu! I told him I had finished the work, though was not happy, but wanted to speak with his father and needed to pay him as well. He did appear 2 days later, shrugged at my complaints about the standard of workmanship, collected his tools - and payment - and left!
(Still no sign of the tradesman I am waiting for, over an hour later!)
Thursday 9 February 2017
A lucky escape
In 1960 we moved to Luanda, Angola, and I had my 7th birthday not long after we arrived there, my sister being just under 2 years older than me, so was 9 that April. We first lived in a house on the outskirts of Luanda, but due to security worries we moved to a more central location a block back from the sand cliffs called Barrocas.
One day while we were playing in the garden a man in uniform appeared at the gate and asked if he could speak to our mother. Mum came out and he explained that he was in the Portuguese airforce and stationed in Luanda, and he was walking past and heard us speaking English, and wondered if my mother would allow him to spend some time with the family to practice his English, and also as he missed his own family back in Portugal. He was around 30, I guess, and very well spoken, and showed Mum his airforce ID, so she invited him in for a coffee and a chat.
He used to come round once a week or so and we would go for a walk with him round our neighbourhood, usually ending up at the open-air Miramar, cliff-top cinema where he would buy us a Coke. He even took us back to his barracks in the centre of Luanda, and showed us around, promising to take us to see the actual airforce planes one day. It all seemed so innocent back then - he was always polite, always in uniform, always insisted on talking to Mum before we went out with him, and always let her know where we would be going.
One day, however, after we had known him for about a year, he came round and my sister wasn't able to join us - I cannot remember if she was unwell, or staying with friends - so I went with him alone for a walk, an 8 year old with a 30 year old unrelated man! We headed towards the Barrocas, the sandy cliffs, and he took me a little way along a path into the bushes where we had a great view across the bay. He told me he loved to come here for some peace and quiet and to admire the view, but that he also used to bring his "girlfriends" to this spot as it was secluded. He asked me if I knew what he meant by that, and though I was so young I had a very good idea what he was talking about (I had a friend the same age as me who was rather precocious and he had told me a lot of things I probably shouldn't have known about at that age back then, and though I didn't fully understand a lot of it I was aware of what males and females got up to - though not really sure why!). He then went on to tell me that he hoped to bring my sister there one day - who was now 10 years old! He then said he needed to urinate, and while doing it said how hot he was "down there" and how this talk had excited him a little. Nothing further happened (honestly!) and we went home.
Despite my youth and inexperience I knew that I had just witnessed something that was very wrong, so told my parents about it when I got home, who immediately cut off all contact with him. I am not sure if they contacted the airforce, but he never came round again. Looking back I am surprised I had the sense and courage to tell my parents, as I was an extremely shy child, but just knew that it was the right thing to do, and that it probably averted something very serious.
In hindsight It was very foolish to allow a relative "stranger" such access to 2 young children, but back then times were very different and we were not so aware of the dangers of predatory adults, plus he had not shown any indication of other than honourable intentions until that day. I still regard that as a very lucky escape.
One day while we were playing in the garden a man in uniform appeared at the gate and asked if he could speak to our mother. Mum came out and he explained that he was in the Portuguese airforce and stationed in Luanda, and he was walking past and heard us speaking English, and wondered if my mother would allow him to spend some time with the family to practice his English, and also as he missed his own family back in Portugal. He was around 30, I guess, and very well spoken, and showed Mum his airforce ID, so she invited him in for a coffee and a chat.
He used to come round once a week or so and we would go for a walk with him round our neighbourhood, usually ending up at the open-air Miramar, cliff-top cinema where he would buy us a Coke. He even took us back to his barracks in the centre of Luanda, and showed us around, promising to take us to see the actual airforce planes one day. It all seemed so innocent back then - he was always polite, always in uniform, always insisted on talking to Mum before we went out with him, and always let her know where we would be going.
