SINGAPORE: Work can be challenging enough on its own, but for one man, a language barrier is making it even harder. He recently took to social media to share his frustration about struggling to communicate with his supervisor, who speaks only Chinese.
“I’m working part-time at a warehouse and I have so far only been assigned [to] a supervisor who can only speak Chinese. I can sometimes understand what he wants me to do but most of the time, I’m just left there with no idea as to what to do. He talks to me in Chinese and expects me to understand him,” the man said.
“To make matters worse, whenever he misinterprets instructions or fails to complete a task correctly, his supervisor becomes visibly frustrated and even yells at him.
“I sometimes have to get someone to help translate for me. He always yells at me when I don’t get what he says. He should understand, right, that I don’t speak Chinese? I always feel bad afterwards, as it always felt like it was my fault that I didn’t get his instructions,” he continued.
Seeking support and advice, he turned to the Reddit community to see if anyone had experienced a similar struggle and how they had coped with it.
“I’d probably start looking for part-time work elsewhere.”
In the comments section, some Singaporeans suggested using translation apps to bridge the gap, recommending tools like Google Translate to interpret instructions quickly.
“Can you try Google Translate app? There is a speech-to-text translation. It doesn’t beat knowing the language yourself, but it helps better than not understanding anything,” one said.
Others, however, were baffled by how he ended up in this mess. They questioned how he got hired if he couldn’t communicate with his supervisor at all.
“I am surprised that you got hired. No, it’s not a dig at you, but the process. Either the supervisor himself must have interviewed you or someone higher up interviewed you and assigned you to that supervisor. Both sound very unlikely if there is no common language between you,” one explained.
A few users also recommended that he escalate the issue to a higher authority within the company. They advised him to bring up his concerns with a senior manager or HR, as they might be able to reassign him to a different supervisor or provide some form of accommodation.
On the other hand, some felt it wasn’t even worth the hassle. They bluntly told him to start looking for another job, saying that as a part-timer, he shouldn’t have to deal with this kind of stress.
“Don’t feel bad for your supervisor’s lack of communication skills and your company’s whacko hiring processes. I’d probably start looking for part-time work elsewhere,” one commented.
“Time to look for another job, your company should very well know that your supervisor [has] difficulties communicating in English and yet assign you under him. I see multiple red flags here, you don’t deserve this kind of treatment,” another commented.
In other news, a foreigner in Singapore was shocked when he discovered a random 15-year-old child mysteriously listed under his family tab in the Singpass app.
Alarmed by the bizarre situation, he turned to Reddit’s “Ask Singapore” forum on Sunday (Feb 9) to seek advice from fellow users. In his post, he explained that the teenager was someone he had never met or heard of. “He is of a different race and was apparently born a Singapore citizen. We are Caucasian and don’t even have PR, haha,” he wrote.
Read more: ‘Is this some scam?’ Foreigner shocked as mystery child appears in his Singpass family tab
Featured image by freepik (for illustration purposes only)