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ntropy
Joined: 11 Oct 2003 Posts: 671 Location: ghurba
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Posted: Fri Apr 27, 2007 1:00 pm Post subject: |
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When are the London interviews? |
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qtfriend2all
Joined: 27 Mar 2007 Posts: 9
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Posted: Mon Apr 30, 2007 5:01 am Post subject: Still here! |
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Hey all, I'm still here but for some reason Dave's doesn't update me when there's a reply to this topic. Feel free to post to me or PM at will. |
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qtfriend2all
Joined: 27 Mar 2007 Posts: 9
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Posted: Mon Apr 30, 2007 5:24 am Post subject: |
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Sheikh N Bake wrote: |
I am offered an interview in London through Wood Group for EG. They mention the salary as $300/day plus all expenses including food and rotation tickets back to the home of record. They say that's 195 days or about $59,000. The rotation is four weeks on and four off. That doesn't sound too bad. Is the job 12 hours a day seven days a week or what? |
From what I've been told, and after receiving my contract, it will be 10 hours a day with 6 hours teaching and the rest doing office/planning things. It's 6 days a week and they may have you work more hours depending on what targets they have to meet.
For the job I think you applied for, that one is more specific and tough because the students have to test at certain intervals and if students are meeting the targets, I guess it spells bad things for you. They interviewed me for that position but then offered me a position teaching General English where there apparently aren't those kinds of demands (I'm assuming because of my teaching experience which right now is just 3 years and a teaching license from the States). I'm not 100% sure if your tentative position is the same one I'm thinking of but I'm pretty sure. However the job I am talking about had the 6 week on/3 week off rotation so maybe I am talking about different positions, or perhaps they changed it.
Sorry it took me so long to respond, Dave's hasn't been updating me when responses were received. |
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globalnomad2
Joined: 23 Jul 2005 Posts: 562
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Posted: Mon Apr 30, 2007 11:07 am Post subject: |
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Thanks for that! It sounds like job security is a tough prospect. Then, if you're traveling every other month, even if tickets are provided I imagine it will be hard not to spend half your money. Another thing...I heard previously that EG antimalarial protocols are extremely tough and unpleasant...have you heard that? |
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qtfriend2all
Joined: 27 Mar 2007 Posts: 9
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Posted: Mon Apr 30, 2007 11:33 am Post subject: |
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globalnomad2 wrote: |
Thanks for that! It sounds like job security is a tough prospect. Then, if you're traveling every other month, even if tickets are provided I imagine it will be hard not to spend half your money. Another thing...I heard previously that EG antimalarial protocols are extremely tough and unpleasant...have you heard that? |
Well I'm thinking the job's pretty secure considering the undesireability (is that even a word?) of the location, but never say never. They told me that it's initially for 6 months but they want us to stay for a whole year, so we'll see.
I'll be going home on my vacations so spending the money like wild shouldn't be a problem for me, plus I'm disciplined!
From what I had to sign in my contract, I am required to take anti-malarial drugs while I am on-site until a certain time after I leave for my vacations. A few days before coming back I start again. Now the one thing is that they require you to sign a form stating you will take the anti-malarial drugs and agree to be urine tested to make sure you are taking them so it's really serious business. In terms of the drugs themselves, from what I've researched the best one I'll have is Malarone which has the least amount of side effects (headaches and nausea as opposed to super light sensitivity and psychotic dreams with the others). So I'll see how that pans out too.
One thing that sucks is I can't seem to get any information on expats actually working there. I've literally scoured hundreds of websites and of course found all the information on the "regime" they have in power and the money laundering scandals etc etc. Everyone says it's a hell to work in but this is not anyone who's actually at the site itself. Frustrated cannot begin to describe me at this point. |
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nodster
Joined: 13 Jan 2007 Posts: 8
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Posted: Mon Apr 30, 2007 1:25 pm Post subject: |
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globalnomad2 wrote: |
Thanks for that! It sounds like job security is a tough prospect. |
Not really. I don't suppose the students are particularly sophisticated, and I don't suppose the students can walk down the hall and get the teacher fired if they're not satisfied.
Both of these conditions - students that can and do judge lesson quality, and students who have influence with the managment who in turn have total power over the educational contracting company - apply widely in the Gulf.
Apart from the malaria pills - the job sounds a cakewalk quite honestly. |
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globalnomad2
Joined: 23 Jul 2005 Posts: 562
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Posted: Fri May 04, 2007 6:17 pm Post subject: |
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Thanks for that! Headaches and nausea? Hhhhmmmm. I don't know that I would find that an acceptable trade-off. Maybe if the symptoms were mild and short-lived. |
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aharbut
Joined: 12 Jan 2006 Posts: 19 Location: Arizona,USA
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Posted: Sat Oct 20, 2007 7:11 pm Post subject: Wood Group |
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Went through this interview and don't think this late comment is even valuable any more but I found the director and the whole program extremely rigid and definitely looked like the type of person I wld definitely NOT want to work with. If you'd like details, I'll be glad to go do into details. Am still waiting for reimbursement for small expenses incurred.
