The Oct 06 Essays: I - The secret of HK

...The secret of HK... is truly based on a friend who is an example of many others. It is centred around the theme of working and existential crisis.

Existential crisis, derived from Existentialism, is the psychologic panic and discomfort experienced when a human confronts questions of existence. This phenomenon, presumably, is common to technologically-advanced cultures, wherein physical survival is not life's priority. (excerpt from here.)

This theme is central to many of my other writings, for example, also Mr Monday. The Oct 06 essays explores the theme too. I was jobless then.

There is a perpetual dilemma with working and not working. On one hand of the dilemma is the idea that I don't feel like working because of the inherent lack of relevance work is to my interest and I should just do what I want because life is short. On the other hand, I feel compelled to work because there's social pressure. This second hand is explored in the extract from the first Oct 06 essays. Here the narrator/perspective is desperately making sense of being jobless. It is as desperate as how he describes the jobfuls are desperate to make sense of working.

26 October 2006 (Thursday):
I am Jobless (Extract)

These are the few reasons why people who have a job are deemed superior to those who are jobless :

1) I work therefore I am. – Identity affirmation
Think about the average grown-ups’ “getting to know you” conversations:
“Hi, I’m Ju-Lyn. It’s nice to meet you.”
“Hi, I’m Sisyphus. Nice to meet you too.”
(Awkward silence follows if there are no cards exchanged in which case both parties will read the card and are taken aback by the size of the organization the other is working at or the position of employment, or both. Since I am jobless, I don’t have a card, so I can only receive a card from Sisyphus, Ex-King/Founder of Ephyra, Rock ‘n Roller.)
“Here is my card,” Sisyphus smiles.
“Thank you. I must apologize, I don’t have a card.”
“Oh so what do you do?”
“I am jobless.” I hurry justify why I'm jobless, or change the topic, otherwise the awkwardness would crush the both of us. Asking about Ephyra which I cannot pronounce will only undermine my position further. “So Wow, you are a Rock ‘n Roller?”

Why do we pretend that the word “Manager” or “Assistant Executive” give us any insight to that person’s life. What the hell man? I don’t know if it is just me, but look, these two terms help me understand somebody much less than “Married” or “Single”.

2) Work is cool! - Barrier of self-preservation and retention.

The workers subconsciously think, “Look if I have to work, might as well establish some snootiness about it. If I am spending almost all of my waking hours being a “support officer” I might as well be snooty about it right? If I don’t be snooty about it, I might realize that I don’t want to work and don’t like it at all if I quit then I will have no identity I won’t know who I am so, so, so let me over-compensate, I will be snooty! Let me gang up with all the snoots in my department, and then organization, and then the rest of the working world. I will work because it is cool!”

The workers consciously think, “Better complain about work because that will humanize me and let people think that I’m not snooty so that they will gang up with me to bully the jobless. So that more and more people work and less and less people will remind us how good it is to not work and enjoy life I better get myself more liabilities lest in moments of weakness I will quit and enjoy life and regret when life will still suck I am going to buy a car now!”

I wish I did not care about being jobless, but I do because I am afraid to take the road less travelled. But also, more of a reason is because I feel so left out. I want to work and be thought of as cool too.

3) Those who work are usually Richer than those who don’t. – Materialistically, and Spiritually.

My neighbour owns two red Ferraris and some other red sports convertible automobiles that I don’t identify but I know that it belongs to the same family because they have the same license plate number.

The truth is I know I don’t want to own so many cars ever in my life. Yet, like a faulty neuron embedded into my mind, I am envious.

Suddenly, the rich are like the new idols. Like how Ozzy Obsourne or Kurt Cobain, or Thomas Hardy or Superman are idolized. Now the rich like Donald Trump, or Warren Buffet are like bloody superheroes. It is like we want to be as rich as them.

If you have a job, you are like closer to our idols than me, the jobless. If you are closer to our idols than me, you must be better than me, the jobless.

--

Now, with these reasons set in place, how can I not be unsatisfied?
I have no identity. I am not cool. I am inferior to you, the jobful.