The Restaurant

On any given weekend, young people get together for an evening of fun. Friends gather to go to movies, to a local meeting place, or to a trendy restaurant. These are normal activities, but not for me. I am server. While my friends are socializing at get-togethers or in restaurants, I work in the dining room of a popular eating place. It is 8:00pm, and I scan the restaurant and take in all the action people from all walks of life interacting with each other. In the left corner of the restaurant are several small round tables, and at this moment, they are all occupied. At one table, I can see a group has of four young women. They are all laughing heartily. I think the leader of the group has just finished telling a joke. These young women are wearing brightly colored career outfits; they probably decided to go out directly after work. It is, in fact, a Wednesday night. At the table just to the right of these women sits a couple. I can clearly see their shiny wedding rings on their ring fingers. In addition, I can now see that they are arguing about something. They are hunched forward, and their faces are tense. Perhaps they do not want others in the restaurant to hear what they are fighting about. The man is holding his cup tightly. The woman is anxiously tearing her napkin into tiny pieces. I am glad that I cannot hear what they are saying; their body language speaks more loudly than any works that I could ever hear. In the center area of the restaurant, things are happening. Five men in their thirties and forties are sitting around a table directly in front of a large tropical plant. They look happy to be here. They are talking and laughing. One guy whispers something to the guy next to him, and the other three insist that these two reveal what they are whispering about. The oldest guy is elegantly dressed in a cashmere sweater. The other four are wearing long-sleeved shirts. Because all five of them are wearing ties, they must have just come from the office. Every now and then, one of them will touch the table a few times as he is speaking, perhaps to emphasize a particular point. To me, offer something to the conversation. In the far right corner of the restaurant, a middle-aged man is sitting alone. I can smell his top-of-the-line cologne whenever I pass by as I head to the kitchen. Although he is alone, he is definitely not lonely. His state-of-the-art cell phone has not left his ear since he came in. I cannot tell whether his phone call is business or pleasure because he alternates from serious tones to lighthearted chuckles. Every once in a while, he asks his server to refresh his cup of coffee. He adds sugar and stirs his coffee rather loudly, but the noisy clinking of the spoon against his coffee cup is drowned out by the music that is being played. This is my job. I take food orders and watch people, from couples fighting to people having a good time talking. I do not pretend to be psychologist, but it is interesting to watch people interact. My job might not be the most socially rewarding job in the world, but every night I learn something new about the nuances of human interaction. That makes me happy.

(T)

hanging, just a thin layer of grease. We line up and move through the line slowly, hopping for a new recipe. Alas, the food choices are the same as usual: wilted salad, lumpy mashed potatoes with salty gravy, and a fatty chicken thigh. The most colorful time in the food line is the dessert jiggly gelation but I never pick up a bowl. That would really mean that I was in prison…or a hospital . Thirty minutes later, we are back in our cubicles, preparing for our afternoon meetings. The enormous conference room contains an oval conference table with twenty shabby chairs. Like clockwork, the supervisor enters at precisely the same time each day. She reads through her routine listen of problems and concerns. As employees, we do not speak. We sit like prisoners and listen to our warden’s robotic voice telling us what we are doing well and what we are doing wrong. We are also given reports to fill out during these meetings. There is no room for creativity in these reports. The multiple-choice answers require only a quick check mark. After that, I go back to work on the chain gang. I answer phone calls, input information in the computer, and glance at my watch. Time seems to stand still, but somehow, I always make it to 5:00pm. That is my professional life. I make a good living, and my salary allows me to live comfortably. However, the atmosphere is oppressive. I walk into my office building, and my creative thought processes shut down. This mindless feeling continues until I drive out of the parking lot. If I were a stronger person, perhaps I would think about changing careers. However, everyone knows the stories of prisoners who are finally released from jail. Many of them find that they miss the routines of a prisoners, and they end up going back.

Prisoner at work

I am not criminal. I am honest, hardworking individual who follows the law and stays out of trouble. However, I can imagine what a prison feels like. All I have to do is think about the customer service company where I work. From the time I arrive at work to the time I leave, I get the distinct impression that I am indeed in prison. Before I even enter my building at 9:00am, I get the feeling that entering a high-security building. I punch in a special code to enter the parking lot. The cold metallic arm slowly swings up, allowing me to pass. As I get out of my car and proceed toward the entrance, I must prepare my badge for inspection. A stern guard wearing a black and white uniform take a look at my photo and glances up at my face. I have seen him every day for the past four years, yet he continues to do this as if he has never laid eyes on me before after successfully getting past the objects, such as keys and nail files. I walk through the metal detector, and if I am lucky, the alarm does not sound. I walk down the frigid hallway until I come to a steel door with a sign that says, “Authorized personal only”. My ten-digit number must be punched in correctly for the door to open. I am relieved when the light shines green and I can enter on the first try. My workday has begun, and I know that it will follow the same routine as every other day. As I get to my dull cubicle, I look around and see that all my coworker’s cubicles are exactly like mine. Like prison cells, they are the same size, decorated the same way, and separated from each other by partitions. From 9:00 to 9:30, I answer the usual e-mails from other employees. After that, I get busy with my telephone work. When customers call in, I have a “speech” that I read to them. There is no creativity on my part. I cannot veer from the company’s statement. Just like a prisoner, I have no freedom of speech. My lunchtime routine never changes either. At 12:30, we all proceed to the cafeteria. The moment we walk in, we are bombarded by the powerful smell of fried food and grease. I look around and see that the cafeteria décor has not changed. The walls are lifeless and gray. There are no pictures or other wall

