As a very young child, I often desired to have everything that I found amusing; obviously, my parents couldn’t always afford my wish lists or everything I set my eyes on. This always got me frustrated because I thought that “money grew on trees” and my parents had no reason for not getting me what I wanted or “needed”. Don’t get me wrong or anything, when I behaved and did well in school my parents got me what I wanted to a certain extent. When I grew a little older I realized, that in fact money does not “grow on trees”.I learned that my dad couldn’t buy me everything, and I also reduced my wish list. Even after that I still didn’t completely understand expenses.
I knew about tax and insurance expenses but the concept of it wasn’t completely clear to me. Thanks to the “Real Games” unit, I now thoroughly understand all the expenses of my household, it really makes me think twice before I ask my parents for anything now a days, considering the cost to live in peace and luxury is so high these days.In this essay, I will discuss my extensive journey through the Real Games unit and how it has matured me in such a short period of time, teaching me all the expenses to live and treating me as a real adult in a real world atmosphere. In the Real Games unit, the career I was assigned was a Biomedical Engineer, sounds fancy huh? Well with the salary I was paid, an individual could really start living fancy.
My gross monthly income is $6000. 00 a month, with that salary; you could really live life without a worry. I work around 50 hours a week, which isn’t that bad.Although, I get 3 weeks of vacation time, which was a big bonus to me! I was greatly content due to the fact that I had a longer vacation than most of the people in my class. One of the best parts of my life is that I get to live with 3 good friends. In our middle sized apartment in east side Scarborough would live Abishan, Anzar, Arjun and I.
The benefits of living with my friends is that I’ll always have someone to talk to, we can divide our chores which makes living a little easier, also one would never feel alone or lonely.Not to mention the fact that I’m saving so much money on rent considering I’m only paying $250 to live in my apartment. With the money saved I can invest in stocks or many other things such as bonds or even save money to start my own business if that is a lifetime goal for me. I also have plenty of leisure time! Over 7 hours a day! This gives me plenty of time to work overtime if times get hard or volunteer! Most importantly I get tons of time to spend with family and friends’; having this much leisure time is a big bonus for me considering I absolutely love spending time with people like my family in life.
I drive a Toyota Corolla 2010, this is both a pro and a con, it’s a very fuel efficient car, and after all, Toyota is renowned for their fuel efficient and long lasting vehicles. I had a lease takeover on my car, which saved me a sufficient amount of money. I would pay $250 a month for my car, until winter 2014, which is when I would pay a whole amount of $3000 to completely own the Toyota. There are many perks to having a Toyota, other than its fuel efficiency, the insurance is quite low on my car also. Considering it is a very cheap car, the maintenance and insurance is really low.I’m only paying $400 dollars for maintenance.
I’ve discovered that saving money instead of spending it all is worth it. I mean, I could afford almost any car on lease, but I chose to cut back and save money so when the time comes I can put the down payment on a house or even buy it on cash! I know many people who did the Real Games and saved little to no money because they chose to live a very lavish lifestyle. The only downfall to my car was that it wasn’t the most high end or luxurious car out there, but then again, I was attempting to save money.In the Real Games unit, although my life may seem very ideal, there are some factors to it that are kind of a downfall, such as living in an apartment with four people, it’s an amazing thing, but like everything and anything, it has its downfalls. You may not always get along with the people you are living with even if their your best friends, and their lifestyle may be completely different from yours, you never actually know how a person really is until you start living with them, and it’s really hard to just move out because it is sort of a commitment you have made to your friends or roommates.For example, what if one of your friends can’t afford a higher rent cost? Well after you leave it is obvious that the rent will increase per person, and if that puts your friend in problems, quite frankly, I wouldn’t be able to live with the guilt.
There will also be many conflicts when you try to entertain guests, considering that there are 4 adults living in a little 2 bedroom apartment. You’ll also have a hard time finding your quiet place in the home to study or just think. Income tax is very high, I’m not exaggerating, 35% of my annual income goes straight to taxes.Although, the money I give to tax does go to helping Canadian citizens and services it still leaves quite a hole in my pocket.
