1. College Years – Interviews

 

And then it was graduation / I was afraid to leave university (Gi Hyeong-do, “During college”)

 

▲ "Stability," Word Extinct in Our Era ©Bbobboseu

I could have remained in school longer. Many were pushing back graduation and ‘preparing to prepare to get a job,’ but I was making a considerable effort not to be among them. I couldn’t think of a suitable place to go to, and I didn’t even have a place I wanted to go. It seemed like a waste of tuition to push back graduation, but to graduate and have to introduce myself as unemployed felt more insecure, and my parents could support my jobless life a few years more. Above everything, though, I didn’t want to add their lack of preparations for their later years into my own worries. In the end, I graduated after four and a half years of school, having meekly taken only one semester off.

 

With my last semester in front of me, and after lurking around fields such as alternative education for youth, magazine publishers, Internet portal sites, and large companies—meaning that I thrust my letter of self-introduction at anyplace that looked okay—the tenth company contacted me for an interview. The email informing me of the time and place of the interview said that a neat outfit would be fine; a suit was unnecessary.

 

After turning my closet inside-out and creating a neat outfit in my own way, I arrived at the interview place only to see everyone dressed as if they were taking graduation photos or had just run out from working part-time at a wedding hall—the women were dressed in white blouses and pencil skirts, sitting with their knees together, and the men had neckties tightened against their necks and were looking at their shiny shoe-tops, sitting with their legs spread apart to an appropriate degree. Everyone had read the email but must have agonized over how neat was “neat,” and whether they would fail the interview by being the only person to wear jeans.

 

Replying to the request to introduce themselves upon entering the interview room, the people, as if agreed on in advance, started to spill out introductions they would have never done in real life, in a clear voice as if they were reading books: “Hello, I am OOO, whose head is full of passionate enthusiasm and whose heart is concerned about the development of this company.” I felt as if I were facing a question in a test covering a field I didn’t know. Like everyone was solving math problems when I had prepared for an English test.

 

But as the interview went on, it seemed like no one in the interview room knew how to get chosen; even the interviewer didn’t seem to know how to choose well among the interviewees. Since no one knew, everyone couldn’t help but fumble. I ended the interview, kicked myself once or twice, and for some reason, got the job.

 

A total of nine of us were picked by public recruitment. An ambiguous number that is less than recruitment for big businesses but large for smaller businesses. Two people have left, and now only seven people remain. According to other people, our case is one in which many people remained; usually more than half leave, no matter how many people are chosen at first. Including the six-month trial period as a paid intern, I am facing my third year at work.

 

2. Office Life is an OX quiz 

 

*OX quiz: A kind of game in which a question with two possible answers is asked, and the people who give the wrong answers are “out.” The game continues until only one person is left.

 

Omitting explanations of the preceding and following circumstances, I was transferred out from the company I entered and am now working at another company. As a joke, I could say it was an employment scam, and to put it objectively, it was indeed an employment scan. To go to work one day and discover that your desk had been moved to the building next door—it might seem like an urban legend, but it is what happened to me.

 

The company was friendly. Starting from the interview, they told us in advance, “You may have to go to a neighboring company. Is that okay?’ And all the people who were wearing suits had answered that it was. I had as well. Who could say no in such a situation? It wasn’t an issue of the right to choose yes or no, but an O/X problem. If you were wrong, you had to leave.

 

The workplace I belong to right now is an online shopping mall that buys and sells fashion products. The first job I was in charge of that wasn’t running boring petty errands was to upload the banner image to the online advertisement account and send emails to the members. The contents of the image and emails changed everyday, and I was in charge of filling in the contents and checking whether they were right.

 

One day during the time when I was still making a lot of mistakes, an error occurred in the banner that gets updated every day at midnight. It was in a place where tens of thousands of people would look at every hour. The issue was not resolved until noon, and during that time, my boss and I were dragged around and humiliated by all related departments. Afterwards, I occasionally woke up sweating at midnight and checked the website through my phone; only after that could I fall asleep. Rather than the dilemma over the job not being right for me, the fact that someone could have a hard time or have to work more because of me made me feel suffocated.

