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An Afghan minister who became a bicycle courier in Germany
- baybal2 5y agoNajibullah's finance, and defence ministers are famously working in Moscow as taxi drivers.
- aww_dang 5y agoNot sure food delivery would be as stimulating as express documents, but I have fond memories of my days as a bicycle courier. I'm sure it is just rosy retrospection, but if I only had the two options I would choose messenger over politician in an instant. I often pitied the lobbyists and office workers. It was a carefree time.
- refurb 5y agoDude knew when it was time to wash his hands of the whole thing.
- kazinator 5y agoBetter a courier than dead, any day.
- dogman144 5y agoThe DoD used to hire Afghans who could speak English to train soldiers in certain scenarios. Common instances of this included civil engineers in AFG who couldn’t get licensed here, that drove Uber and spent a few months training Americans somewhere in the Louisiana woods to make ends meet. Such a waste.
- baybal2 5y ago> Common instances of this included civil engineers in AFG who couldn’t get licensed here, Welcome to reality of 3rd world immigrants to the West. Near complete untransferabbility of career, skills, and credentials.
- AdrianB1 5y agoIn IT the skills are very easy to transfer, it is an area where formal education and certification matter the least. For doctors there is a path for getting board certifications, not easy but it is done a lot. For lawyers there is no career transferability because law is the most heterogenous domain around the globe and expertise in a country is not applicable in other jurisdictions. Most skilled labor like plumbers, electricians or constructions can transfer most of the knowledge, having to do adjustments for local practices and regulations. Not extremely easy, but doable.
- BoorishBears 5y agoMy father had no trouble transferring his education into getting his PhD. My mother's skills carried her to a doctorate in nursing My uncle's medical skills carried over well enough for him to be an orthopedic surgeon My aunt's carried well enough to run her own medical clinic in Norway Do you think they're learning to count sticks or something to get their degrees in other countries? Why wouldn't thinks as internal as learned skills transfer? Credentials might not map 1:1 but they're also backed by something... everything you learned to earn them
- ausudhz 5y agoIt's not transferable 1:1, some college / university are not even recognized abroad. I had a friend of mine from Thailand that couldn't get recognized her master degree in marketing in an European country. So she enrolled again to go through the same stuff she learned just to get the valid degree spendable in the county
- BoorishBears 5y agoMy comment is saying they're not transferable 1:1 right there... Even between first world countries they're not transferable 1:1, even within single countries they're not transferable 1:1 But the reality is your friend had an incredible head start going over the same stuff she learned. There's this narrative that high educated people form 3rd world countries all have to end up in menial jobs because somehow a doctor/lawyer/engineer/tradesperson from a 3rd world country is not knowledgeable enough to do anything else by 1st world standards, and it's more of a meme than anything.
- NonContro 5y agoIn many cases the qualifications are fraudulent, bestowed based on bribery or family connections. Those with legitimate qualifications can always re-complete the education in the new country.
- ausudhz 5y agoLike many engineers (mechanical, nuclear, electrical etc) were doing low paid jobs in the west when the east block collapsed. I guess it's what it's, in this situations better be alive and have food on the table than struggling to meet end meals
- baybal2 5y ago> were doing low paid jobs in the west This fails to mention that US plumbers were getting higher salaries than Russian engineers, or higher on average than most of people in the West. In my small hometown in Russia, everybody can't get more amused that the best wage for immigrants there is paid by agricultural college diplomas. The biggest mansions in the town are of: 1. local gang boss, 2. agronomists who went to US for work. (Russian agronomist salary was like 9000 roubles a month 15 years ago)
- ausudhz 5y agoYou also fail to mention that not everybody is driven by money. Russian engineer and scientist knew pretty well that they could get better life conditions in the US for example, yet they decided to live their life in Russia. These are personal choice beyond what me or you think about, need to be respected. So said, many researcher today are paid very little and they could get a better pay in private sector yet they don't bother to.
- sandworm101 5y ago>> yet they decided to live their life in Russia. These are personal choice Really? Anyone who thinks that America, or anyone else, has any sort of open-door policy towards immigration is kidding themselves. Setting aside whether a Russian engineer would be allowed to leave Russia, the process of immigrating to another country is never easy. It costs money. Lots of it.
- ausudhz 5y agoIt was (and still is) lot easier if you're a scientist or a skilled worker. > whether a Russian engineer would be allowed to leave Russia Why not? I live in a country that is not US nor Russia and I know few very good Russian engineers. They worked in US too, some of them returned to Russia eventually. So I don't understand where you get your basis. People are allowed to leave Russia they're not trapped (not to mention the many I've met when traveling was allowed)
- lu4p 5y agohttps://archive.is/qgwI2 https://archive.is/qgwI2
- Rompect 5y agoRemember that this guy already has had British citizenship, but he decided to immigrate to Germany despite the language barrier and not being a citizen.