Negative Influence Of Foreign Culture On Cambodia

Every country around the world has its own culture to represent the nation. People can notice each other or know where they are from and who they are because of the culture. Culture Includes language, tradition, custom, dressing, food or meal, buildings and relgion. Cambodia is also a country that has its own culture, but this culture is not such pure as before because our culture, now, is coming with foreign cultures. Mixing culture is not good for each country. What are the Influence of foreign culture on Cambodian culture? The first of all, bad Influence is our culture will not exist in the world any more. As we know that culture is practiced by people. If people do not use our culture and back to use foreign culture, our culture will be dead in one day. As we can see, the way people dress is in Khmer culture, there are no jeans, T-shirts, there are only simple trousers or pants, dresses made from silk. But, now populations wear jeans, T-shirts especially girl they like wearing tight jean or short skirts that our culture does not allow to do like that. However, those are not completely their faults because they imitate that style form foreigners because of following foreign culture into our country that appear on the television. As a result, foreign culture can kill our culture easily. The second reason is people will confuse the culture and they will not know which our culture is. Today, people still know that our culture is. but twenty years later people will not know our culture because we never use it. We use only foreign culture and they will wonder if we have our own culture or not and they also think we pulverize that culture from the other because they can see on television, that other country has culture like ours. The last point is people around the world will not know and admter our culture anyone. They all know us, Cambodians, because of our culture, language, custom, and dressing. In contrast, we, ourselves, forget our culture, we never use our language; we never wear Khmer dresses. Thus, how can people use only foreign language and dress foreign style cloth and the way they act as if they were foreigners. In consequence, people around the world will forget our culture. In conclusion, I would like to repeat that three influences of foreign cultures on Cambodian culture are Khmer culture will not remain in the world, people get confused about the culture, and people over the world will not know our nation anymore. Thus, as we Khmer, we should try to keep our culture alive and describe our culture to our children or students to know our culture and remember it forever to tell room one person to another. Culture alive means nation alive, good culture means good nation and god leader, So, we should take measure to protect our culture from flowing foreign cultures into our country.

(T)

Another reason is that in life, especially in one family the happiness worth must more than wealth. Nowadays there are a lot of millionaires having mountains of wealth but do not have happy life. Why? These people spend nearly their lifetime in earning more and more money? Because of money, they forget their leisure time and even their own family, As a result, a family which is used to be warm, loving and caring tums sour and bitter. Although money is significant for people, it still cannot be compared to the health. Furthermore, money will be worthies if we do not have a good health. Evidently, this mostly takes place to those who, because of money, forget their own health. They are busy earning money, money, money…Consequently, they are seriously ill. The thing that would make them regret the most is that do not have a chance to spend their money they earned happy. Opponents to this idea might think that money is the most important thing in life because they would think money is indispensable for human. Without money, three will be no food or even anything. No money, no clothes, no money, no education… This way of thought might be right to certain extent. However, money is not the most important thing in our life, only if our value in life the most. But I strongly believe that people don’t value money the most in life, money is the very step to reach something more valuable such as: happiness, relationship… etc.

Money is the most important thing in life

What do we value the most in our lives? Why do we study and work so hard in our lives? Isn’t it only for the sole outcome money? Money is the only way to support our living standard. Without it, we might be going through hardships or other problems. Even though money is very useful in our living, we don’t consider money as our most valuable thing in life out of the three main reasons. The first main reason is that a true friendship does not come from money. As we have already know, as human being. We need a true relationship with other people. We don’t gain their trust and confidence by simply showing them that we have money. For example, between friends, if we want a person to be our real friend. we must be reliable, honest, and helpful to him or her whenever she or he is in need of helps. We should not just show off that we have wealth and expect them to be your true friends.

(T)

Moreover, our brain starts to be weaker and weaker. These worst results can gibe the bad influence to the study. For example, when we got drunk in the night before we go to study the next day we cannot study well because of hanging over. What’s more beer and wine today are moderately expensive, so we will waste a lot of time and money just for sitting and drinking alcohol. The last point is drug addicting which is the most disgusting thing for me and for the whole society. Drug is like a chronic disease which can be fatal. Naturally, our bodies and mind are designed magnificently, but when we get addicted with drug, our brains are confused with the wrong data which is known as mental illness. For this problem, we have to spend long time to recover, without logical thinking. Whenever the drug users cannot afford the money the drug takes, they can do anything to get it either legally or illegally. Especially many crimes have occurred because of drugs. Being a student, if I go addicted to drug, I will go to a place called hell where my future is destroyed. In conclusion, smoking, drinking, and drug addicting are the devils of the individuals, the society, and the world. Therefore, we, especially the adults, have not known about the dangers and no to try them, because we must join hands locally and internationally to combat them in order to make our world a perfect place to live.