If
you caught the
mistake, you could
have a wonderful
career ahead of
you as a phone-book
proofreader.
Phone-book
proofreader. It
always struck
me as the world's
most boring job.
Maybe there is
some satisfaction
to be had: the
utter joy of coming
across your own
name, or the chance
to stick it to
someone you hate.
What fun to be
able to tell people
you're on a first
- and last - name
basis with everybody
in town. After
20 or 30 years
on the job, all
those names and
numbers might
become so familiar
that you don't
even have to check
them, because
you've memorized
them. What a great
party trick, to
ask a stranger
his name and respond
with his phone
number.
And
of course, there's
satisfaction in
knowing that your
work - a little
tedious though
it may be - is
vitally important.
Make one mistake
and the policeman
at 742-5897 will
be getting calls
for the drug dealer
at 742-5987.
It
takes a certain
personality to
do this kind of
work.
Burning
with curiosity,
I went out in
search of phone-book
proofreaders,
all the way to
Ramat Gan, to
the office of
Moshe Miller.
Miller,
production manager
at Golden Pages,
deflated my expectations
right off the
bat: the ג€white
pagesג€ are not
proofread - not
in this country,
anyway. Does that
mean one hapless
David Cohen will
go through life
under an assumed
name? (Or perhaps
he really is
David Conen, lost
forever in that
vast sea of David
Cohenness.) Yup
- at least until
Cohen or Conen
himself notices
he's been mislisted.
The
ג€yellow pages,ג€
on the other hand,
are proofread,
but compared to
the monotony of
proofing the ג€whites,ג€
this work is positively
glamorous.
ג€It's
boring,ג€ admits
Miller.
There
is variety in
the job description,
such as checking
contracts, and
feeding data into
computers, but
sometimes there's
nothing to do
for several weeks
but go up and
down the columns,
from the first
page to the last,
from alef to tav.
ג€Other
things keep the
people happy here:
a pleasant social
atmosphere, good
working conditions,
nice work stations.
The workers operate
a self-management
system. They make
decisions about
procedures and
set down their
own working guidelines.
They know what's
best for themselves,
and they make
recommendations
to the managers.ג€
says Miller.
On
the other hand,
it's a nine-hour
workday, and the
pay is not great.
Mind you, there
is a nice perk:
free phonebooks
for everybody.
Most
people stay on
the job for many
years, Miller
says. The company
record for a proofreader?
ג€Twenty years.ג€
Miller laughs.
ג€Unbelievable,
eh?ג€
ג€This
is not a job for
a macho type.
In fact, I've
got 20 proofreaders,
and they're all
female. We've
tried to enlist
men for the work,
but it's futile.ג€
ג€The
work requires
a relaxed type
of person who
cares about accuracy,ג€
one proofer says.
ג€There's not a
lot of action
here.ג€
ג€Never
laugh at the people
who read the phone
book, because
I write it,ג€ says
Mindy Nudelman,
48, formerly a
Toronto teacher.
(She refuses to
divulge her phone
number.) One of
the three staffers
in the English
department (Golden
Pages also puts
out versions in
Arabic and Russian),
Nudelman has just
finished a masterwork:
a translated collation
of every single
Tel Aviv-area
business, 40,000
of them, from
IBM to Yossi's
Toto booth. By
the end of it,
she felt not unlike
a Torah scribe
jotting the final
letter to a scroll.
ג€It's
always been the
back part of the
Hebrew directory,
a few piddling
pages. But now
we're going to
have a 900-page
directory. A great
deal of the mistakes
in there are mine.ג€
English-language
directories provoke
inquiries and
complaints from
the public ג€“ not
about name spellings,
but street spellings.
ג€We
go by logical
English spelling,
not according
to Ha'akademia
[the Hebrew Language
Academy]. People
called up and
said ג€˜hey, how
come you spelled
my street like
that if the sign
outside my house
spells it differently?'ג€
Nudelman
allows that maybe
her profession
is not the most
invigorating.
ג€My brain cells
die here,ג€ she
says laughing.
But the job does
have its moments.
ג€You
try and find the
amusing things.
Like one translator
who couldn't get
the short form
for the word 'boulevard.'
So instead of
'blvd.' it came
out 'bulv.' So
one of our directories
is full of bulvs.'
I dunno; perhaps
to a proofreader
that's really
funny.
ג€Another
one I remember,
there was a photography
shop that wanted
to say they have
a messenger service.
The owner wrote
something like
'massage boys
deliver to hotel.ג€™
We weren't too
sure what the
customer wanted.ג€
(She might have
had a good laugh
from a legendary
entry some years
ago, in the Toronto
white pages. A
Jewish resident,
miffed that he'd
have to pay not
to have his name
in the book, stuck
it to the phone-book
company by being
listed as 'Gaykakken
Offenyam,' Yiddish
for 'Go take a
crap in the sea.')
Does
she think she
has the boringest
job in the country?
ג€No.ג€
All right, then:
what's more boring?
She
thinks for a moment.
ג€Washing dishes.
That's gotta be
more boring than
this.ג€
OK,
dishwashers of
Israel, there's
soap in your eye.
Your calling has
just been named
Most Boring by
a phone-book proofreader.
What
sez you? What
do you think is
the most boring
job in the country?
We're looking
for ultra-excruciating
tedium, the kind
of work you couldn't
do for two minutes
without going
gaga.
Send
your thoughts
for a future column
on the subject
to Sam Orbaum,
The Jerusalem
Post, POB 81,
Jerusalem 91000,
by fax to (02)
531-5622 or by
E-mail to sam@jpost.co.il
.
Please
include your name
and phone number,
and specify if
you don't want
your full name
published. As
usual in this
column, discretion
is far from assured.
