Career Day Musings

(Back posted)

It's half past ten in the morning and only a quarter of the stalls are (wo)manned, with a grand total of three being ready for students passing by to descend. The geneticists are friendly but obviously not set into their spiel, their main drawing factor being the 3D glasses carefully arranged in tandem with silvered pens and rugged bottle openers. A chat, some pamphlets and a competition entry later and I'm walking away. Pocketing my retro cardboard specs I ponder if they suspect my true reason for grabbing one, matched with my recently repaired 'hero' coat my second step to emulating the Doctor was completed and my rabid fangirlism was sated for another day.

Later, after being decidedly snubbed by the Unilever stall, joy was the first most feeling as I watched the previously snobby marketing stall be expertly manipulated for freebies by a obvious natural skeptic. He simultaneously questions the validity of their existence at this obviously educational institute while charming them into plying him with goods in the same breath. As he leaves the simpering booth babes I curse my natural fear of such a barbed tongue as sincere congratulations for such a feat was surely deserved in my mind.

Pamphlets firmly attached to the swag, warm smiles and a slightly conspiratorial air signified those booths used to their business of self-sale. They stood out clearly in the banality of fanned brochures and $2 store lolly bowls, Cookie Time swathing their stall in garish cookie-patterned fabric, ensnaring students after luring them in with free cookies and plush toys. ASB covers the table in miniature blue piggy-banks and delicate embossed paper bags to take them away in, at once combining the old-time sense of elegance banks used to have and a blatant use of the modern trend of plastic kitsch that so litters our lives.

How do stall holders expect to gather students without freebies, piles of bland filers and a obvious preference to converse with their co-worker than actually selling their company's idea? Turned away bodies, crossed arms and delicate grimaces scream 'Go Away!' to any nearby, empty tables and awkward office workers encourage viewers to pass by, sometimes a someone is tempted close enough to snag a free lolly or pen. These stalls have given up before the Fair even began.

On the opposite scale are the bright posters exclaiming plenty of time to “Travel and Play in the USA!”, with student exchange schemes aiming to attract students overseas. It's no wonder we are losing our graduates with rising study costs, student supports being shut down and the general negativity projected towards University students. Such pressure is enough to drive away even the most staunch kiwi fan.

It is disheartening, this thin veneer of promises barely cover the reality of our individuality being burnt away by branding, of futures filled with bumbling office encounters and the never-ending stream of paperwork, paperwork, paperwork. Far from being inspiring, this Career fair makes you want to give into the inevitability of it all, swapping graduation caps for hairnets and lecture theatres for a slot behind a desk, your only distinction from those surrounding you a misspelt name tag on your embroidered polo-shirt.

But, whether or not such a future will prevail, we will see. The majority of us will graduate, our qualifications a glorified signifier of a willingness to persevere. In such times it is said you have to shine, and what shines most of all is change, change the script, change your style, change the rules. For who of the successful was ever accused of being normal?