One day, however, after we had known him for about a year, he came round and my sister wasn't able to join us - I cannot remember if she was unwell, or staying with friends - so I went with him alone for a walk, an 8 year old with a 30 year old unrelated man! We headed towards the Barrocas, the sandy cliffs, and he took me a little way along a path into the bushes where we had a great view across the bay. He told me he loved to come here for some peace and quiet and to admire the view, but that he also used to bring his "girlfriends" to this spot as it was secluded. He asked me if I knew what he meant by that, and though I was so young I had a very good idea what he was talking about (I had a friend the same age as me who was rather precocious and he had told me a lot of things I probably shouldn't have known about at that age back then, and though I didn't fully understand a lot of it I was aware of what males and females got up to - though not really sure why!). He then went on to tell me that he hoped to bring my sister there one day - who was now 10 years old! He then said he needed to urinate, and while doing it said how hot he was "down there" and how this talk had excited him a little. Nothing further happened (honestly!) and we went home.
Despite my youth and inexperience I knew that I had just witnessed something that was very wrong, so told my parents about it when I got home, who immediately cut off all contact with him. I am not sure if they contacted the airforce, but he never came round again. Looking back I am surprised I had the sense and courage to tell my parents, as I was an extremely shy child, but just knew that it was the right thing to do, and that it probably averted something very serious.
In hindsight It was very foolish to allow a relative "stranger" such access to 2 young children, but back then times were very different and we were not so aware of the dangers of predatory adults, plus he had not shown any indication of other than honourable intentions until that day. I still regard that as a very lucky escape.
Bakery tales - Part 3
7. Production planning.
Bread baking is not simply mixing a dough, forming it into loaves and baking it off, at least not in a working bakery! Oven capacity, availability of bread tins, differing baking times (rolls need around 25 minutes, tinned bread 35-40) and oven temperatures, and so on all come into the equation.
I used to arrive 15-20 minutes early each shift and go over the production list and work out how we would achieve it most efficiently - the first few doughs were always pretty standard, though the batch size might need increasing or decreasing, but after those it was a balancing act as we needed to recycle trays and tins - sandwich loaf tins and french stick trays especially. So the first mix was always wholemeal and used a lot of sandwich loaf tins, followed by the first French Stick mix. We had sufficient of each for two batches of each at once, but of course the oven could only take one of each so this had to be taken into consideration. French sticks proved faster than sandwich loaves (and baked quicker) so even if made at the same time - Chris did the sticks while I did the sandwich loaves - they would follow each other into the oven. The stick trays were perforated so cooled very quickly too, while the tins needed a little longer before we could put the next batch into them - so throughout the night we alternated doughs so the tins, trays and ovens were always ready and used most effectively. Even so on some nights we were waiting on the sandwich tins for the final dough when numbers were particularly high - for some reason, and despite us asking, the day bakers never made any sandwich loaves so these were always the bulk of the white bread overnight production!
Chris and I had this down to a fine art - we worked at opposite sides of the bakery and I made the doughs and all the tinned bread, as well as some of the French stick production (the stick moulding machine was also near my work station) while Chris handled all the roll production and the speciality bread (we used to make a little Soda Bread, Rye Bread and Cholla Bread) - we rarely had any "spare" time, but since we didn't get paid any overtime we obviously wanted to finish as quickly as possible, while maintaining standards. Our oven guy used to cope brilliantly with everything we threw at him, despite his young years, but would occasionally ask us to slow down a bit, or give him a hand, if the ovens were backing up.
Chris' girlfriend was expecting their first child, and when she went into labour Chris had arranged to take a couple of days off (as there were complications) so the mid-shift baker, Steve, (who only worked a couple of days towards the end of the week - the one who suffered from Psoriasis) came in to cover for him. Unfortunately the second day of this I was taken ill with food poisoning, so had to stay away - and I only found out the following day that Steve's condition also flared up preventing him from working, so Jimmy and Karl had to go in to cover the production.
