Fourth year or, Transition year; a plan formed by aging founders of the school system who believed this year would turn children into adults, maturity would be achieved in nine months, almost like an egg growing into a baby in the womb except for the fact that transition year was optional!! To attain this maturity the four classes of transition year were brought camping, canoeing and on numerous excursions once parents had signed the ‘release’ forms! But twice in the year, for two weeks each time, the students were sent out into the wide world to gain some much needed work experience and if lucky, some money and a chance to continue on working once the two weeks were over. In previous years the school had formed bonds with shops, accountants and local tradesmen who would accept at Christmas, and again at summertime, a handful of recommended students. For most of the students this was a time to enjoy away from school but endure four weeks of their precious transitional period as a less than valued member of the workforce.
Work experience normally meant, but was not limited to, making tea, cleaning, polishing and running out to the shops for lazy staff members much like staying at home really helping your parents, except that is for one sought after position in the big city. Legend had it that a chocolate factory, located out of town, not only paid well but let you eat as much treats and goodies as possible. With sweet teeth and the scent of money ripe in their nostrils a select group of students packed their disc men, put on their warm clothes and took the train to the city. With Christmas lights guiding their way to their new temporary place of work, ‘Eatanleavus’, they felt a bit like Charlie on his way to Willy Wonka’s factory. After they met their manager and were each assigned roles and rooms to work in, they began their first stint as employed civilians.
Neeve Powter, the perfectionist performed the technique of damage control. A hard job to be in charge of as any minor scrape or scrawl would deem these nuggets of chocolaty goodness unsellable to the hungry public. She spent her day in room one with hard working packers who, although excelled in packing, lacked humour and conversation. With Carlos Michaels running room two, it was a more relaxed atmosphere playing the music of the Wu Tang Clan and the Backstreet Boys to keep spirits up as his own clan put the finishing touches to the boxes before letting them out as Christmas presents. Brendan Peters and Rob Ryan were the workers who adhered to Carlos’ relaxed ways but still managed to get the job done. As had been done and well documented in the past, this year the group of hard working students brought, on a daily basis, a selection of treats home to their families, friends and Devlin O’ Keeffe who waited impatiently for his fix as close to the factory as possible. One week almost down and with the first pay check firmly in sight, happiness hovered over the workers as they sang songs, oompa loompa like, and looked forward to their first weekend with hard earned cash in their pockets.
With Rob Ryan’s dad’s birthday on the Friday and his dad a self confessed choc-o-holic it would have been complete madness given the resources at his finger tips for Rob not to turn up with a big bag of chewy cocoa and liqueur based delights for his dad to gorge gratefully on. With the day drawing to a close and the remaining luxury candy refrigerated until Monday, the working crew of both room one and two packed away their belongings and complimentary bag of goodies. Neeve Powter, on this particular day did not have a bag so without a second thought, Rob nestled her Nestle type treats into his black school sack along with a nice big bunch of chocolates for his dad’s birthday. As did the rest of the team and down the stairs they descended to exit into the festive evening air. As the last couple of steps rose to meet them something appeared to be amiss as the management team stood in wait, arms folded and a look of pure hatred hung over their faces. Thinking targets had not been met the team was preparing for a petite pep talk to increase their work ethic the next week but when the manager said ‘It is shop policy to check your bags as you leave’ blood ran cold and confusion took over.
As a line of stumped students now leaned up against the wall, one by one the bags of each suspect were searched. Almost all passed the search due to the sweets being at the end of a deep, full bag or a wooly hat so bulky it covered their contraband. All except for Rob whose bag was bulging to the brim with conspicuous confectionary. So as the rest of the workforce was ushered to the exit, Rob was bustled upstairs to the manager’s office to explain this breech in sugary security. As Rob explained he thought this was acceptable the manager weighed the bag of sweets to reveal a £17 cost that her business would have lost if she had let him go. Unbeknownst to her, £60 had just been pushed from her premises and in previous years thousands of pounds had walked out her shop door. A disappointed and fired Rob left the building with the sweets still in his bag as he believed they were a great present for his dad. He was £17 pounds and one job lighter but with no procedures in place nobody knew that taking chocolates home was against the rules of ‘Eatanleavus’. On returning home he explained to his dad that he had both good news and bad news for him. His dad was delighted at the good news, not so happy with the bad news but ultimately understood the lack of clarity the chocolate factory had provided. To this day Rob believes that it was never his fault and never a bad thing that he did on his time in the factory, if anything it helped him gain the maturity that people were trying to force on him in different ways in school And despite a loss of £17, an embarrassing apology to the nuns of Mary’s college, Rob gained something that hurtful, disastrous day that people find takes years to get, a nickname that sticks….. Robchocs was born….
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