Compared to our “neighbor”, The United States, the cost of living is much higher, from income tax to insurance. Although I have a cheaper car, my insurance is much higher than it would be for the average person in The United States. I pay over $200 for insurance a month, while the same vehicle’s insurance in The United States is would be around $70 a month. Life as a Biomedical Engineer has its pros such as good vacation time and a very sufficient salary, although it also has a few downfalls.
Quite frankly, at this time in my life, I wouldn’t even consider becoming a Biomedical Engineer because after reading how my typical day would look like, it just seems very boring. Don’t get me wrong, it’s better than sitting in a cubicle and working on a computer all day but, it still is very boring. All I would do is test, maintain, and prepare for new machinery while also training other employees. Personally, I like a job where I’m not stuck in a cubicle or training employees. I’d rather have a job where I have new challenges every day that better me in both my profession and as a human.Something that excites me each day and keeps me happy, I don’t know about anybody else, but I don’t think becoming a Biomedical Engineer is such a fulfilling career or something that could change your mood, because I would want a career where I would look forward to the next day of work instead of dreading it, even if the salary, vacation time or hours aren’t the best.
The location of our apartment also isn’t the best; it’s located in east side Scarborough. The community of that area isn’t the safest.Although, there are many nice, upscale neighborhoods in Scarborough, the place our apartment is located is more of a subsidized type area, which is a reason why our rent is so low, even before splitting it amongst the four of us. Safety is a big concern, even though we’re adults in the real game we still have to fear gang violence, robberies and kidnappings. The regular hours of my job aren’t bad; in fact it’s pretty good. However, the fact that I could be called after hours or on weekends to fix medical devices really doesn’t suit me, I believe the weekend should be dedicated to yourself and your family, not work.
Imagine you just made plans or are on a picnic with your family or just spending time with someone in general and you’re called to the hospital and must drop what you’re doing and go to work. No amount of money can make up for time you spend with family or friends. A subject I must be strong is, mechanical drawing, although this may seem like a very childish con, I am not the best artist. When I choose a profession, I would like to be a professional at it, and master every element.Mechanical drawing is a big part in this profession and I just wouldn’t be an excellent Biomedical Engineer if I wasn’t an excellent mechanical drawer, or excellent in any of the other subjects related to my profession. Some people, like me, just aren’t good artists, my sisters are amazing artists, but I on the other hand, just wasn’t blessed with the talent.
The journey through the Real Games unit was honestly so educational and fun. It really gave us a heads up about how the real world is, rather than us being shocked when we graduate and enter the actual real world.I’m very glad we were introduced to this topic because I didn’t know how many expenses and complications there were to living in the real world, a couple individuals could not afford to live in my class because their salary was so low. They would be buried deeper and deeper in debt if they hadn’t took their career up with our teacher. The career I was given had good hours, vacation time and salary, but it just wasn’t compatible with the person I am today.
I can’t imagine the boredom one would go through spending all day with machines and training employees.I would rather have a more exciting and intriguing job that I would look forward to each day. I learned so much this unit about life, it’s unbelievable, it like I was living under a rock the past 14 years! My favourite element in the Real Games was the fact that we actually learned how life would play out after we graduate and such, we were treated as adults and were given financial and personal challenges throughout the unit, it was quite different from what we are used to learning, it was a creative blend of both language and media literacy.I didn’t like how we weren’t able to complete all the activities in the Real Games, because I was really looking forward to learning more about life when we’re older because I genuinely think a topic that describes our future is very intriguing and exciting. I’d like to conclude my essay by expressing how much I liked this unit; I believe this was the most interesting topic our class learned this year, not only in language and media literacy but the most interesting topic amongst anything we learned in any other subject.
The ability of showing us what our otential future could look like was such an amazing idea because it seemed that everyone was greatly interested in the topic. This unit slightly prepared me for the future and equipped me with the general knowledge I would need to survive as an adult. I also hope to be approached with similar units in high school to make my high school experience more interesting and so there can be a change then regular book work which is not as interesting or creative, and I believe that introducing this unit to our class was also a good idea because students tend to do more well on topics they are interested in rather than topics that cause boredom.
