Rachel is away sunning herself in Hungary- she has taken an extravaganza train trip and so, dear Laundry readers, you are stuck with a little whitter from Harry, Gemma and Sam (Sam Smith that is- he shares his name with the respected pub-chain)

We have the very lovely volunteer Sam working for us at the moment, and its driven us to thinking about work experience experiences. Have you had some terrible, commical or otherwise, time during work experience, or, the other way around, someone getting experienecs working with you?

Well- me, Gem and Sam are going to share ours with you today-

Harry: At my school you had to do some official work experience at about the age of 14. It was all organised by them but you had to select an area of interest. The inspiration for this for some people seemed to come deep from within- ‘I’ve always wanted to be a podiatrist’ (My friend Adam) or more commonly, ‘I want to work with kids’ (the lovely Caroline). Mine was a little bit lost, but the careers library knew there’d be several people like me and so to help with this lack of direction had bought a computer programme that tested your personality and matched you up with something that in theory should suit. It was called Kudos (regretabbly sharing the former name of local nightspot- before it became ‘Destiny’-uuurrrggh!) and for me managed to drum up Funeral Director (aaarrrrggghhhh) along with Solictor. I chose the latter, understandably. Why the hell they had the first in there is any guess- good with people? So off I toddled in my brother’s girlfriend at the times dated- too big for me shoulder padded suit ensembles (skirt was too short though, which didn’t go down well). My biggest recolection of the whole two weeks was coming across a file about two people I knew who were in a big amount of trouble and not being able to tell anyone- it nearly made me burst- and the rest was really boring- going to Hemel Hempsted local court and hearing two-hours of driving crime cases- not quite the glorious alley mcbeal get-up I had imagined! So, to be a Solicitor was not for me… (you know, nothing to do with my GCSE results- just the secret keeping!).

Gemma: My school work experience, also enforced at around the age of 15/16, was inspired by my desire at the time to become a designer - I swayed back and forth between interior ( I watched a lot of “changing rooms” back then, anyone remember it, that tv programme?) and graphic design. Eventually I opted for graphic design and sat back waited with the expectation that my school would obviously take their time and ensure the best and most chic of placements for me. Little did I know… I turned up on the monday morning to be greeted by 3 burly, tatoo covered men who made signs for pubs! I spent the week peeling sticky bits of plastic of larger sheets of paper, in order to form the sign template, a labourious task but someone’s got to do it! Needless to say it wasn’t the experience I anticipated, but it wasn’t all bad, I got on quite well with my fellow sign makers and at the end of the week they awarded me with a huge assortment of minature signs of my name, which I used for weeks to come to the anger of my mum, when I plastered them on my bedroom window, and to (I thought at the time) the jealousy of my friends, but who knows?!…

Sam: Finally, my chance to speak out. When I was 15, I also used Kudos, a computer questionnaire to find my true calling in the world. It told me that I was well-suited to become a fence erector. Many of my friends were also apparently well suited to this career and I often wonder if any of them found their way into the fencing industry. Since then, my interests in environmental issues led me to The Laundry. I must say, this placement is going a zillion times better than other placements I’ve had. In my experience of work placements, they usually always involve some sort of repetitive sticking activity such as sealing envelopes, putting stickers on things, etc. The Laundry people did get me folding stickers for a while (did you notice how beautifully folded your packs of blue stickers have been recently?), but those days are over now. They have now trusted me with the telephone and a computer, and I have access to all the top secret Laundry documents. So I’m gunna get reading and try and look important and busy, like a true work experience student.

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