Y has been working really funky hours the last couple of months and by ‘funky’ I mean knocking off anywhere between 10pm and 4.30am most nights and working through Saturday and Sunday (albeit from home) most weekends. To be honest, I’m getting a bit tired of the relentless hours – just because I understand it doesn’t mean I have to like it. Besides, this can’t be healthy and I’m being proven right by his frequent sore throats and “I feel like I’m getting sick” remarks.
I’m not the only one to have commented on his recent lifestyle – his parents are pretty convinced that this is all wrong. Y reckons it’s partly got to do with the fact that they want us to start a family, but his mum said something that really struck me the other day – “It’s not worth it to be working so many hours on that pay he’s getting.”
Now I’ll be the first to say not all of us do what we do for money – I am in the magazine industry, after all – but even I have been tempted to say the same thing on occasion. And what it really means, I think, is that it might actually be okay for Y to work these extended hours if he were getting an investment banker’s salary, for instance; if he was getting paid enough to justify the hours he’s putting in.
How very Chinese of us.
Does that mean it’s okay to work obscene hours if you’re getting paid a lot of money? For starters, I’m pretty sure investment bankers are being paid for their skills and their brains; not for the hours they end up working. And at what price does it become okay to work long hours at the risk of jeopardising your social life/family/health?
I’m not naive; I am fully aware that a lot of people give a big chunk of their lives towards achieving a career, often sacrificing any or all of the abovementioned, and that is why I understand that Y needs to do this. It’s his job; it’s the nature of his industry; it’s his career. But really, at what price does it all become okay? Is there a price that makes it okay? Should there even be a price in the first place?
i’ve always wondered that myself – like joining a MNC so as I could earn more and prepare me for the future ie marriage bla bla bla but I figure, I don’t think I could stand the whole long hours, political smuck thingy. I guess sometimes we’re better being contented with what we like to do despite peanuts pay.
agreed. that’s why you and me are doing things like timekeeping and scorekeeping eh ;)
From what I gathered, Y has definitely found something he is passionate to work on, which I think you should be proud of. Sometime it doesn’t really matter whether it’s the peanut pay you are getting, but the love for the work can really say something about one’s character.
I guess sometimes, we just have our “chinese-ness” in us that money is the most important factor that drives you. But not all of us, it seems.