 

A few moths before becoming a full-time employee, an intern was cut. Not fired, or allowed to resign, but cut, something that still rankles whenever I think of it. The designers that are hired through subcontracting businesses are frequently replaced. Non-regular positions and interns are classified as replaceable people. There is no ‘big boss’ in the office, but there is hierarchy. By being silent over getting rid of someone, I have been contributing in making people tools.

 

3. The Reason I Remain In the Company

 

The first monthly paycheck I received after becoming a full employee was equal to the amount of money I had earned working a part-time job while taking a semester off. When eating out, I didn’t have to worry about the prices on the menu, and I could also give my mother some money. I repeatedly added and subtracted the meager balance in my account to see whether I could earn enough to rent a room above ground level when I turned thirty. Right now, I’ve given up on making a studio apartment in Seoul mine with the salary from this fair-sized business.

 

I do think about not staying in this field for a long time. But if I go to a new field, all the work experience I’ve accrued until now will become nothing. And this environment of being guaranteed the minimum of evening time to myself and not having to get hit with an ashtray because of my work performance keeps me here. This place is uncertain, but outside, I can’t even see in front of me because of the fog. Some of my coworkers say they are still happy while others say they are just doing what they have to do.

 

Recently, my life motto has become fixed to “Why not give the company a few years, since I’m going to live until I’m a hundred years old.” Every morning I tell myself that I won’t do too much, and although I will give as much as I can, I won’t give it my all. The company has taken my health and my future, and does not promise anything about my life afterwards. Many people go to work every day because they feel anxious, and every day many quit their company as well.

 

Anxiety is a strange thing. Once you take one step away from it, it’s nothing, but you can’t bear to take that one step. When I first started looking for a job, I thought 1,500,000 won [1,410 USD] a month was fine, and that I would never work overtime at night no matter where I worked, and I was determined to do something helpful to the environment and to society, but now, I’m worried about medical bills that will occur if I ever fall sick, and about my later years which are still far away. Every evening I ask myself not to become a monster out of anxiety. Stability is an extinct word to our generation.

 

4. A Life That Has Evenings

 

Even if one is anxious, one must play. Trying to enjoy my life as much as I can is good for the earth and the community and for myself. The things I want to do these days are dancing, writing, playing instruments, doing nothing, and indulging in romantic relationships.

 

▲ I swing like a pendulum between what I can do and what I want to do, and every day I find the balance that fits me. ©Bbobboseu

After I come home from work, I go dancing at least once a week, play instruments, occasionally go to writing groups, and very occasionally I go to gatherings where we get together and laugh and drink for no reason. I had thought dating was only something one could do when you were young, but looking around me, that doesn’t necessarily seem to be true. In the mornings I get up with fatigue, thinking, just kill me now, but at night I go out again. I comfort myself with the thought that one doesn’t have to make what one likes to do into a means of living.

 

You have to do what you can, now. Some choose to quit office life, and I have chosen to be a bat for the time being. Until now, I had thought that I had to choose between what I could do and what I wanted to do. These days, I swing like a pendulum between what I can do and what I want to do, and every day I find the balance that fits me. If it’s too hard, I give up. If it’s manageable, I do it. If it’s fun, I continue to do it.

 

I heard some nonsense once about how you need to swing back and forth a thousand times to become an adult; anyway, you never become an adult. We’ve already fulfilled our share of a thousand times when we were about ten years old. Although I’m already swinging, I will swing more fiercely and actively. That is what I can do at the moment. [Translated by Rose]

 

*Original Article: http://ildaro.com/6803 Published: September 5, 2014

 

◆ To see more English-language articles from Ilda, visit our English blog(https://ildaro.blogspot.com).

기사 내용과 관련이 없는 글, 욕설을 사용하는 등 타인의 명예를 훼손하는 글은 관리자에 의해 예고없이 임의 삭제될 수 있으므로 주의하시기 바랍니다. 댓글 작성 시 상대방에 대한 배려와 책임을 담아주세요.

• 닉네임
• 비밀번호
• 
• 도배방지 입력