Working for a living

Yesterday, I chanced upon this article on the Finnish broadcaster YLE's website. It features a fresh graduate Liu Tianyan in the tough job market.

I met Tianyan last autumn while covering a university-linked event. He was the President of International Student Organisation (Tsemppi) at the University of Helsinki and at that time, was pursuing a Masters degree in IT. He seemed like the sort who excels academically and busied himself with student activities and part-time work at a software company. He was good-looking and presented himself well.

Tianyan is Chinese. His family came to Finland some years ago. I remember his father was a diplomat and his family left when the posting came to an end. He chose to stay on in Finland partly for the free education and also because he wanted to be with his girlfriend, who was Finnish.

In Singapore, students with this kind of record seldom have trouble getting a job. Most times, they would have received offers even before graduation, sometimes even several to choose from.

Last autumn, Tsemppi arranged a get-together for students concerned about life after graduation. At that time, the economy had not plummeted so the students' anxiety seemed, to me, just normal for people preparing to enter a new phase of life. Things took a turn for the worse by Q4 and as time went by, joblessness of young people below the age of 25 became a social problem for governments worldwide.

Soon after that Tsemppi event, I dropped an e-mail to a professor from NUS who had helped me land my first job. Hearing those students made me realise I got things easy, so I'm grateful.

All these years, I have also kept in touch with my boss from my first job, who had been a great mentor, continually offering sound advice. As I come to the end of my summer course and we talked about intellectual property protection, I'm reminded that my ex-boss tried to persuade me to take up a second degree in law since the IP law is a lucrative, not to mention respected, profession. I turned down her best of intentions because I didn't really want to go back to school. Did I regret my decision? Not exactly because it wasn't what I want to do, but in view of job opportunities, I am probably more employable as a patent lawyer than as a writer.

At this point in my life, I am blessed that my family and I can lead a good life even though I am not contributing to our household income. I am happy I can spend time with the children and do things I like. Many other families out there can't have this luxury.

But I won't likely remain like this. My team mate from the summer course could tell that I won't be staying at home long, even though we've only known each other for 2 weeks.

I am in transition. The past 5 years feel like a long transition. Now that the summer course is coming to an end (tomorrow!), I wonder where life brings me next.