The next night both Chris and I were back in, and Mark (our packer) and the oven guy (whose name totally escapes me - but it may also have been Mark, or even Mike!!) told us that the previous night had been a fiasco! Karl and Jimmy had looked at the production list and decided the best thing to do was run through each type of bread in order - so they started with 5 batches of roll dough, followed by 4 batches of French Stick dough - and halfway through the sticks - 2 batches complete and in the prover, one divided and resting in trays, and the fourth batch already mixing - realised there weren't enough stick trays (which were specially curved for sticks) to continue! The next dough they put on was the Harvestgrain, which used half the sandwich tins, followed by the first Wholemeal mix, which used the other half - then they put on the second wholemeal, which was all sandwich loaves - and realised that the tins hadn't even gone in the oven yet from the first batch! No problem, on with the first of the white doughs, which was ordinary tinned bread, and some tray loaves (Bloomers), as was the second white dough, followed by the remaining French sticks - leaving .... 4 batches of white sandwich loaves! They still had a Wholegrain sandwich batch to do as well - and since from start to finish a "sandwich" batch took over 2 hours, even allowing for the fact we had 2 sets of tins there was still more than 6 hours of production to do ... and they had already been working for well over 6 hours!
Apparently they spent most of the rest of the (extended) shift standing around in the bakery smoking, waiting for the sandwich tins to come back from the oven, and then placing the next dough in an extremely hot sandwich tin straight out of the oven, and then waiting for the tins to come back again! Mark, the packer, says he was giving them a hard time muttering about lack of bread to pack, "which was never like that normally"! I am not sure if they ever fully realised what a mess they had made, or whether it made them appreciate what "proper" bakers could do in a night shift!
8. Suspended for not working on your day off!
I applied for an assistant foreman job at a large bakery in the South of England. The interview they requested that the spouse attended as accommodation was offered as part of the package, which was over one of their many shops - all senior staff were provided with rent-free accommodation (more of that later!). We were shown a 3 bed-roomed flat which was quite nice, and the area appeared reasonable even though the shop was in a precinct.
Following the initial interview I was invited back for a week-long trial at their factory. I had to take time off from my current job, and drove down - they had arranged Bed and Breakfast accommodation for me for the week (at their expense). I arrived early for my first shift (which was overnight) and the Production Manager explained to me, in the presence of the Foreman, that no-one, except the Foreman, knew the real reason for my trial - just that I was there for the week and would be trying out various jobs.
The first night I met several of the workers, who all eyed me with a little suspicion, but I spent the night working with the Foreman, who explained a lot about the business and the way it worked. He also told me something about many of the other bakers, including one, Steve, who used to be the Foreman, but had stepped down due to the pressures of the job, and was now simply a baker, albeit a senior one. At one stage I worked with him for a while and found him to be a very pleasant man, though he admitted he knew I was there being assessed for the assistant foreman role! He asked if I was taking staff housing and warned me that once I was in free housing they would expect a lot more commitment from me. He was still in free housing and said that they regularly called him in to work extra shifts (for overtime pay) or to extend his hours, due to illness of another baker. The implicit threat was that if he didn't comply they would take his accommodation away!
The bakers had an informal arrangement that one baker would get an extra day off each week (we worked 6 days out of 7 normally) and the others covered the extra work. It was agreed with the Foreman, and the Production Manager was also aware of it and "approved". The second night I arrived for work to find that the Foreman had called in sick! Steve took charge and sorted me out with work for the night, even though he was not officially "management" any more, but he also explained that the bakery more or less ran itself and didn't require that much supervision unless things went wrong!!
The production manager had been appraised of the situation and came in around midnight, whereupon he told Steve that he would have to take charge for the remainder of the week. Steve reminded him he was no longer a Foreman, and that he had the following night off (it was his turn that week to get the extra day off). The Manager raised his voice and told Steve that he would have to give that up this week, and reminded him that he had a responsibility to step up! He then called him to the office. About half an hour later Steve came back - "I have been suspended", he says, "For refusing to give up my day off, and for refusing to stand in as the foreman, so I have been given a week's suspension without pay!" He was furious and was refusing to accept this - it would be a formal black mark on his perfect record, and he felt it was totally unjustified. So he continued working, but asked me if I really wanted to work for a company that treated its workers like this!
About half an hour later the Manager came through - "What are you still doing here?" he demanded. Steve told him he was not accepting the suspension as it was unfair, and with the Foreman absent we needed all the workers we had. Eventually he had to leave, though said he was consulting a solicitor about it in the morning! The manager allocated me different work and he, too, left.
The following night we still had no Foreman, and no Steve, so I floated around going to whichever workstation needed help. Quite a few of the other bakers commented on the fact that this was common practice with employees who had staff accommodation, as the company felt they now "owned" them and could treat them how they liked!
