Perlito or Pupung as friends call him thought he will be able to get his dream job right after graduating in college. However, the ambitious lad from Negros Oriental realized that most of the companies where he had worked failed to satisfy him. He was seeking for more.
Nonetheless, when a window of opportunity opens, he recognized it right away. One of his friends invited him for a job interview at Marriott hotel in Cebu six years ago. The employer, (a Saudi national and his present boss) came to Cebu to look for salesmen. He is the owner of a large lubricant trading company in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA).
There were five of them and Perlito was one of the three lucky applicants who passed his interview. They were offered to work in Assawayer Trading Company Limited located in KSA with benefits like a yearly vacation, free accommodation and car. The employer also shouldered their processing fees and they were also given travel allowances. He arrived in KSA August of 2001.
He took a Philippine Airline’s flight from Manila to Dammam. It was Perlito’s first time to ride a plane and he was shaking with tensions when they landed in the large airport of Dammam, Saudi Arabia. He spent more than six hours waiting for someone to pick him up. Fortunately, a Pakistani national offered to help by offering his mobile phone so he can call his company in Saudi. A staff answered and he was fetched from the airport to the Dammam office.
Everything should have gone smoothly from there. But alas Perlito learned that life abroad is not a bed of roses. For six months Perlito struggled to cope with the new environment. He came to a point that he even called and begged his employer to send him back to the Philippines.
The food, homesickness from family, the different nationalities he meet everyday, the unusual lifestyle and the nature of work as a technical salesman for industrial petroleum lubricants made adjustment so hard for Perlito. But eventually perseverance and determination made him survived it all.
Perlito said, “It is far from my dream job as a mass communication graduate. But trainings helped me survived the first year. I studied and learned a lot from the regular sales trainings held by our company.”
In 2004, he was recognized by Magna Industrial Company Ltd in Hong Kong as one of the top salesmen for Omega Specialized Lubricants representing Saudi Arabia among 96 countries worldwide.
Perlito’s message to all OFWs around the world? Take advantage of all opportunities for improvement. Learn to love your job to gain job satisfaction and excel in your work.
