We've started our technical training today and as usual, the first exam was a charm. I managed to pass our recitation about how e-mail, Internet, FTP, and other network tools work. We were given 6 hours to prepare a documentation about SMTP, POP3, Web servers, ping, whois, nslookup, dig, telnet, etc. And after that, we had a question and answer portion about our research. For the first time in history, I was able to paraphrase all those information I got from the net which I usually cut and paste before. Believe me, I managed to survive college doing that. But here, that'll just won't do. In six hours I was able to explain thoroughly what happens to the email as soon as the user clicks on send. As in really detailed like - "the client send a EHLO command to signal the SMTP server that it is ready to send data" detailed.

Anyway, I've got myself a new objective. Even though I really don't want this job as a customer support engineer, I'll finish this training because of the certificate of completion that they give out. Having that certificate would be like another achievement on my resume. After I get that, I'll transfer somewhere else. I get to train without paying them to teach me. In fact they are the ones that give me money in exchange for my training. But of course, things would be different if they increase my salary really high after I pass this training. I'll probably stay with them - a little more English skills won't hurt. I even think that I'm really getting comfortable speaking in English. I barely stutter now nor do I eat my words anymore. This could be really helpful for me - but the downside of it is that I'm really tired. I really don't look forward to going to work everyday. Now I know why Corrine would probably get a memo for excessive absences.
What I really like about this training is that even if we fail, we'll still get our 10,000 pesos. We won't go on to the next phase of the training but we'll still get to linger at the office and do nothing while waiting for our payday. That'll give us enough time to look for other jobs.