A faux pas I made in an interview for a summer job at The British Council in Bahrain
by Carrie Evans (Author)
Awoke this morning to the thickest pea-souper I believe I’ve ever seen in the Gulf. I remember first hearing about this phenomenon at Spring Gardens in London from a terribly plummy sort of chap, who was supposedly interviewing me for a summer job teaching English at the British Council in Bahrain. I say supposedly, as I don’t recall any probing or even remotely challenging questions that day, such as which tense I would set about teaching first to elementary-level learners, past simple or present perfect, but I do remember him explaining, almost insultingly when I come to think of it, that very few teachers wanted to stick around in the Gulf in the summer months, because of the searing heat of the desert combined with the exceptionally high humidity, which he called the pea-soup effect. Even after my foolish slip of the tongue, admitting, at his enquiry about my self-perceived weaknesses in relation to work, that I might be considered something of an alcoholic when what I had meant to say, of course, was workaholic, he quickly informed me that I seemed to be ‘the right type’ and that he thought I’d get on very well over there. They were clearly quite desperate for staff.