Weekends in Book Five: Working Through the Maze 2018

I am going to be far happier when Work doesn’t get to claim any of my Weekend time! I did get to hang with friends a bit. I did watch the first two full seasons of Dragon Ball Z abridged. I did get Skyrim down to a single remaining DLC trophy. But a lot of that came at my inability to sleep past 4 am… and the fact that (sat) I was getting texts from work until 11.
ALL of them in Chinese. I mean, I get it… this is Chinese New Year and the Chinese staff and I are expected to do a shit ton of events but… seriously? Maybe I am the asshole but… United States Event… United States Firm… English speaker involved in the event… the Chinese staff speak at least SOME English (a right lot more than I speak Chinese!) So… why communicate exclusively in bloody Chinese that I then need to translate?

But then, that is the right heart of it, isn’t it? Like the Sunday Event. I am a (1) white, (2) English speaking (3) attorney who has already quit the firm. YET they send me an hour away on a Sunday evening to an event I don’t get paid for where everyone speaks Chinese. So… when I arrive, I spend 15 minutes looking for the translator they were supposed to have for me. An Iowa Native in Iowa at the mercy of 150 Chinese Students who all “have plans to live and work in China, so they don’t understand English well”.

Again I ask.... WHY did they send the Iowa Native who has mastered English, struggles with Spanish, dabbles in German and French, and prefer sub-Anime.... at no point in that does it seem like a good idea to send me instead of one of our Chinese speakers.

About that, though, another great reason to bail? They terminated the Part Timer. The Iowa attorney I went to high school with that lived in China and is fluent in Chinese..... they fired him. He graduated from law school a year before all of us and had more connection with the Iowa/Chinese community than I will ever be capable of. And they fired him. Reasons?
White Boss: He just doesn’t have enough trial experience.
Chinese Boss: He wasn’t picking up Immigration as fast as she wanted him to.

Uhm… he’d been here less than a month… and unlike me when I started, has actually had to immigrate before!

And as for trial practice? When you let him go, you still had me. Do you really need 3 attorneys doing Criminal Law practice in a primarily Immigrant-focused firm? Are you crazy? You need (first and foremost) attorneys that can COMMUNICATE WITH THE CLIENTS! I don’t know why that seemingly simple and obvious point is still so elusive to them.

6 more weeks remaining.