Fernando- former colleague.
Portugal born and raised.
Met in the year 2019- March, no spring time at all. Raining most of the time.
Sitting next to me. He had started 6 months earlier.
He spoke no word of Spanish or Italian.
He helped me only the first 6 weeks of on- going training and mostly job.
Moderately tall- curly short brown hair- elegant coats during winter time.
Sitting in front of 2 monitors- like me. Workstations.
Patiently waiting the smooth incoming call- HE- from Portugal and Brazil.
He started 2 hours later, and left 2 hours later than I did without saying a single word.
Later shift.
In the morning the brown and curly hair young man arrived with wet wipes to disinfect his desk,
monitors and phone.
Only in coming call at the begging of our shifts from India to say the following: ‘’you look idle’’, disconnect the Avaya phone and reconnect.
Extremely thin- elegant jackets- curly brown hair- with headphone on his ears to listen to music.
Fernando- I could barely hear what he said to the end- users- criticizing from time to time them.
Arriving with a Thermos full of coffee- hot coffee- and a straw. A piece of chocolate.
Making comments about the job- escalation and content-from time to time.
Once just because I asked ,he confirmed that he had his parents living in Portugal- and a sister.
Fernando came to Belfast with an internship of 6 months. Studied 2 years of IT in Portugal.
Fernando – a big saga book he used to read in the office when calm.
Fernando – we worked at Easter day and Easter Monday in the Office- 2019- 2020.
I only made him a comment once since his English was a bit unclear- foggy- he replied once annoyed that he was trying to help me.
Other than that- all fine.
He never made comments about my way of dressing- talking or listening or deodorants sprayed here and there. NEVER EVER.
Fernando- complaining of the low pay we received with the agency, every single day.
Fernando’s mother had heart issues- young- the father still working – and the sister.
Fernando cooked his lunch in the evening and had it in the company’s kitchen on his own at 3 pm.
He purchased a guitar once- he brought into the office, just wrapped from the store. He was starting a new hobby.
Fernando – no further issues- they used to transfer by mistake from India in coming calls in Spanish- language he was not able to understand, once even in Italian.
‘’Your extension’’ ?
The rest to connect remotely to end users’ desktops- No meetings- internal meeting – to talk about what? A waste of time. Only few trainings- with documents and carried out remotely to show the issue.
He- twice a week used to have lunch at a bistrot-he drove no car- he took the bus on his way back.
Fernando- got confused- one day when he mentioned the name of a French man that passed away 2 years earlier- I was no longer in contact with him. Damien.
It was not allowed to connect to our private emails- only reading the news. He was planning a 3-day trip to Dublin in 2020. Fernando looking for a more peaceful accommodation – with no issues with tenants.
He only had problems when we were sent home to work- he used to ask repeatedly to provide us with company’s laptops- instead of using our own.
Once home- a room- for both of us in different post codes- our Line Manager – Indian – connected remotely to our laptops to check if we met the requirements to provide support- only cloud and the browser was essential.
Service Now was working fine and later another wonderful Cloud platform- the Line manager wanted to know our ISP-
Fernando- no more direct contact with him- not even in chat- one every 3 months maybe- Craving to take his holidays to visit his family in Portugal.
Smooth remote connection- provided the link to down load and install the remote-control software.
Complains- about the amount of work assigned every morning. Increasing and increasing- Audit training twice a month.
At the end of the anti-project as it was called- I received a call from him- HE WAS MAD.
He asked me: SI have you noticed that there is other 3 people connected? I had noticed-
The company had closed in October 2020. Every thing remotely.
Fernando- he did not care if I went to smoke a cigarette- whom I was talking to- I never chatted during my job.
I met him only twice in the city centre-
Tall- brown curly hair- his big issue- he once asked me- acne- persisting seasonal acne- and hay fever.
He registered to have a public health card-
Once I called him to communicate that I was learning Active Directory on Windows server. New job. He was very happy since he knew I knew what it was. (My job lasted only 6 weeks).
Fernando in June 2021 had started a new job- hybrid- role. Indian company- Irish manager.
Once I visited him in the Office- they did not let me in- they said he was not there-that we might have a coffee during the weekend. Fernando- new job that lasted 2 years-
End of his job- 2023.
Fernando – tall- thin- brown curly hair. Very little conversation since then.
He drove no vehicle- I have only his mobile number- no contact anymore.
Fernando- the Portuguese- very good drawer- I remembered he drew very well faces and features- portraits- another of his hobbies besides classic guitar playing.
Fernando had only 1 or 2 Irish acquaintance, but mostly Portuguese ones- Portuguese friends.
We worked on our own. Fernando and I.
FERNANDO SLOWLY WALKING- eating- his nice birthday he never celebrated in the office- the 26th of February.
The only one to participate to the last and only from Belfast was ME- he had left – using Microsoft Teams – browser- nobody was expecting me.
SURPRISE! I told Fernando in a phone call in 2022.