I read, with interests, article in New York Times about how young Greeks going back to the land, in the face of economic hardship in the country. This is not unlike what's happening in Japan, as reported in New York Times two years ago, in the depth of economic recession, that young Japanese are increasingly resorted to working in farms.
There is something comforting about the physical labor in working the land (or sea). It's physical since the work can sometimes be back-breaking; yet the products are so real. One reaps the harvests from the labor one puts in. Naturally it has to come with the blessing of Mother Nature. When it comes to that, when humans are working in harmony with what Nature would allow it, the notion can even be romantic.
Yet one shouldn't overtly romanticize the need to subject oneself to hard labor and the mercy of Nature. Such has always been the hope and dreams of forebears, working hard in affording better education for their children so that the younger ones do not have to go through the kind of hard labor that they have to go through.
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My parents went through those same thought process, and they succeeded in sending my siblings and I to college, seeing to it that we all have good jobs, a more comfortable life, and a more secure future.
Sometimes though, things do not always happen the way they would have wanted it. Like the Greek mother noted in the article, she works hard to send his sons to college to be engineers. Now, with economy going down the drain in Greece, all the sons become unemployed. Still, she has not wanted them to go back to the village and the land since that would represent a big step backwards, and all her life efforts would have come to naught.
The same goes through my parents' mind. Among our five siblings, we all started our career quite well. But my brother's career was cut short by an downsizing effort in a bank some 10 years ago now, when his whole department disappeared. For a while, he was onto more lucrative contract work. When this recent recession hits in 2008, the contract ended, and he has not been able to find anything comparable to that. It matters little that he has expertise in both accounting and IT; when companies don't want to expand payroll, they don't take on any new staff and would cut headcounts to conserve cash.
One of my other sisters went through similar snag, though with a twist. She was in senior management in audit when she was sabotaged by one of her staff who has much bigger ambition to push out my sister so as to get herself promoted to head the department. My sister had not realized that this woman was curry-flavoring with senior management and backstabbling her. When the news came, it's a total shock. Still, the result is the same when she hits the bump in her career. Unlike my brother who is still trying (with no luck so far) to land other job offers, my sister decides to become a full-time stay-home mom, and turns her focus to starting her own business when her kids get a bit older. I'd say, good for her.
From my parents' perspective though, the speed bump faced by my brother and sister, though originated from different sources (my brother's loss being totally out of his control due to company reorganization and outsourcing, while my sister's loss was due to office politics and power play), it's one and the same. My parents are sad to see that their kids' careers are cut short or hindered in any way. They went through physical back-breaking labor when they're younger, and they would not have wanted to see their kids going through the same.
Sometimes, I do feel that my generation is not as tough as the bygone generations of my parents' who have gone through much toughness and the wars before they found their footing, established the families, and set their children to a smoother path. As such, we (or at least I) are much weaker than they are physically. Most of us are weaker (ie. not as tough) mentally as well. Take my brother as an example. After his initial loss (from the company's outsourcing decision), he never really bounces back completely. For a period, I suspect he suffers depression (albeit mild one) due to all the rejections from job search. While my sister has switched gears and moved on with her life, I can't say my brother ever got over that hump.
Personally, while my career has been going quite well, as with my two other sisters, sometimes I wonder how I would have handled it, should I encounter the same snag as my brother and sister (as with so many others who are currently unemployed). I know, deep down, I do share this sense of insecurity (particularly the one shared by mom), that all these that we work so hard for, can be snatched away in a split of seconds. Afterall, company policies change; economies go through highs and lows. We could be flying high in one instance, and be let go the next day. Do we really have much say in it?
Precisely because of that, I've always been working more than one job at a time since I was in high school. Whether the job is part time, or full time, what matters to me is, I have a plan B. I'm also relentless in making conservative investments that provides me with income stream. I don't do this out of concern of retirement; I do this more because I worry about loss of income before retirement. My sense of insecurity pushes me to secure financial independence since a very young age.
And, I can't get too comfortable in any one particular job, as it was the case with my sister, when she thought she was in a good position, senior management and all, with her own department and team of staff.
Along the same line, I'm unable to be a big spender either. Don't get me wrong, I don't live miserly. I like make charitable donations as I believe in lending a helping hands to the less fortunate ones.
This keeps me on tiptoe, even in the best of times in the economy, and it has served me well so far. At least with the economy going down, I'm able to snatch up bargain investments at rock-bottom prices in the past 2-3 years which are now roaring back. (Albeit all the talks of groom and doom, some investments like certain real estate and stocks, are actually quite a bargain in 2009/2010, but it's getting overpriced again now.)
There are times when I even contemplate getting a bigger place with a tiny plot of land, so that we can learn to till the land in manageable chunk. Last year when we visited friends in their farm in rural Virginia, life is peaceful and straightforward, though it's by no means cheap. It can be an expensive proposition to till the land extensively, what with all the infrastructures, farm equipments, labor and all. I grew up in the city, and by no means, I would survive by just farming alone. I know that much. I do want to learn the life skill to live a simple life, knowing more about the food (rather than just buying from supermarkets).
I wonder when I might be able to put that idea (of tilling my own tiny plot of land) into action...
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