Of course you're sneezing, there's parsnip up your nose!

The title refers to an incident this afternoon when my sister was feeding my niece some nice mashed parsnip. It's difficult to feed H. so KT just let her paddle around in the bowl of clay-consistency-ed parsnip and hoped that like everything else that H. plays with it would end up in her mouth. Because H. lacks much manual dexterity she got parsnip all over her face, which irritated her and caused her to try and rub it off using her hands which were covered in more parsnip and she ended up spreading it further over her face and yes, up her nose. I wasn't watching at this point so when my sister said:
"Of course you're sneezing, there's parsnip up your nose!"
in a slightly exasperated "I-told-you-so" type voice to someone who doesn't speak/understand words, I found it noteworthy.

So, the job that I worked Monday and Tuesday was not nearly as bad as I made it sound. It was just definitely NOT what I was expecting or would have chosen.

My job was in the canteen of the Cambridge physics lab building. The canteen is almost identical to every other college dining hall, only 1) English 2) It served faculty and construction workers from a nearby site as well as students. I was a caterers assistant, which translates to "doer-of-bitch-work".
I was outfitted first thing with a white lab coat and a paper hat (better than a hairnet, but only slightly). Every person that I came into contact with fobbed me off onto someone else so I spent both days skulking in corners and trying to look busy while asking people if there were any jobs that needed doing, while they efficiently and busily went about their own work. I was working with 3 other women behind the counter (the chefs were all British men) and we were all immigrants of some sort. Milly was from Poland, Sylvia was from somewhere in Africa (judging by her accent and African looks, of course I may be making a horrible assumption and she actually is a 4th generation Swede) and Phang (Phan? Fan? Fang?) was from somewhere in Asia (again, judging from her thick accent and Asian looks, and again possibly an nth generation European). Milly was a hard-ass who told me what to do in an arrogant, unintelligible Polish-English accent and had a clear crush on one of the chefs (whose name was Nicholas). She would growl at me to do something, turn around and trill "NEEEEE-Co-LAhS!" and give him a melting look.
I made sandwiches, which are different than in the US. In America a sandwich usually has a thick mat of meat surrounded by lettuce, tomato, mayo and mustard. In the UK it is one little slice of meat (if any) and the lettuce/tomato combination is called "salad" and is a specific ingredient the way that avocado or cheese would be, and EVERY sandwich is buttered, even the tuna and egg salads. The second day I had to re-do some of the sandwiches twice, because there is a sandwich kind called a ploughmans sandwich, which is a sliver of ham, salad, pickle (= relish + some brown goo) and cheese. The first time I realized that I had forgotten to add the cheese and the second time I discovered that I had forgotten to add the pickle. I also broke a plate which Sylvia kindly wrapped up in a paper towel and then gave it to one of the chefs who (this is the odd part) looked ridiculously happy, as if Sylvia had given him the only thing that he had ever wanted and now he could go and die a happy man. I also tried to do dishes but I was very very slow, and I didn't know where to put them once they were clean.
Serving the students/faculty was interesting because I could have passed for any one of them (not that I am English or inclined to study physics). Just a few months ago I was on the other side of the counter, and suddenly I was behind it wearing the paper hat and hygiene-coat. It was also a job that I never expected to hold for various reasons: 1) I have a BA and people who graduate from college generally have different jobs 2) growing up middle-class conditions you to expect to have very different jobs as well, it allows you a choice of work and the chance to choose a career that tickles your fancy somehow (or else makes you hella bank) and this job is not one that many (or possibly any) people would choose over lawyer/doctor/secretary/sommelier. I also noticed that I was working a job usually done in America by an immigrant, which is who my co-workers were. I hadn't thought of myself as an immigrant, instead I thought of myself (think of myself) as someone on a little adventure, a hoo-rah before settling down and picking a career. For my co-workers, they were more serious about their time in England, they were seeing it as a very different sort of oppurtunity. I am glad that I didn't have to work that job for more that a few days.