Strange jobs

Kneel young: Niña Defensor’s strange job was a modeling gig for a Middle Eastern shampoo brand. Photo by Carlos Guadarrama

As a yuppie, it’s almost as if your brain is doomed to bring up the topic of work in any given conversation. The small talk that once revolved around Lego and Pog has now evolved into the hows and whys of your job, if any. “So, dude, what do you do now?” “Yes naman, brand management!” Dreaded or not, such an exchange can be familiar. Yet despite tiring of this customary catching up myself, I wind up meeting people with uncommon but intriguing ways of making a living. Here’s a few of them.

LOL Model

Niña Defensor, 23, has had her share of TVC awkwardness. “The strangest commercial I was part of was for a local network’s love calculator commercial,” she says. “I had to text the information of my significant other to a certain number and receive our compatibility results. Of course I had to act all romantic. I didn’t really expect we did commercials like those over here. It was pretty funny.”

As to how everything began, Defensor says she started modeling at the age of six and hoarded VTRs throughout high school and college. “I’ve just always been the type who can’t stay idle. Being very energetic, I constantly need an outlet to channel my energy in. Being busy is good.”

Said energy got her the usual print and television stints, but products like a Middle Eastern shampoo brand stood out from the bunch. “I was dressed very conservatively, according to their culture,” recalls the petite model. “It was different. ‘Cause I actually learned about their culture a lot on the set and I was the only Filipina in there.”

At the end of the day, royalties and the lack thereof were always the strangest arrangement. “I learned that one of my photos was used as a spa ad in Cebu without my consent,” she reveals. “My doctor also told me that there’s a salon in Manila that uses one of my setcard photos for a local ad as well — another without my consent.” I guess not all modeling gigs end with a laugh. And it’s not like she’ll start saying no to these jobs though because sometimes the strangest ones equate to more pesos.

The portal to Port alets: Martin Cruz poses with co-workers during the recent blessing of one of their new facilities for healthcare waste.

BS Waste Management

Martin Cruz, 25, meanwhile, used to intern at Kraft before joining food and beverage in their end form: waste management. Portalets and shit, literally. “One time, I joined the operations delivery crew in delivering portable toilets, or Portalets,” narrates Cruz, who works for them as a sales supervisor. “We vacuumed and cleaned them. I saw shit and sometimes it would fly back when clearing a clog or obstruction in the vacuum hose. Tumatalsik pa ‘pag may bara.”

A graduate of the University of Asia and the Pacific (UA&P), Cruz reveals that he got into waste when he joined a local logistics company. “I was then directed to work under the owner’s other company called Integrated Waste Management Inc.,” says Cruz. “Waste management was a path I probably never would have imagined getting myself into. Strange experiences.”

From time to time, he would also get to rotate to industrial waste. “We usually cater to pharmaceutical companies, where we use a big pyrolysis, an environmentally friendly incinerator. My company actually gets to destroy shredded paper bills from the BSP and illegal drugs from the PDEA as well.”

At the risk of sounding like some show on Discovery Channel, Cruz also assists in dealing with the collection, treatment and final disposal of infectious waste from hospitals, clinics, and laboratories. “I witnessed an actual hauling of infectious waste,” narrates Cruz. “You see blood in the storage area, containers for sharps, needles, blades, and big yellow bags filled with infectious waste being loaded into the transport van. And the smell — oh, man. For me the smell is worse than the waste from portable toilets and the industrial side.”

However, Cruz actually sees all this as some sort of “blessing in disguise.” “I find this job fulfilling because of how it humbles me,” he adds. “I work with people who are way less fortunate than me and yet, they find it in them to get by in life. Some even have it in them to keep smiling while they do it.”

Twice the fun: Al Chino Daquigan lives the dual life of both a sports trader and firearms dealer.

Sports Trader, Firearms Dealer

To end with, we have the two-faced life of Al Chino Daquigan, 26, who currently operates both as a sports trader for a European sportsbook company and a firearms dealer. “As a football sports trader, we offer different markets to betting customers for each game. Then, we price them up and adjust those prices accordingly as the games progress,” explains Daquigan. “My family’s also into the firearms business. We sell guns to qualified citizens and handle processing of different papers like licensing, permit to carry, gun transfer and the like.”

If this sounds any sketchy, the former real estate agent is quick to point out that everything is legitimate: “We don’t offer henchmen services nor do I fix football matches.”

When it comes to the customers he works with overseas, he is fascinated by the “multitude of filthy rich people around the world.” “Single bets can amount to as big as a high-end two-bedroom condo unit,” he compares. “Some people simply don’t care if they’re losing more than $200,000 a year. The recent Euro 2012 finals had more than $300,000 placed in total, and that’s just in a single game. Where do they get all this money? Makes you wonder.”

Daquigan also implies that it’s not enough that you obsess over mainstream sports. “Your love and knowledge will be tested especially in lesser known leagues like the Indonesian Premier League, Chinese Women, Belarusian Youth League, and so on,” he enumerates. “I watch the games and see to it that I offer the correct prices in each market. This is very, very important, as the slightest of mistakes can spell doom, and that is hundreds of thousands of unwanted bets.”

 Despite the social risk of unconventional work, the strangest thing for Daquigan seems to be the time it took for him to heed this calling. “Sports has been and will always be my passion, and a corporate setting was never my thing,” he admits. “My job gives me free access to this amazing world of adrenaline. I love what I do, and I don’t have to wear a coat and tie doing it.”

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