The hunger for jobs and the lure of a glamorous career flying Air Jamaica’s ‘love birds’ yesterday sent thousands of Jamaicans, mostly young women, chasing after 25 positions as flight attendants on the national airline.

From as early as 4:00 am, five hours before the scheduled start of recruitment, job-seekers responding to newspaper advertisements, began to queue outside the Duke Street entrance to the Jamaica Conference Centre. By 9:00 am the line had snaked its way from Duke Street stretching over a block to Ocean Boulevard on the downtown Kingston waterfront.

The company, expecting between 600 and 800 applicants, ran out of interview tags after issuing 1,000 and registered another 2,000 persons, before it stopped accepting applications. But hundreds more turned up afterwards, some from as far away as the western city of Montego Bay, hoping to land one of the 25 positions Air Jamaica said it wanted to fill, in order to get back to its full complement of 500 flight attendants.

“We have been oversubscribed. We anticipated that it would have been a heavy turnout but this is an overwhelming response,” said a hard-pressed Beverly Hall-Alleyne, director of human resources at Air Jamaica.

“We are trying our best to facilitate as many people as possible,” she told the Sunday Observer as the job-seekers jostled each other outside the recruiting rooms.

Some of the disappointed persons were heard grumbling that not enough tags were issued and that the requirement of three to four CXC subjects was “too wide”, resulting in the crush.

“It felt like a cattle call…and people were out standing in the sun for hours,” complained Renee Johnson, 20 years old, who was not one of the lucky 3,000.

“The qualification range is too wide, they said that a degree would be a distinct asset but not a requirement, so they should have expected this many people,” said Johnson.

“Everyone can fulfill the basic requirements,” added Ravekia Stephens, another 20 year-old applicant.

Hall-Alleyne explained that open calls are done to make the interview process faster, incorporating the checking of documents and interviews all in one setting.

Air Jamaica eventually announced that it could issue another open call for interviews, if all the 25 positions were not filled from those who had made it in.

The huge turnout largely reflected the high rate of joblessness in Jamaica, a situation not likely to be eased any time soon, given the tight economic squeeze.

Figures from the state-run Planning Institute of Jamaica showed that 954,300 Jamaicans were employed last year this time, but the labour force could accommodate some 1,124,500 jobs.

A survey of consumer confidence released last week by the Jamaica Chamber of Commerce found that only one in five Jamaicans expected the job situation to improve during 2004.

A just released World Bank Study on Jamaica said that employment rose less than 0.3 per cent per year in the 10-year period, 1991-2001.

Dwight Lawrence, one of the minority of men who turned up, said he too came in search of something to do. “I just wanted a job, and I bet you that 80 per cent of the people here do not have jobs,” he remarked.

“I really just want a job,” said one young lady who was lucky enough to score an interview, but who asked not to be named.

But among the sea of job-seekers were many young women dressed as if they were attending a fashion show or entering a beauty pageant, suggesting that the perceived glamour of the job was a further pull.

Many young people see a job as a flight attendant as desirable, with the opportunity to travel the world and receive part of their salary in US currency.