LOL. Look at Firesysok's location:
"zone of the alienation". That says it all for him.
Alienation may refer to:
I think for him, it was the last definition. Too bad for him he is now a pasty faced weak pilot who resorts to petty bullying on Pprune to get his kicks.
Cathay is not perfect, but its a decent job. To hell with the idiots. The way I see it, the main point to consider is if you will be able to move around a bit. Especially in the beginning. Second, your not going to make as much money as others might allude to. Some other posters above have spent many years to get what they are getting. To get that you have to be a Hong Kong based Captain on the passenger fleet. That will take you 10-15 years minimum. I will go out on a limb here and say that you will probably make on average 60-80k USD to start, be based somewhere other than Hong Kong for your first 5 years and will pay tax where you are based or living. Count on 40%. The upside is that there is progression (albeit slow), and a solid career job.
English.... well yes you would need to polish your writing with any application correspondence. I admit Im not an English prof, but you should be able to communicate effectively. However, this is a loose forum and therefore who cares. Just make sure when you apply and write letters and such that you run them through a spell check and maybe your friends for proof. Once your in, your in. This is not a desk job where you have to write legal documents. You fill in the Tech Log and paperwork and such that a monkey could do.
Just because English wasn't your first language does not make you unacceptable to Cathay.
Another word about your last interview. In my view the Cathay interview process is entirely dynamic. That means there is a great amount of luck involved. The more you prepare, the more you mitigate the risks, but the law of averages will always rule. You could put the same guy through the interview 5 times with different people testing, and I guarantee he will fail once. So does it mean that if you passed the "standard" the first time and not the next that you no longer meet the standard? No. It just mean its a moving target and both parties do their best to make it fair. But thats where it ends. Give it another gentleman's try. You have nothing to lose. Just be serious about it.
When I went through, there were a couple of blokes that didn't get hire that in my mind should have, and a couple that should have that did. I saw from the inside, but HR could only see a snapshop from the outside.I have many a friend who are now very successful Captain's now at other equally prestigious companies that didn't make the bollocks "Cathay grade". Basically, the huge amount of resources and $$ spent on the assesment is a big waste of time and money. It could be done much easier and more efficiently.