Racism and homophobia at work or just personality conflict?

It has been hard this week. I am on holiday for four days, I miss my baby very much. We could go around town together, at the moment I don’t feel like going on my own. I’m sorry I’m responsible for making him suffer, I suffer too, and I wish we could be together. I would love to take him in my arms. I hope he will find ways to forget suffering about me being here.

It is ridiculous, it has been only three weeks, but it seems like forever when he is not around, and that I am all alone. Maybe Gloria will become my friend, I would like that. She is very funny.

I went to McDonald with Gloria and her son yesterday after work, the girl from San Salvador, the one who baby sits my bosses’ children. Apparently everyone is given too much work and are questioned when it is not done. It appears to be a management trick to get people to work harder. I suspected that much, I feel better now that it has been confirmed.

It means that they only pretend to be disappointed and to be expecting more in order to throw us into panic mode so we work harder and harder, even at home. I also believe that even if they were impressed or happy with your work, they would not say so, so you never really feel like that now you can relax, you worked well.

I felt right into their trap, letting it get to me and allowing it to emotionally kill me. Unfortunately these mind games, even though they are as old as capitalism, are still working fine, and I can’t just cure myself from this stress. I still feel like I am not good enough for them.

If I knew that my reports were appreciated (except the last one), it would make me feel better. I need to read that last report again, maybe it was not that far from the truth after all. I just hope in time they will agree.

I think I can continue with this job, not sure if I will have a talk with my bosses on Monday before signing for and paying my apartment and hence confirming that I will be staying in L.A. for at least four more months.

Gloria’s brother studied cinema, the whole thing. He can direct, produce, edit, author DVD, etc. What a surprise, another one. I’m sorry he was sacked, and I know now that it was a conflict with my valley girl who just could not stand him. I’ve got to be careful, or the same thing will happen to me.

Gloria said that when her brother started to work there, no one liked him, contrarily to the other Mexican which everyone loves, including my famous director. The fact that they like the other Mexican guy can be justified by his great personality, I like him very much myself. There is nothing in him that is threatening, and he is a great “Yes Sir” type of person.

Gloria said that it was typical of this director to either like you or loath you, and he was rude to her brother, as he is rude to me. She said that she could feel how patronizing he was with me, so it was not in my imagination.

She blames it on the fact that we are foreigners, so I guess to be French-Canadian, as far as my director is concerned, is like being a Mexican or someone from Central America. Great, racism, and perhaps also homophobia, which certainly does not help my case.

I never suffered discrimination for being French, it is the first time I would suffer from racism that I am aware of. Well, there have been a couple of instances in the past where I did suffer from racism, but I won’t get into that now.

I guess when you are flooded with Mexicans (when in fact I feel that this town belongs to Mexicans and it is the Americans who are flooding it), French-Canadians can be put in the same bag. Mix it all up together, add some onions and make a nice salad you can eat at lunch time.

I don’t know if it is racism or homophobia, or the threat that I represent for being young, having that much experience, with a title like Management Consultant. It must be difficult in court to justify racism, unless some specific events happened, and in this case he never mentioned anything that could suppose racism or homophobia.

So I am not ready to say Gloria is right, and the first impression I had of her brother was not that he could become a great friend, I have to admit. But at the time he had been under intense pressure for over two months, and he was sacked within two days of my arrival.

I think it is simpler than that with the director. Our personalities just don’t match, he just did not like me from the start. And I think he would not have even if he had known nothing about me. One good look was enough for him to judge me, before I even spoke.

And Gloria confirmed it, he either like you or he doesn’t. Unfortunately he had the time to do a lot of damage, he has succeeded in destroying my credibility to my bosses, just as the valley girl did with Gloria’s brother. And I did not help myself afterwards either, with my string of mistakes.

Dear me, I was unaware that this place would be so cut throat and that my head would no longer stand on my shoulder within one day of my arrival. Not sure how I will survive this, but with Gloria on my side, I may stand a chance.