The Woes of Unemployment

Recently graduated, it was shocking that the life we had all dreamed about; of a comfortable paying job, with a modest car to get around and enough money now finally to take AirAsia trips with friends and enjoy life -- had to DIE!

We (a few of my classmates and I) took a slight break, maybe about a month after our studies ended, to just enjoy ourselves a little, take short road trips, with the balance of the PTPTN money we had. Little did we know, that life outside that Harrier 9 of us squeezed into for our epic journey down south, was a web of frustrations and connections and impossibility for job prospects.

As soon as we decided to find a job, and started applying for jobs in hospitals since it was a dream of many to work in a hospital setting; everyone told us that's where the experience is! But as we sent the emails of resumes, and waited for the phone calls that would call us in for the numerous interviews we deserved; none did! Nada, Zilch, ZERO phone calls!

Then slowly, the worry in us grew, we thought ah maybe hospitals are all just waiting a little while more to employ us eager fresh graduates. But then, slowly as time went by, still....NO CALLS! And then, one fun afternoon, after a lunch with a lecturer of ours, we found out that we were alone in this battle of employment as a lot of my other classmates were in fact employed and even fought over by a few hospitals and institutions.

We had to sit down and analyse what was wrong with us. The one obvious reason came up; we just weren't very Chinese. Apparently all employers of major hospitals preferred Chinese employees. I remember we were told numerous times that it just gels with the majority of patients that the hospitals drew in. I'm sorry, but we apparently weren't on the train that changed the national language of Malaysia to Mandarin/Cantonese. If Cantonese/Mandarin was so important (nothing wrong with that!) but then it should be implemented to be a compulsory language to learn in schools, so everyone gets equal opportunity.

Then the small centres that we did apply for jobs at, paid us so little that it was impossible to buy a car to travel to the centre and then pay our heavy debt of ptptn and also to be able to LIVE! Centres wanted to pay us RM 1500 even for a full day 6 days a week job. What utter rubbish!

Then we also found out, that it was impossible to obtain an interview in major hospitals that would most likely pay you a fair amount of money, without some connections. We had to make sure connections were sought out and effort was taking in making connections. The whole thing became so tedious, that all we could talk about when we met up, was how frustrating applying for a job as a Physiotherapist in Malaysia was.

The problem is that our government, ministry of education and ministry of health, never screens, never denies new colleges that spring up like mushrooms all over Malaysia offering courses like Nursing, Physiotherapy and many other allied health science courses. With no control over the number of diploma graduates being produced every year in these fields; Malaysia has done what seemed to be impossible; saturated the field of allied health sciences so much that you see unemployed physiotherapist as well as NURSES. Two jobs that are highly in demand almost anywhere else in the world. Bravo!

With diploma graduates of nursing and physiotherapy being produced in the thousands only around KL; jobs are becoming more and more scarce and because it is so saturated, employers now know that they don't need to pay very high as much as a graduate deserves since jobs are so hard to come by, anyone would jump at the opportunity of the first job they obtain. So it starts; the payment of RM 1200 - 1500 for diploma graduates.

So now, what do we degree graduates do? We're all high and mighty convincing everyone we have to better than a diploma graduate but with no regulation in job designation of a diploma and degree graduate, why would any employer want to higher a degree graduate and pay you more when they could higher a diploma graduate and pay less? The set of skills we learn are almost similar in fact. But okay, so some employers have been hearing about a rumour of a Bill that might be passed station diploma graduates would be assistant physiotherapists and degree graduates only can be qualified physiotherapist, so to be safe, they hire a few degree qualified physiotherapists in hospitals and centres. But again because it's so saturated, and they need way fewer degree graduates than the ones that are produced; employers cap their pay at RM 1800.

So the vicious cycle continues, as we take these offers of RM 1800 and continue to go deeper in debts that we cant afford to pay off, cause cars take 10 years to pay off, ptptn loans take 20 years to pay off, houses take 20 years to pay off....we fall into the trap of leading a life full of debts till we finally die.

Dreams of travelling are slowly pushed aside, as we are now faced with a difficult question; to do what we spent the last 4 years studying and have grown to like and have passion for but earn peanuts, or to do something totally unrelated (like work in a call centre) and easily make twice the money and be able to travel and do things in our lives before we kicked the bucket.

I am saddened when faced with this question, as I feel no person should be but Malaysia has made this part of our lives. Many of my friends chose the latter, not by choice but by circumstances. We may get lucky breaks, but not all of us are that lucky. If this country does not change, we'd be stuck with our children and children's children worrying about the same thing and going through the same experiences as us, and unemployment would come to an absolute high that this economy and country would not be able to do anything else but crumble.

