A Guesthouse Door Opens

In the midst of a now typically heated argument with my mother about whether God had abandoned us, I shouted I need a job now! You see, I couldn’t wait any longer. McDonald’s was killing me physically and mentally a little more each day, but we needed the money too much for me to just quit. We’d already suffered catastrophic financial losses in the wake of the super typhoon, endured a total loss of peace from the merciless Chinese developing a five-star palace in front of our Siargao home and I’d personally experienced the horror of multiple melanomas. All these terrible things had already shaken my faith to the very core. Now, just day to day living in England was becoming too much to handle. That’s why I had shouted. I wondered if God might finally listen to the desperate cry of a broken person and actually do something good about it. 

Amazingly, within days of the argument, I received a call from a local guesthouse. I had applied for at least 25 local jobs in the wake of the terribleness of McDonald’s and hadn’t received a single reply until now, so this felt like it might be a breakthrough. I was called for an interview and got offered the job at the end of it partly as a result of my previous social media work for other Cromer businesses. Alongside general managerial duties (like checking in guests and taking bookings), I was to be in charge of marketing and social media for the guesthouse. This would include free trips to restaurants and local attractions to write website blogs and make reels for Facebook. While the role was only four evenings a week (with a sleepover allowance), it meant I’d have my days to surf or hang out with my family. Also, the hours would enable me to continue seasonal work at the surf school pushing my overall salary to £27K.

I emailed my resignation to McDonald’s immediately and breathed a huge sigh of relief. Perhaps God cared about me (and us) after all. He had opened the glass stained door of a historical guesthouse and slammed shut the revolving glass door of a burger giant. After less than two months, my fast food career was over.