- AdrianB1 5y agoLanguage is probably the biggest roadblock in getting a job in Germany and most people ignore it. German is not easy (my grandmother was a German teacher, some of my family members are of German descent and none of us is speaking any decent German) and Germans are more xenophobic than they will ever admit. Even in my American company meetings with German people sometimes we have very awkward moments when the Germans switch from English to German mid-talks, even if they are peers or lower ranking than the non-German speakers in the discussion.
- quonn 5y agoSo Germans speaking their own language in their own country is now xenophobic? (referring to your first paragraph) It‘s true that with the exception of big companies or certain industries much German is spoken at work. Exactly like Spanish in Spain, French in France, Italian in Italy or Portuguese in Portugal. I‘m German myself, mostly living outside Germany. I try to fit in as good as possible, including making an effort to learn the local language. It would never cross my mind to think of a country as xenophobic because they speak their own language.
- BoorishBears 5y agoThere were two statements: - Knowing German is important - Germans are more xenophobic than they care to admit Why are you forcing them to be one then attacking that false premise?
- quonn 5y agoBecause these statements are logically connected in the form of an argument and even an example is giving.
- chmod775 5y agoI order food just about every second day, with a lot of it being delivered by 'lieferando' people. This used to be mostly young people: think students and high schoolers. But lately I've been greeting mostly people looking to be 40-50 at the door. I've been getting used to it but the first few times I was surprised. I think this is the motivation behind the article: People aren't expecting anyone older than say 25 to do this job, much less the former minister of a country, but I suppose times are changing. Let's hope this equates to better pay. High schoolers who get rotated out every six month won't exactly be the best at negotiating or even think of unionization efforts.
- serial_dev 5y ago> Let's hope this equates to better pay. High schoolers who get rotated out every six month won't exactly be the best at negotiating or even think of unionization efforts. I am not optimistic. Will the older immigrants (from many different countries) who don't speak German well, don't have connections, don't really know their rights, and don't have any other options be better at negotiating and unionizing?
- CryptoPunk 5y ago>>High schoolers who get rotated out every six month won't exactly be the best at negotiating or even think of unionization efforts. Artificially raising pay above market rates leads to higher consumer prices, and massive deadweight loss from greater unrealized production/earnings. Between 1870 and 1900, when there was no minimum wage, or labor regulations to empower unions, US wages doubled in inflation-adjusted terms, while US industry expanded and became financially healthier. This was very much unlike the post-war period, where US industry was running on borrowed time, making increasingly burdensome concessions to unions that led to huge bankruptcies and retrenchment in the 1970s in many industries.
- vharuck 5y agoA better explanation of the growth from 1870 to 1900 is the Second Industrial Revolution[1]. This was a short period of massive changes to logistics (better railways), society (electric lights improved factory productivity), and what was even possible to make (improved materials and precision machining). Labor only comes into the story because less labor was needed to make things. Wages went up because productivity shot up. I would be more convinced if you showed two similar nations who had very different outcomes during the 1870s to 1900s because of wages. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Industrial_Revolution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Industrial_Revolution
- xutopia 5y agoAm I the only one bothered by the use of dual and duel in the same article as if they were interchangeable?
- kazinator 5y agoCould just be a typo or autocorrect. A spell checker with no grammar features will not catch this since both are words.
- prennert 5y agoMarginally related: At least one US senator works as an Uber driver. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/nov/13/ben-sasse-uber-driver-nebraska-senator https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/nov/13/ben-sasse-ub...
- trhway 5y agoa movie about similar situation "House of Sand and Fog" https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0315983/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0315983/ . The US where the movie is set of course isn't Germany, it is more socially stratified and the "job is a job" is much less applicable here.
- markmark2021 5y agoToo bad the article was a fluff piece. There could have been a lot more depth to the story, the value of health, of not being motivated by position or title, of keeping yourself mentally and physically busy as one works through a transition. One thing the article only hints at is he doesn’t speak German! Of course he couldn’t find a job in Germany. I think this guy is going to be OK. He knows how to market himself at least.
- helloworld11 5y agoWell, at least this speaks well of him not having been a corrupt minister who stole whatever funds he could during his tenure and stashed them in portable or overseas wealth. I'd find it hard to believe him fleeing to Europe with much money and then deciding to work as a courier just for kicks or cover.
- farseer 5y ago1. The guy knows the value of hard work. 2. The guy was honest and didn't embezzle funds to retire in luxury. I believe he will not only be ok but thrive.
- saargrin 5y agohow does one "move" to germany? doesnt seem like he's a refugee , especially if he left long before current taliban debacle
- fleur-de-lotus 5y agoHe should go to the UK. Learning German and reach fluency at his age is a daunting task.