this post was submitted on 25 Mar 2024
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What's the worst job you've ever had? What made it bad and how long did you last?

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[–] [email protected] 1 points 7 months ago

Assistant camp cook at a Boy Scout Camp. The assistant cook does almost all of the prep work for the head cook, and does all the kitchen cleanup. The dishawasher handled only dishes from the dining hall, not any of things used for cooking. M-F I had to be in the kitchen by 5:45am, got about an hour off after lunch--if I managed to complete everything quickly--and then got out of the kitchen at around 9pm. I also had meal breaks, as long as they didn't interfere with getting the job done. Sunday I had to be in the kitchen at 3:30p (we only did dinner for the arriving troops), and Saturday I got to leave at noon or so since we only did breakfast before they all left. I had room and board--which was a milsurp wall tent with a milsurp cot--I had to supply my own bedding--and whatever I wanted to eat once the campers were done and my work was done. My wages were the princely sum of something like $175/week. In the early 90s. It worked out to something like $2.50/hr (which would be about $5.15 now).

And to top it off, the camp director got fired, a new one came in, and he fired all the kitchen staff so that he could bring his own people in. I was told at the time that I would have been the only one he kept, but he didn't want to change his team. So I got moved to another camp about 90 minutes away.

Head cook was cool though; he'd been a cook in the Navy for decades, starting in Korea.