The week continued in a similar vein, but the manager had asked me to go in to see him a little early on the final night to talk over my week there. At that stage he was noncommittal about how he felt things had gone, but he apologised for the way the week had panned out without supervision, and admitted that it was not the best of situations for a trial! I must admit that part of me wondered if it had been stage-managed, to see how I would react, and whether I would try and take charge, but as I had been told not to let anyone know I was being assessed for the assistant foreman role (as "there were others here also in the reckoning"), I was uncertain as to how I should have reacted.
I didn't get the job, and I do feel that I "dodged a bullet" there!
Bread baking is not simply mixing a dough, forming it into loaves and baking it off, at least not in a working bakery! Oven capacity, availability of bread tins, differing baking times (rolls need around 25 minutes, tinned bread 35-40) and oven temperatures, and so on all come into the equation.
I used to arrive 15-20 minutes early each shift and go over the production list and work out how we would achieve it most efficiently - the first few doughs were always pretty standard, though the batch size might need increasing or decreasing, but after those it was a balancing act as we needed to recycle trays and tins - sandwich loaf tins and french stick trays especially. So the first mix was always wholemeal and used a lot of sandwich loaf tins, followed by the first French Stick mix. We had sufficient of each for two batches of each at once, but of course the oven could only take one of each so this had to be taken into consideration. French sticks proved faster than sandwich loaves (and baked quicker) so even if made at the same time - Chris did the sticks while I did the sandwich loaves - they would follow each other into the oven. The stick trays were perforated so cooled very quickly too, while the tins needed a little longer before we could put the next batch into them - so throughout the night we alternated doughs so the tins, trays and ovens were always ready and used most effectively. Even so on some nights we were waiting on the sandwich tins for the final dough when numbers were particularly high - for some reason, and despite us asking, the day bakers never made any sandwich loaves so these were always the bulk of the white bread overnight production!
Chris and I had this down to a fine art - we worked at opposite sides of the bakery and I made the doughs and all the tinned bread, as well as some of the French stick production (the stick moulding machine was also near my work station) while Chris handled all the roll production and the speciality bread (we used to make a little Soda Bread, Rye Bread and Cholla Bread) - we rarely had any "spare" time, but since we didn't get paid any overtime we obviously wanted to finish as quickly as possible, while maintaining standards. Our oven guy used to cope brilliantly with everything we threw at him, despite his young years, but would occasionally ask us to slow down a bit, or give him a hand, if the ovens were backing up.
Chris' girlfriend was expecting their first child, and when she went into labour Chris had arranged to take a couple of days off (as there were complications) so the mid-shift baker, Steve, (who only worked a couple of days towards the end of the week - the one who suffered from Psoriasis) came in to cover for him. Unfortunately the second day of this I was taken ill with food poisoning, so had to stay away - and I only found out the following day that Steve's condition also flared up preventing him from working, so Jimmy and Karl had to go in to cover the production.
The next night both Chris and I were back in, and Mark (our packer) and the oven guy (whose name totally escapes me - but it may also have been Mark, or even Mike!!) told us that the previous night had been a fiasco! Karl and Jimmy had looked at the production list and decided the best thing to do was run through each type of bread in order - so they started with 5 batches of roll dough, followed by 4 batches of French Stick dough - and halfway through the sticks - 2 batches complete and in the prover, one divided and resting in trays, and the fourth batch already mixing - realised there weren't enough stick trays (which were specially curved for sticks) to continue! The next dough they put on was the Harvestgrain, which used half the sandwich tins, followed by the first Wholemeal mix, which used the other half - then they put on the second wholemeal, which was all sandwich loaves - and realised that the tins hadn't even gone in the oven yet from the first batch! No problem, on with the first of the white doughs, which was ordinary tinned bread, and some tray loaves (Bloomers), as was the second white dough, followed by the remaining French sticks - leaving .... 4 batches of white sandwich loaves! They still had a Wholegrain sandwich batch to do as well - and since from start to finish a "sandwich" batch took over 2 hours, even allowing for the fact we had 2 sets of tins there was still more than 6 hours of production to do ... and they had already been working for well over 6 hours!
