The importance of loving what we do for our jobs, to find that drive to wake up in the morn, to go to work…translated…
The conversations of work from over a decade at a publisher of detective novels suddenly came up between my friend and I. at the time, the publishing business was on the rise, the company that just got started up was full of energies, no matter what the case was that we'd proposed, the boss gave us complete support over. I was young, and bold too, wasn't afraid of failure, yet. The very first task at work was to set up the press conference for putting our publisher on the maps. My friend was the editor, I, in sales, but, the company was super tiny, so, all hands on deck for all of the, business functions (it's just only the four of us anyways!), back then, we were, quite, close to, one another for sure!
The publisher used the promotion of "dress-up into famous detectives", invited all those who loved the mysteries, detective novels to dress themselves up as their favorite characters. As the sponsors, other than renting out those outfits for the participants, we'd also, borrowed a bicycle for our boss, so he could enter into the old style Japanese architecture in character, he'd played the part of Furuhata Ninzaburo from the T.V. shows. As fans of the detective genre, it was like a reunion of friends, it didn't matter if we knew each other, all who were there, were, our, friends.
Although, everything big and small was left to me to set up, but, my coworkers had been helpful when I'd needed their assistance, including a trip to a costume shop near the Taipei Main Station to rent out the various kinds of specialty costumes, to set up all the gadgets, the things, like the pipe of Holmes, the magnifying glass, the bicycle of the character that my boss portrayed, the beard from a character……..everybody was working individually, to put this event together, we were very busy, but had a ton of fun, doing this.
After so much time had passed, as we're now, talking about this, my friend asked, why did we work our asses off then? Starting up the publisher kept us busy, and following the setup of the agency makes us busier still. The new company, in order to make itself known, edited quite a lot of books for printing, and therefore, the sales department was hard at work as well, like every year, we'd invited the Japanese authors, from the copyrights, to editing the books, to the sales, everybody was on high, alerts. In Japan, these visiting authors were kept mysterious and unknown to the masses, they're actually, big kids, other than the mango shaved ice at Yongkang Street that was a must-visit and the Dintaifung restaurant, riding the elevator up to 101 to the terrace, he'd asked to be taken to the Dihwa Street night markets, and purchased an electric mosquito zapper, took it back to Japan with him with glee.
There were, the moments where the sorrows and the joys mixed together too, the authors who were able to sell so very well, after a few years, started not doing so well anymore, but we'd, still held our hopes for that dying chance like the lovers, couldn't break up, we'd rather get screamed at, and still willing to, print. But, a work was made into a movie, and this writer who was originally considered poison that nobody wanted to publish, suddenly became, the most wanted overnight, and, all the readers have a book of his in hand. This made us believed, that so long as we use our love, then, the exotic flowers will eventually, come into, being.
Why did we work all our asses of back then? My friend's inquiries, sounded like a regret that's', filled with, a whole lot of, love. At the time, it'd not felt like we were all working too hard, we just, loved publishing the books, loving that tiny little, agency of our. Loving the authors, treated the readers as our, friends, nothing more.
This is on the importance of working in a field that you loved, and work became more than just that simple paycheck, because you look forward to going to work every single day, to do what you're supposed to be doing there, and, helping those publishers get their books out, you'd become, someone who'd helped someone else reach a goal, and that made you feel, fulfilled, that's why you don't feel that work was hard, when you'd had to, work really hard at it!
No comments:
Post a Comment