Getting a Real Job

The idea of pretty soon having to go out and get a real job is scaring me. Will it be a problem that I finished university more than a year ago? Will I need a higher command of Japanese than what I’ll have at the time? Will I need more experience than I have? (I don’t really have any experience.) What will I do if I can’t get a job in the field I want? I realise this is the kind of angst a number of my friends have gone through and while I don’t mean to belittle theirs, I feel mine is compounded somewhat by being in a foreign country and being married. Rui isn’t exactly dependent on me but I do feel some sort of obligation to provide for us.

And even if I find work, what if I hate my job? Then what am I going to do. While I have two degrees I could theoretically use to seek employment I’ve never been very confident about putting myself out there as a computer programmer. Not to mention the fact that I’m pretty sure I’d enjoy that less as an occupation than something legal-related. Frankly, if I did do anything in the IT world I’d preferably like to be working in web development. But I have no experience in that apart from what I’ve done in my own spare time and, thanks to the infinite wisdom of the School of Information Technology at the University of Sydney, almost no formal training.

It doesn’t help things that seemingly everyone I know from law has some sort of high-flying job with a legal firm or a consulting firm or an accounting firm or failing all of those: the government. All the while, I toil away trying to teach vocational high school students English.