Wala ka pa sa realidad #02

[The following is lifted from WHAT HAPPENED IN 3 YEARS SINCE I GRADUATED? in 5 years in UP—just posting the particular section as a separate entry for the Wala ka pa sa realidad series I want to continue. This version has additional yaps and edits.]

I didn’t go home to Laguna after my graduation in UP Diliman. I stayed in Quezon City and started looking for jobs. I remember applying for a management trainee position at an oil company, which did not work out even after passing various interview stages, an aptitude test, and a random concept presentation before a panel. I used to share that journey on my Twitter account, which was naturally deleted after I missed reactivating it within the allowable time. 

I took a social media detox as soon as I became officially unemployed, deactivated my accounts like logging out was not enough, and uninstalled them as well for my sanity. It was almost depressing, as my allowance had stopped; my parents were no longer obligated since I had just finished school. I accepted the reality that I would be burning whatever was left in my meager savings unless I found a source of income.

Of course, I did apply to the major media companies. Funny, GMA replied recently, after 3 years, since I applied for an editor position as a fresh graduate. The reply seems automated, and they might be refreshing their system LOL! I got an offer from VIVA for 16k. I almost continued despite being below the minimum wage (upon checking our thread, the formal offer was apparently 18k, but my memory remembers the lower figure, perhaps from the initial phone interview). Securing employment is a test of patience and mental health—let alone economic standing—more days went by silently with no progress from the hundreds of job applications I sent through LinkedIn, Jobstreet, Kalibrr, and directly to company emails. 

I was not unfamiliar with the reality of a graduate of film, or media, or communication, or the arts vs science discourse in the country ("There is no money in the arts") and in general. I knew, and I was living it. For the record, I didn’t subscribe to the notion that UP graduates get employed more easily or quickly. Perhaps for some, that might be the case, hence the stereotype. But I knew it was not always the case for everyone; it cannot be. Or maybe I was not just cut for it. Is it my speech disorder? Lack of a better undergraduate experience? Of course, the reasons I conceived were to put the blame on me and my incapability, but later I realized it was also the system’s fault. It was slow, ironically competitive, and traditional. I’m talking about my experience in both corporate and government structures. 

I had an interview experience where the interviewer mocked my asking price of 20,000 (I deliberately lowballed myself after a series of failed applications with an asking price of 25k or so). He said, “Iho, nung panahon ko, 13k lang ang salary for entry-level jobs. Saan mo naman nahugot yang 20k?” I just kept my smirk, tried to justify something for nothing even I knew I wouldn’t proceed with that kind of people anyway. Fun and depressing times, indeed. 

FIRST EMPLOYMENT

After two months and due to my financial condition that I was running out of money and getting depressed, I accepted a job offer that paid minimum wage. I had no better option unless I borrowed money and waited out other pending applications (which, in hindsight, I should have! But time was a luxury I could not afford. My pride also did not allow me to go home conveniently and just simply stay with my parents.) I chose that offer even I knew there was a certain and better job offer coming, or did I? Well, I was receiving callbacks from my pending applications on my first day at my first job!

The role was an assistant editor, and the site was in Pasig City while duty was 6 working days a week from Monday to Saturday. I detailed my onboarding here: Wala ka pa sa realidad #01
After 3 months, my job description changed—not a promotion but an “update”, as the new contract explicitly stated—and I became a content associate with a slight pay increase. We were basically producing video content for e-commerce (aka online shopping, aka TikTok, Shopee, etc.). 

The term was a 10-month fixed contract. The boss liked me—too much that I essentially earned bargaining power, which I thought I must exploit, if I was already being exploited, right? In my final month, I was up for regularization and promotion—a rare case, the HR claims, but is willing to do so at my boss’s discretion.  But I wanted to negotiate if I were to stay.

I had 3 terms: 

• salary increase (of 50%, which they agreed), 
• change the working days from six to five (which they rejected but eventually adopted a month after I left), and
• an across-the-board JD update if not promotion of my team (which HR explicitly frowned upon as I did not have the powers to ask according to them)

Little did HR know that all my terms were already on the table with my boss, the owner of the business, and the creatives team. I was merely trying to speed up the process so my boss would finally honor her word; it was her business after all. However, in those latter weeks with the company, for some reason my boss and I had stopped communicating directly, and administrative matters were left with HR and other managers. I was left to wonder whether things would have worked out if only we were able to talk directly like we used to before.

Well, that’s how capitalism works: business interest over employees’ welfare and benefits. I couldn’t get all my demands, but it was a sacrifice worth taking as my co-workers now enjoy a 5-day work week. I just hope they are finally paid better today as I can see that my boss’s business is still alive, if not thriving.

Some time (& tsismis) later, I learned that I was called a rebel, that they wouldn’t hire someone from UP anymore if it were only to be an activist or disruptor like me. Good riddance, I guess. I would have built a workers' union if I had stayed as a regularized employee. Hahahaha! If the chika were true, thanks to my other co-workers who tried to defend me in my absence and recognized the contribution, if not sacrifice, I made for the team. They didn’t ask anything from me or for me to fight for them, nor have I asked anything in return; my terms might seem selfish (are they?) but I only wanted better conditions for everyone. 

SECOND EMPLOYMENT

I have no regrets because a month after my unemployment and mass-applying again, I got job offers. Unfortunately, I was faced with the same dilemma between waiting for better ones or accepting what’s available. Sadly, living from paycheck to paycheck or with the little above the minimum wage I earned from my first employment, I was not able to save anything to sustain me for another month or so. Again, I had no better options but to secure a source of income as soon as I could. Again, my pride took over and made the decision. Again, I could not afford the luxury of time to wait any longer. 

I took the marketing associate position with a work-at-home setup at a top IT-BPO company over a contract of service (COS) project officer position at a government think tank. The salary was the same as my asking salary if I had stayed in my first job. So somehow, I felt vindicated for not staying since I would earn the same amount I wanted, if not a little more due to other benefits, in my second employment. 

Both follow a corporate system but this time, I was only doing one role. If I haven’t mentioned it yet, I worked an end-to-end content production in my first job and assumed multiple roles, working six days a week. Now my main JD is copywriting under the creatives team of the company’s marketing department. It was life-changing, literally and financially, because I only work 5 days a week from the "comfort" of my home! I only get to see my workmates at least once a quarter of the year. Worth mentioning, one of the company values is challenging the status quo—the total opposite of my first job which disliked it. 

FREELANCING

This was also the time I entered online freelancing by offering my editing services. Having a remote job that respected working hours was also the reason why I was able to help produce the short films even after I finished college. I had more time and have been utilizing the 2 rest days that I did not have previously for creative and personal pursuits.

If you're interested in my service, you can check my video editing portfolio here.

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Wala ka pa sa realidad #02

updated 14 August 2026

Wala ka pa sa realidad series is a "chronicle" of my life after college. But let me use the word "chronicle" loosely (because I can't think of a better term now) as I might share stories from different periods and not necessarily in order of when they happened—or consider them "snippets" as I reminisce or try to relive both the good and the bad: from poor government transactions as a fresh graduate to office politics that I encountered or about how I navigate living independently. Simply put—my reality—with all the mundanity and contemplations that come with it. 

The series title came from the common condescending phrase or ageist mockery by people who "knew better" than us just because they are older and we are younger. And each entry may or may not prove them. 

Read 

Wala ka pa sa realidad #01