RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

For­mer Petrotrin work­er Jael Ca­bal­lo-Shep­herd learned a valu­able life les­son a year af­ter Petrotrin closed its doors: “Do not de­pend on an or­gan­i­sa­tion for sur­vival. In­stead, de­vel­op your skills and your God-giv­en tal­ent.”

Ca­bal­lo-Shep­herd shared a sto­ry of re­silience and for­ti­tude which led to the set­ting up of her com­pa­ny, The Nur­ture Nook Spa, based in Co­coyea, San Fer­nan­do.

Un­like many of her col­leagues, Ca­bal­lo-Shep­herd said she did not re­ceive a cent in sev­er­ance ben­e­fits from Petrotrin de­spite be­ing em­ployed at the com­pa­ny as a tem­po­rary work­er for five years.

“All I got was my back­pay which was owed to me but they said I missed the num­ber of days to qual­i­fy for re­trench­ment and so I did not get a cent,” she re­called.

Hav­ing suf­fered through the or­deal of re­trench­ment, Ca­bal­lo-Shep­herd us­es The Nur­ture Nook to make peo­ple feel good about them­selves. She of­fers restora­tive mas­sages, wa­ter­less med­ical pedi­cures, and sug­ar­ing, a nat­ur­al way of re­mov­ing ex­cess body hair.

“When peo­ple think about foot mas­sages, they think about it as a lux­u­ry but it isn’t. Even though the econ­o­my is bad, peo­ple need to take care of them­selves. Peo­ple need to re­alise that things will go well for them when they feel good about them­selves,” she said.

Ca­bal­lo-Shep­herd said she recog­nised the im­por­tance of self-care long be­fore Petrotrin closed. She ex­plained that her son was on­ly five months old when Petrotrin fold­ed and in the ear­ly days she was wor­ried.

“We were con­cerned about what we would do, about fi­nances and about how we were go­ing to take care of our son. It was un­easy but things worked it­self out for us here,” she said.

Sit­ting on a chair and smil­ing hap­pi­ly, Ca­bal­lo-Shep­herd said she fo­cussed her en­er­gies on re-tool­ing, re-train­ing and re-en­er­gis­ing her­self.

Be­fore the com­pa­ny’s clo­sure, she did a course in med­ical mas­sage with the Pearl Gopaul School of Mas­sage Ther­a­py and when the com­pa­ny fold­ed, she threw her en­er­gies in­to fur­ther­ing her skill.

“I be­gan do­ing foot mas­sages. In March this year, I got my cer­ti­fi­ca­tion as a qual­i­fied body sug­ar­ing prac­ti­tion­er from Alexan­dria Pro­fes­sion­als and I got my Cer­tifi­cate of Achieve­ment Diplo­ma from Im­pe­r­i­al Feet. I al­so got cer­ti­fi­ca­tion to be­come an au­tho­rised dis­trib­u­tor for Im­pe­r­i­al Feet,” she said.

Now many peo­ple, even those with­out jobs, go to her for mas­sages.

“I try not to have high prices for mas­sages. You have to keep do­ing it to feel the ben­e­fits,” Ca­bal­lo-Shep­herd said.

While she is now able to make ends meet, Ca­bal­lo-Shep­herd said she had­many close friends who were out of work when Petrotrin closed. She said some who were giv­en jobs faced vic­tim­i­sa­tion.

“There was a stig­ma to work­ing at Petrotrin. Peo­ple would say don’t bring your Petrotrin at­ti­tude here,” she said.

De­spite the chal­lenges she faced, Ca­bal­lo-Shep­herd is thank­ful for all that she learned at Petrotrin. She still finds time to work part-time for a com­pa­ny as a da­ta en­try clerk and al­so to con­tin­ue work­ing part-time at an­oth­er spa.

“I learned how to per­se­vere and make things work de­spite all the chal­lenges. I am do­ing three jobs right now but it is worth it. These part-time jobs helped me to buy the equip­ment for my spa.

“I am thank­ful for every­thing that I achieved in one year with the help of my hus­band and my fam­i­ly,” she said.

She urged young peo­ple to find a skill so they could do things for them­selves and al­so for oth­ers.

Peo­ple in­ter­est­ed in vis­it­ing The Nur­ture Nook Spa can con­tact Ca­bal­lo-Shep­herd at 347-3383.