AND NOW… THE NEWS

20.05.04

We are not working today! We are good-for-nothing! Really! It is the Ascencion of Christ today and we have festivities here at Vrilissia. So I sit here all quiet and write, relieved after Penelope’s comment. It is good to know that your voice is heard when you decide to scream or whisper.
You are not going to believe this. Television is after me. Really. I had absolutely no word with anyone. I was sitting at my little desk and was waiting for another 10 minutes before I could get off work. The mobile phone rang. They are calling me from Mega Channel, to talk from the position of an employee who works on a definite contract despite the governmental announcements for a switch of such contracts to indefinite ones.

And this happens precisely because the minister in charge decided to exempt from the procedure all the people with a disability who work based on contracts of the Organization for the Employment of the Workforce –protected by the Law 2643, according to which the hiring employer is subsidized by the OEW, on the condition that he/she keeps you in the company for 4 years (without subsidy for the 4th year). – I belong to this category of employees and I can’t seem to understand how come we are exempted from the procedure of making employees permanent.

The National Confederation of People with a Disability raised objections regarding the minister’s decision and is prepared to appeal to the State Council. This is going to be a good step, there is no doubt about that. The point is that our dear colleagues looked for an employee who would say things from his point of view. Well, I don’t figure out how come they always end up asking me for these kinds of things, which definitely honours me but makes me feel sick too. I told you, I don’t want to take up tasks that appertain to a saviour; the same goes for situations that are indeed of my business. On the other hand, if they don’t find anyone else to talk about those things, then I will feel terrible for not having done everything I could to help a group of people to whom I belong. In short, fame comes at a price, right?
For that reason, I told them to come at 3 o’ clock in the afternoon to my place. I leave you now, I need to relax a bit. You will watch me on the news… again. You bet there will be loads of hemming and hawing!…

BLAH, BLAH, BLAH…


So they came for the interview, during which I was asked about my personal opinion on the situation. Things were all right until that point. I was asked to describe my working conditions. Things were all right until that point as well. Then there came a series of questions like ‘tell us about yourself’ and stuff like that… How come they don’t understand that this does not concern only me but ALL the people with a disability?

All right, I know that the media intend to make things personal but I am not going to play this game! This is why I generalised the content of the conversation and did not allow myself to accept any further stupid questions. I ended up talking all by myself and was utterly stressed, because every second of silence was endless, to my mind.

When I asked the interviewer what she thought of my words, she said: ‘I guess you wrote very good essays at school’…
No way. My teacher, Mrs. Alexopoulou, filled my notebook with remarks written in red ink. She had said that I would blow it in the Panhellenic exams. She was the one who blew it in the end. Don’t you think?
P.S.: My father went to take the dog’s lead for a walk. He had forgotten the dog and came back to pick him up… Isn’t he unbelievable?