The whole project sounded like a prison. |
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bdbarnett1
Joined: 27 Apr 2003 Posts: 178 Location: Phnom Penh, Cambodia
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Posted: Sun Oct 21, 2007 5:49 am Post subject: Re: Wood Group |
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aharbut wrote: |
Went through this interview and don't think this late comment is even valuable any more but I found the director and the whole program extremely rigid and definitely looked like the type of person I wld definitely NOT want to work with. If you'd like details, I'll be glad to go do into details. Am still waiting for reimbursement for small expenses incurred.
The whole project sounded like a prison. |
I'm interested in what you have to say...I tried to PM you but I don't have 25 posts yet!
I'm also seriously consider the rotation scheme, as my wife is not ready quite yet for a full-blown move abroad, but is open to it in the future. Makes more money than I currently make, as well. Not to mention I am fluent in Spanish, passable in French, and have been interested in EG for years, especially its indigenous languages. I realize that working 6 days a week doesn't give much time for talking to learning Fang, but that's what those 4-week off rotations are for |
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aharbut
Joined: 12 Jan 2006 Posts: 19 Location: Arizona,USA
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Posted: Sun Oct 21, 2007 8:16 pm Post subject: EG -- too much to be desired |
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That Broussard guy who did the interview (what a waste to hv people fly all the way to a fancy hotel in Detroit for a 2 hr. interview that cld easily hv been done by phone) was so out to impress me on how he so cleverly figured out that the project wld need pencils and how he so cleverly figured out how to order them. Wow! Then he said that if a student scored 99.9d% in all the other courses he wld be taking and only 69.5% in his ESL--70 being the cutoff--they wld still dump him. The other two interviewers in the room and I all blanched at the same time.
After he went on and on about the extra special copier they wld be getting, he later went on to say it was positively NOT for use by tchrs and nothing but nothing cld be copied--not even out of books designed TO BE COPIED-games, etc. (They were not planing to use any "game"-books.)He also made it sound as if any mingling w/ those "folks" on the "other end of the island" was not encouraged. All in all, I was sure I wld've done him some bodily harm at the end of a cple wks HAD I been hired. Super rigid.
The facilities sounded army barracks-style and I wld bet that when you were gone, someone else wld be using your rm. Coming bk to the US through that many time zones wld tk you a wk to recover from--going east is easier. Doing it every month wld probably having me baying at the moon at some point.
That job sounded like a real blood letter. I did a similar set up in India but that was infinitely better than anything the EG had to offer and they weren't an $OIL$ company.
Best cut my losses. |
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allons-y
Joined: 02 Jun 2007 Posts: 1
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Posted: Sun Dec 30, 2007 11:42 pm Post subject: EG - Too much to be desired |
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aharbut..........I just read your post. I, too, was in Detroit for an interview and agree with everything you say. That Broussard was so full of himself talking about how they could not have hired a better man for the job (himself) and generally stroked himself for 20 minutes before he 'laid down the law' for teachers. No Internet, no going off the compound, etc., etc. He even said that he has access (and we wouldn't) to shipments that come in, including fresh lobster, but that he MAY invite us on occasion. What a jerk. I totally couldn't wait to get the hell out of there.
Re: teaching. In effect, one would job share. You would briefly confer with the other teacher while you were on your way out and the other teacher was just arriving for his/her 30 days. He admitted this is where they have had problems. You can imagine the problems that would arise from this system.
This job was definitely a good one to pass over. |
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Insubordination
Joined: 07 Nov 2007 Posts: 394 Location: Sydney
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Posted: Mon Dec 31, 2007 12:21 am Post subject: |
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*Insert inappropriate and untimely rant8
It i* a prison. I seriously doubt you'd be allowed to step foot in the country itself. I saw a documentary on it (made with a smuggled camera) and the cities look like rubbish dmps as the corrupt dictatorship (who banked for Pinochet) doesn't spend a cent of infraestructure.
I worked with the (tiny) EG Olympic team as a Spanish interpreter and a tighter rein was never kept on anyone. Well, maybe the Cubans.
Still, many of us probably have cars filled with their oil as our countries seem to be OK with this particular dictator and buy it. |
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biffinbridge
Joined: 05 May 2003 Posts: 701 Location: Frank's Wild Years
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Posted: Tue Jan 01, 2008 9:07 am Post subject: the enigma... |
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I had an interview for this post in January 2007. I was not offered a job. First job I haven't got got after an interview. Loads of experience, still in my 30's, done oil rotations, soon off to do another 6 and 3er.
I have absolutely no idea what kind of teachers they are looking for as everyone I know who has had the interview has failed and many have pm ed me on Dave's having failed. The only person to contact me actually with Marathon Oil was a teacher with very little experience.
40% tax taken in EG...gotta be some kind of 'baqsheesh'.
Oh yeah, btw I found the British interviewer, (in London), really anal. |
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junkmail
Joined: 19 Dec 2004 Posts: 377
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Posted: Tue Jan 01, 2008 11:51 am Post subject: |
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If the Devil had a home it would be Bukavu, if he had a summerhouse it would be in Bata.
Rotation work has it's benefits though. Enjoy your 4 off with your 'hard earned' cash and keep your wits about you and your sanity while your in EG; easier said than done. |
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globalnomad2
Joined: 23 Jul 2005 Posts: 562
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Posted: Sun Jun 08, 2008 12:09 pm Post subject: |
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never mind!
Last edited by globalnomad2 on Mon Jun 09, 2008 3:08 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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