As a student, I must have been luckier with my summer jobs than your contributors (Labour pains, G2, 9 June), because from some I obtained useful practical experience, and from others money to help finance my postgrad degree. Except in a dried grass factory. The grass was ground to a very fine powder and poured into paper sacks containing about 25 kg. The sacks were not strong enough, and about one in five burst. My job was to shovel up the powder from the floor and put it into another sack. Within minutes I was looking like a Martian. All my clothes, even my underclothes, were full of the stuff, and I had fine green powder in every conceivable bodily orifice. After work I had a bath and the water turned green. I didn’t return for a second day.
Paul Brassley
Newton Abbot, Devon
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