jobs that working holiday makers do as these are the seasonal or short-term jobs that require a lot of labour force.
Even though the work could be tough, she believed she had found the work-life balance she wanted and discovered more of herself in the trip.
To many young people, particularly those from Asia, a working holiday in a western country means a break from the boredom and confusion in their working life. They pause from seeking career development in their home countries and go to explore and take up challenges in host countries.
A survey done by recruitment agency Randstad shows that Hong Kong has the worst work-life balance among workers in the Asia-Pacific region in 2015. About three quarters of the Hong Kongers have to take work calls when on holiday. Similarly, other Asian areas including Singapore, China also have a generally higher percentage than the 40 per cent in Australia and 27 per cent in New Zealand.
Besides, under Hong Kong’s examination-driven education system, it is difficult for teenagers to have a clear goal of what they want to achieve or work for if they have to enter the workforce after the public examination at form six.
According to a survey conducted by the Public Opinion Programme of the University of Hong Kong, about 70 per cent of the respondents aged above 18 believe that young people do not have a clear career development goal.
Ms Lam was one of those who would like to explore in a foreign country with the uncertainty. She expected and wanted to work at a farm or a factory before she arrived Australia.
Though work was instable and demanding, she enjoyed the life spending with foreigners in the first time in her life.
More than strawberries and bananas:
The cultural exchange and new way of looking at life with tough work
Picking spoiled bananas out of a big pool of them was one of Christy Lam Ching-ting’s jobs at a factory in Australia. Sometimes it was stressful as it was stuffy inside and she was always monitored by the supervisor. The repetitive process could be boring. And sometimes she had to put her hands inside the water for a long period of time that made her fingernail separate from the flesh.
Ms Lam was one of the working holiday makers who stayed in Australia for one year. After she quit her job as a clerk then an event organizer at an elderly centre in Hong Kong, she wanted to think about her future. She spent about ten months in Carnarvon, a small town in western Australia for work.
She said it was far more than just picking strawberries and packing fruits. Working on a farm or in a factory are some of the most common
Ms Lam was working with other working holiday makers for the quality control of bananas in a pool of them under the monitoring of a supervisor.
Ms Lam spends a lot of time in a small town Carnarvon for most of her stay working as a farm hand in Australia.
Working holiday originally aims to facilitate cultural exchanges between the host and partner economies when first introduced in Australia and Britain in 1975. For the programme implemented in Hong Kong, it also seeks to enhance bilateral cooperation and promotes tourism and development between the two places during the participants’ stay of one or two years.
There are no restrictions on the nature of work, but many of the participants end up working for low-skilled jobs since they are only allowed to work for the same employer for at most three or six months for most of the countries. This sets an obstacle for finding other jobs as employers normally prefer long-term employment.
Ms Lam said living in the working hostel with other backpackers was fun and warm. Never had a chance to live with foreigners before, she had a perfect environment to be soaked in a completely new culture.
“European and Asian backpackers were all living together. The friendships I built there were short, but they were all remarkable in my life,” she said.
They went out for fishing, barbeque and short-distance rides after work together. On festivals, they would cook food of their own country together. Through observing the habits and the way they talked, Ms Lam was amazed by her ability to distinguish people of different
In a working hostel, Ms Lam lives with people from various countries for the first time in her life.
nationalities by looking at them in the supermarket after staying for a period of time.
“Usually Germans can speak fluent English, Italians have their unique accent and you know they are Italians by looking at what they eat. Their names always end with an ‘o’,” she said.
Through her journey, she knew herself better. She said it was the reason why she became clearer of her goal for the future.
“When you come to another environment, you would be surprised by how you act,” she said. She had more reflections on herself when facing new situations.
Her way of life changed after coming back to Hong Kong. “I would still be hard-working to strive for what I want to achieve, but I also want a better work-life balance, which is what I learnt there.”
“People there can really take that balance, they work for eight hours a day, get eight hours of ‘life’ and eight hours of rest,” she said, “I wonder why I can’t do it when I am in Hong Kong.”
She said the managers in Australia provided “Smoko”, a period of time for employees to smoke or go to washroom, from time to time. “Even though working in factory was hard, they appreciated employees working over-time and provided additional pay for that. This was humane. We cannot get over-time payment in Hong Kong easily,” she said.
Another cherry packer Teow Foo Chuan, a Malaysian who went to New Zealand at the age of 29 in 2013, also enjoyed the life of working holiday so much.
“The life was very laid-back. It was rare that we had to work for a long time,” he said.
He said it was much easier to live in New Zealand comparing to Malaysia. “The kiwis do not rush for everything. But in Malaysia, one person shares two people’s workload; in New Zealand, one person deals with less work.”
He thinks that New Zealanders would not look down on low-skilled workers, which is different from that in his home country. “The mind-set is different when you are out there. Besides, it is not like a permanent job. It does not mean I am a loser if I am just picking cherries,” he said.
He believed that a lot of the holiday makers of this generation were tired of their work in the home country and could not make changes that they sought some alternatives. He found a permanent job as an IT software developer and stayed in New Zealand. He has no plan of getting back to Malaysia in his short-term goal.
Strawberries, bananas or cherries, are some of the important elements for these young adults in their process of pursuing their dreams, though the fruits did not offer a bright item on their CVs. They did not get a direct answer from working holiday and which sector they want to work in, but more of a lifestyle that they would live for the rest of their lives.
Ms Lin does not really put a label of a working holiday maker on herself and finds jobs that ordinary people will do. She works as a salesperson at Coach.
She finds the differences in work culture when she works in Canada for the first time.
Promoting cosmetics is also one of the jobs that she has never tried in Taiwan before. She cherishes every opportunity to learn.
The ordinary working environment for farm hands.
Working holiday without fruits
Not all of the working holiday makers have the experience of working in farms.
Sophie Lin Yin-chun is another working holiday maker from Taiwan who started her adventure in Vancouver six years ago. The journey started due to the same reason, hoping to stay away from hard toil.
She believes that it would be really difficult for her to get back to her previous life in Taiwan after she has got used to the relaxing lifestyle of the West.
Ms Lin did not have any overseas experience before she graduated from Soochow University. She took advantage of the working holiday programme with a desire to improve her English language skills and to prove with her eyes that westerners have a more relaxing life.
“People in Taiwan are too used to their stable life. Or I would say people in Asia focus too much on their work. Stability can be good or bad, but after you have been living according to a routine, you would lose competitiveness. If the company you are working for suddenly closes, you lose your world,” said Ms Lin, “You have to find your own path instead of following others.”
After the two years of working holiday in Canada, she continued this road in London, the UK, and currently in Dublin, Ireland.
“The greatest thing was to have found a lifestyle that I like. I don’t know about the future, but I feel great that I found myself through working holiday,” she said.
She said she learnt about how to present herself and be confident of her abilities. When she was in an international city like London, she had to compete with the best strivers from different parts of the world for job opportunities. “You would get to know about your strengths and weaknesses better. You need to be brave. And I tried to just get into the shops randomly and persuade others to hire me.”
She found jobs in the retail sector and worked with colleagues of different nationalities. She had never been a salesperson, a job that is not regarded as one for higher achievers back in Taiwan.
“In western societies, people working these lower-skilled jobs are regarded as equal to those professionals. If you are interested in working there, it is great and nobody looks down on you.”
To “share the local lifestyle” was found to be the most commonly chosen reason for embarking on a working holiday, according to a qualitative study of 60 Taiwanese backpackers in New Zealand and Australia by Professor Chaang-Iuan Ho in 2012. The second most common one was to “travel and work”, which means earning money for travelling.