Summer job blues (Suzanne)

So, I am back in Hong Kong, and first year is all over *sheds tear*. Anyway. I am rather strapped for cash, this year has not been kind on the wallet, and there are numerous things I have to buy in order to advance my education/job prospects in future (several of them being new instruments. Ah, music. Not only does it pay a pittance, it also costs a lot of money to break into the market). Therefore, I am searching for a job.

The problem, however, with searching for a job in Hong Kong is that a) the exchange rate between HKD and AUSD is not very good, so anything I earn over here will be worth nothing once converted into Aussie dollars, and b) Hong Kong jobs pay much less than Australian ones anyway. We have no minimum wage over here, and absolutely no conception of anything remotely like a welfare state (there are barely any labour restrictions – minimum length of full-pay maternity leave is six weeks here, vs a year in Australia, but also no tax unless you’re really rich and even then you only pay 15% max), so there are massive wage differentials – the top end earn a lot, the bottom end earn very little (generally this is mirrored with a large differential in the cost of living, so if you know all the places where you can buy cheap things you get along alright unless you need health care in which case you’re screwed). I remember before coming to Australia I was really excited at being able to get a job at a publishing company that paid the equivalent of three Australian dollars an hour; jobs such as the ones in retail in Melbourne that paid double-digits would probably have killed me from shock.

So anyway. I have mailed my resume to about 8 or 9 different places. The highest hourly rate I get off these (generally clerical work – I don’t speak Cantonese so retail which pays slightly (but not much) better is shut off to me) is about seven dollars an hour, and that would be an absolutely FANTASTIC salary for a summer job.

Actually, I did find one job advert for a temporary legal secretary that pays the equivalent of 24 dollars an hour, but it asks for 10 years or more of legal experience. I applied anyway because I think the recruiter is a bit out of touch with reality — if you had ten years of legal experience, you’d be looking for work as a barrister, not a clerk. Or at very least a permanent legal secretary so you’d get health insurance and benefits – what kind of person with ten years experience in a law firm looks for a temporary clerical job during an economic boom?

Y’know, if I didn’t have to pay additional rent to stay in JCH over the summer, I would really be missing Melbourne and its minimum wage laws right now.

Oh well.

In other news, the food back home is excellent as per always. I love how you can eat out all the time in Hong Kong for almost nothing. Hooray for $1 congee and $7 sushi lunchboxes (vaguely authentic sushi too, not the weird stuff with teriyaki chicken and avocado and chilli sauce in it – Chinese-made Japanese food is horrifically bastardised, but at least it actually contains raw fish – why do Australian fast-food sushi places always insist on cooking the tuna? I’m sorry, sushi with canned tuna is just plain wrong)