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Article: One Year Out - How to Avoid the Real World

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One Year Out - How to Avoid the Real World

As graduation loomed closer last May, and friends were getting jobs or planning on attending grad school, I felt the pressure to think about my own future.  So, I thought about it for a while. Nothing any of my fellow graduates were doing appealed to me.  I didn't want to work in consulting or at a bank.  I wasn't ready for law school.  I didn't want to be buyer at Macy's.  I didn't want to join the "real world." I could only reach one conclusion: I did not want to start a career. What I did want was to be free, independent from any serious responsibility.  Most of all I didn't want to get stuck in a rut or routine that could last the rest of my life. 

I decided there were two options: Take what Douglas Coupland calls a McJob or work as an intern.  The McJob includes things like waiting tables, working in stores, and basically not using the full potential of your brain.  The intern option is often a boring, office job that includes mindless work, but can sometimes be stimulating and allows you to enjoy weekends and evenings.  This boiled down to the decision between moving to California and working as a waitress - I had lived my whole life in New York and wanted a new and different experience - or moving to a foreign country for a few months - I had never studied abroad and always regretted missing that experience.

I chose option #2.  I got a six-month work visa for the U.K. through BUNAC (British Universities North America Club).  Fortunately, through a connection I had at an advertising agency in London, I found a job working as an intern in Account Management.  The job was, well, horrible.  While I did learn a lot about advertising, I spent most of my time bored out of my mind, making color copies, cutting things out of magazines, or running annoying errands.  Nonetheless, as a whole I would highly recommend the experience of living in a foreign country.  I not only was able to live life like a British person, but I met people from all over the world.  I lived in two flats in my six months there with people from England, Australia, and New Zealand.  A friend of mine also did the same program, and found it to be an equally interesting experience.  She worked for Borders bookstore and lived with people from Korea, Japan, Switzerland, Italy, Sweden, and France. 

At the end of the six months, we both traveled extensively.  I spent 6 and a half weeks in Europe and a week in Scotland, while my friend traveled around Great Britain to Scotland, Wales and Northern England.  This travel time was just as worthwhile and enjoyable as the whole six months in England.  While I was travelling, I was never in one place long enough to truly live in a new culture, but the independence, cultural richness, and insights into myself and others are incomparable to any other experience I have had thus far.

I returned to New York for four months with plans to go to Australia at the end of August, this time with a four-month work visa from BUNAC.  I have already lined up a waitressing job at the Sydney Olympics and cannot wait for my next adventure to begin.

As my next departure date looms closer, I must admit that these four months at home have changed me in ways I did not anticipate.  I have come to the conclusion that after Australia I will be ready to begin a real career.  I do not know if it will be a career for life or just for a few months.  I still don't know if I might want to go to law school one day.  And I still am not sure what career I will try.  Nevertheless, traveling and seeing the world are experiences that I will always find important to defining my own sense of self, but settling down does not seem as terrifying and undesirable as it did one year ago.

Rachel Penski, a 1999 graduate from Cornell University and a research associate at Vault.com, will be leaving for the sunny shores of Australia in just a few weeks.  We hope to include her follow-up article in early 2001.