Apparently they spent most of the rest of the (extended) shift standing around in the bakery smoking, waiting for the sandwich tins to come back from the oven, and then placing the next dough in an extremely hot sandwich tin straight out of the oven, and then waiting for the tins to come back again! Mark, the packer, says he was giving them a hard time muttering about lack of bread to pack, "which was never like that normally"! I am not sure if they ever fully realised what a mess they had made, or whether it made them appreciate what "proper" bakers could do in a night shift!
8. Suspended for not working on your day off!
I applied for an assistant foreman job at a large bakery in the South of England. The interview they requested that the spouse attended as accommodation was offered as part of the package, which was over one of their many shops - all senior staff were provided with rent-free accommodation (more of that later!). We were shown a 3 bed-roomed flat which was quite nice, and the area appeared reasonable even though the shop was in a precinct.
Following the initial interview I was invited back for a week-long trial at their factory. I had to take time off from my current job, and drove down - they had arranged Bed and Breakfast accommodation for me for the week (at their expense). I arrived early for my first shift (which was overnight) and the Production Manager explained to me, in the presence of the Foreman, that no-one, except the Foreman, knew the real reason for my trial - just that I was there for the week and would be trying out various jobs.
The first night I met several of the workers, who all eyed me with a little suspicion, but I spent the night working with the Foreman, who explained a lot about the business and the way it worked. He also told me something about many of the other bakers, including one, Steve, who used to be the Foreman, but had stepped down due to the pressures of the job, and was now simply a baker, albeit a senior one. At one stage I worked with him for a while and found him to be a very pleasant man, though he admitted he knew I was there being assessed for the assistant foreman role! He asked if I was taking staff housing and warned me that once I was in free housing they would expect a lot more commitment from me. He was still in free housing and said that they regularly called him in to work extra shifts (for overtime pay) or to extend his hours, due to illness of another baker. The implicit threat was that if he didn't comply they would take his accommodation away!
The bakers had an informal arrangement that one baker would get an extra day off each week (we worked 6 days out of 7 normally) and the others covered the extra work. It was agreed with the Foreman, and the Production Manager was also aware of it and "approved". The second night I arrived for work to find that the Foreman had called in sick! Steve took charge and sorted me out with work for the night, even though he was not officially "management" any more, but he also explained that the bakery more or less ran itself and didn't require that much supervision unless things went wrong!!
The production manager had been appraised of the situation and came in around midnight, whereupon he told Steve that he would have to take charge for the remainder of the week. Steve reminded him he was no longer a Foreman, and that he had the following night off (it was his turn that week to get the extra day off). The Manager raised his voice and told Steve that he would have to give that up this week, and reminded him that he had a responsibility to step up! He then called him to the office. About half an hour later Steve came back - "I have been suspended", he says, "For refusing to give up my day off, and for refusing to stand in as the foreman, so I have been given a week's suspension without pay!" He was furious and was refusing to accept this - it would be a formal black mark on his perfect record, and he felt it was totally unjustified. So he continued working, but asked me if I really wanted to work for a company that treated its workers like this!
About half an hour later the Manager came through - "What are you still doing here?" he demanded. Steve told him he was not accepting the suspension as it was unfair, and with the Foreman absent we needed all the workers we had. Eventually he had to leave, though said he was consulting a solicitor about it in the morning! The manager allocated me different work and he, too, left.
The following night we still had no Foreman, and no Steve, so I floated around going to whichever workstation needed help. Quite a few of the other bakers commented on the fact that this was common practice with employees who had staff accommodation, as the company felt they now "owned" them and could treat them how they liked!
The week continued in a similar vein, but the manager had asked me to go in to see him a little early on the final night to talk over my week there. At that stage he was noncommittal about how he felt things had gone, but he apologised for the way the week had panned out without supervision, and admitted that it was not the best of situations for a trial! I must admit that part of me wondered if it had been stage-managed, to see how I would react, and whether I would try and take charge, but as I had been told not to let anyone know I was being assessed for the assistant foreman role (as "there were others here also in the reckoning"), I was uncertain as to how I should have reacted.
I didn't get the job, and I do feel that I "dodged a bullet" there!
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