Soulmates.

I never believed in soulmates. I don't think there is the ONE for me, or I am the ONE for someone else.

Recently though, as the few last months of college life drew nearer something changed.Well a lot of things changed actually. 4 years suddenly felt like it had only been 4 days! And I started to realise as i looked around me, that i felt such an amazing closeness to my friends. It made me stop and think about these new feelings.

And in that short span of time, the bond that grew between us girlfriends was so overwhelming, so refreshing so  unconventional. We did not hold back in expressing our affections, our love and our flaws. And surprisingly, as I heard them all, I only had love, true undying love for these wonderful women.

I quickly realised that these women, these talented potential amazing women were , had to be my soulmates!

Could that be possible though? I was always told that soulmates were your romantic life partner. Yes my partner would definitely be my soulmate, i cant think of a reason why i would want to be romantically involved with anyone who isnt, but would he be my only soulmate? I don't think so, and I don't wish that to be so.

But that's all that's different really, the romanticness. I love my sistas but I am not as romantic with them but in every other way possible, we're so compatible. We understand each other, we click. They are everything I see in a partner for life! PartnerS. It made me realise all my previous soul sistas that I wish i made the effort to express myself to.

Soulmates were not meant to be gender specific, they're just meant to be the most perfect, amazing people you can see spending the rest of your lives talking to, laughing with, laughing at, travelling, sharing and having a companion that understands you and is as compatible as anyone can possibly get! Regardless of gender, regardless of romantic-ness, regardless of physical/sexual attraction.

It's been an awesome journey these couple of months! Journey filled with self discovery and new found love for the amazing people around me.

I've learnt to always show and express how i feel about my friends, and i've learnt to accept new relationships or rather new types of relationships and to think that it is possible that there may be 101 different types of relationships in this world that my feeble mind may not be able to comprehend,

as it has taken me 24 years to discover this.

Don't we all wish the world was You and I?

Everyone has their own opinions, I've heard. Some stupid, some reasonable, some exceptionally revolutionary! Ok i hear all the haters going who are you to say it's stupid? So this age old argument about people having the liberty to act as stupid as they want. say stupid things if they felt like it, do stupid things if they felt it was right, is a whole load of rubbish isn't it?

I mean, unfortunately, unless anarchy is to be achieved, and we all thought that if left rule-less and unregulated, human beings will be just A OKAY, we have rules for a civilised society. But the matter only arises because these rules differ according to the religion, and the culture we've all been through.

I sit here tonight soon to be the Eve of Deepavali, listening to Anthony and the Johnsons My Lady's Story and it has inspired me to write. I am saddened when i listen to such poetry in music, to such beauty in music that we live in a world with so much shame and many more repugnant voices.

It seems rather stupid that people with as stupid opinions as gay-haters, women discriminators, wrong do-ers in the name of religion...wait the first two has to do with religion too walk amongst such beautiful people and in beautiful places and amongst such amazing creatures of the land and the blue waters of the oceans. How something as simple as an idea, like religion which began centuries ago, has spread so widely that some of the worst crimes of hate and just pure evil has been committed in the name of religion. I want to coil into a hole where religion would not have made my life a struggling battle with the rules that keeps my mother in the kitchen and out of the senate, the rules that pushes the faces of my gay friends into dirt, the rules on how to lead my life in preparation for something none of us controls; death, and the rules that has lead the powerful to oppress so many weak and vulnerable that i think of as i read about their stories.

I would only have the inspiration till the end of the 10th loop of this song to write about something i wish if i don't get to experience, my children or their children will be able to. I desperately want to believe that we are capable of change, that poetry and music will thrive and reach to as many people as it has reached, touched and spoken to me so many times and given me inspiration and faith. If only people were to seek faith in something more physical, more lucid, more real so we wouldn't all hide behind this illusion called God as we relinquish all our responsibilities to this beautiful space we occupy in this universe.

Seems ridiculous that we dismiss drugs that causes even the slightest of side effects, or a hair product that damages our skin in the process to long straight hair, or vote out senators and politicians that make decisions that affect our unforgiving economy but with facts in our faces and history repeated a billion over times proving how religion has evoked animal sacrifices, human blood shed, genocides, more murder, discrimination and yet we turn a blind eye, a deaf ear and muted mouth and pray for change!

Why wont we be the change that we so want? The peace we hope for as we walk out our doors? 20th loop over --- I think of a few great people that are only ashes now and think of what an amazing world it would be with them around but concurrently it seems the frustrations of this world is better left unburdened for the dead.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=35-RJ7NxFFY