Flip through the latest issue of Gulf Weekly.
When I complete my exams in early June, I will luckily have almost four months off before my university experience begins.
During this time, I plan on doing absolutely nothing and holidaying with my friends. However, my parents have a more productive suggestion for how I could be spending my free time.
My father always talks about how when he was a young lad, he had a job as a paperboy. Back then it was typical for people to get their first jobs in their teens, but I would say that this definitely isn’t as commonplace as it used to be, especially in Bahrain.
This isn’t to say that getting a job, especially as work experience, doesn’t still take place. Some of my friends in the UK have told me that their schools recommend getting some work experience and some even help their students to find jobs.
Unfortunately, I feel that the importance of work experience for students and teenagers gets neglected here in Bahrain. Of course, the range of opportunities isn’t as diverse here as it is for those living back in England, a paperboy being a prime example of this. However, living abroad should open up different opportunities and should therefore help us develop a unique skill, which would make us stand out. Sadly, this doesn’t seem to be the case.
