Confessions: UEA’s worst part-time job horror stories

Everyone has had a horrific part-time job that wasn’t worth the minimum wage scraped together and needed to fund year 12 Mayfair superking habits and house party Smirnoff Ices. From cashiers to waiters, stockroom attendants to ski instructors, there are many forms that our nightmare Saturday jobs took. But no matter what you spent your weekends doing in exchange for cash, the chances are that it’s scarred you for life in one way or another. Here are some of the most bitterly nostalgic recollections and horror stories from UEA students who wish to remain unnamed.

The changing rooms attendant

“Whilst I was at sixth form, I worked part-time at a national discount clothes store which shall remain nameless. On my second weekend working in the fitting rooms, I noticed a grim smell coming from the men’s side. Assuming it was an issue with the heating or something coming from the nightclub next door, I went in to check only to find a massive shit wrapped up in a cardigan. Worst of all, it wasn’t even a cardigan we sold.

To this day I wonder how it got there, or what possessed a person to shit in the changing rooms. I also wonder whether they miss that cardigan. I’m still pretty scarred from the whole fiasco and it was almost three years ago now.”

The lifeguard

“I’m a lifeguard and used to work at a summer camp. One evening I went to my friend’s party the night before a shift and said I wouldn’t get too drunk. Obviously, I got absolutely fucked. I was definitely still drunk when I was driving through the country roads on the way to the pool, and when I got to work I was definitely not okay. Sitting on the high chair with the summer sun beaming on me definitely isn’t what you need when you’re absolutely hanging.

I went to the toilet, threw up everywhere and then got my friend to text me a made-up emergency about my grandmother. I changed her name on my phone to ‘mum’, showed my boss and then left. Safe to say I never went back there.”

The kids’ birthday party supervisor

“Working kids birthday parties is the worst, with the parents usually being more annoying than the children. One mum insisted I let the children eat first, and then took them to play games afterwards. They ran around, overheated, and I was left to clean up four lots of hot dog vomit.”

The barista

“After struggling for months to find a job in Norwich, I finally got a call from a café saying that they liked the look of my CV and asked me to come in for a trial shift. The position was pretty much guaranteed they said, judging by my experience, but they just wanted me to come in to make sure everything was fine. The trial shift was at 6:30am on a Thursday morning.

However, the day before was my best friend’s 21st birthday and she was holding a massive house party to celebrate. There were going to be a lot of people (and a lot of drugs) and it was slowly turning into a bigger and bigger event. I knew I was definitely going to drop some Mandy (how can you not on your best friend’s birthday?) so I decided I would start a couple of hours earlier than most people so that I could still have a good night, but then go to bed a couple of hours earlier so I’d be slightly more fresh in time for my trial shift the next day.

One thing led to another, and my 3am self-orchestrated curfew flew by. Suddenly it was 5am, everyone else was slowly leaving and I was still racking lines. I had to force myself to bed, only to sleeplessly lie down for 45 minutes before I had to wipe the glitter from my face and head towards the bus stop in time for my shift.

I spent the whole four hours gurning my face off as I made capuccino after latté after cappucino. It was highly embarrassing – my prospective boss who seemed so warm and cheery on the phone could barely look at me, and it’s safe to say I was never offered the “guaranteed” job after all.”

The sales assistant

“When I was 16 or 17 I had a part-time job working at Marks and Spencer’s, and this 28 year old man in my department kept asking me out even though there was the massive age gap. I never went out with him but I had him on Facebook and he just used to send me dick pics and selfies of him smiling into the camera. This went on for months until I told him to go fuck himself. Luckily it’s cooled off since.”

The kitchen porter

The supermarket cashier

“There was a new manager at work that was tall and handome, tan and in good shape. He also had a slightly receding hairline and, as everyone liked to point out, he was old enough to be my dad. We started flirting, I was enjoying the attention when I found out from another colleague he liked younger women. Once we were both having a cigarette behind the store and he kissed me. I wasn’t sure where I wanted it to go, but one thing led to another and suddenly we were kind of dating, kind of shagging. No one knew, obviously.

He used to pick me up a few streets away from where we worked and we would coordinate our shifts so we could have the same days off. It was a summer fling – a whirlwind of fancy dinners, fast cars, and trips to the coast. It sounds pretty cliché but then again, what’s not cliché about shagging your boss? It ended when summer did and I went off to university. Now it’s just my very own dirty little secret, only to be shared in drunken games of ‘Never Have I Ever’.”

The cupcake stall-holder

“I used to work at a cupcake stall when I was 17 and we were encouraged to give slices of the cakes to customers as tasters. I didn’t realise they were just for the customers though, and would sit and eat cake after cake for the four hours I was supposed to be there. Unsurprisingly I only ever worked two shifts before I wasn’t asked to come back, although I never returned my work hoodie so who’s the real winner?”

The Christmas temp

“I had a Christmas temp job at Build-a-Bear. You know, the shop where kids choose a deflated teddy bear to then stuff themselves and choose it a little outfit. As with any job that involves overtly-perky and artificially-happy levels of customer service that eventually makes you want to kill yourself, you quickly grow tired of the parents and the children as they trudge around the store taking forever to choose their bear’s components. Also, parents can be extremely rude when in the process of doing something to please their brat. Every time a customer was a dick to me, I would sew the bear up without putting the silk heart in. I have a bag of bear hearts under my bed to remember the joys of retail by.”