Being a twenty-something graduate in Singapore

I am obviously currently a twenty-something upwardly mobile Singaporean with a degree. 95% of my Facebook friends belong to this category too. Looking at the feeds of the things my friends are doing, I can’t help but see a pattern of how we as a social category live our lives. From my cursory survey of my friends and me, here are some things we do. Taking a Wittgenstein approach, not all of us do one common thing but any two of us will do one of these things.

1. Join and run some kind of marathon

It seems that we like to run marathons, ranging from “relatively short distance of 5km” (Oxygen magazine, August 2010) to the full-blown 42km, and even vertical marathons and bi-and triathlons. This stems from a pursuit of a healthy lifestyle in jogging regularly and pushing ourselves to some boundary. Also there’s that rush of adrenaline not only from the workout but also from the participation in such social rituals — we are social creatures.

2. Volunteer

Some of us have a good heart and weekends are devoted to volunteerism and other humanitarian projects.

3. Seek out good food

The keywords are seek out. Some of us relish prowling the Internet and streets for obscure, non-mainstream good food. Even if that means walking through narrow lanes in Bukit Pasoh, hunting down one restaurant in the middle of nowhere, making reservations weeks and months in advance … we do it. Part of the charm of such an activity is the rush from anticipation. We go to the restaurant, we sit down and whip out our cameras, take note of the names of dishes, and mentally draft our blogs and Facebook captions. The food isn’t all that matter.

4. Watch plays

Regardless if they are artsy blackbox productions or high-profile musicals, twenty-somethings like to attend plays. And some love it in the evening, where they get to play dress up and air-kiss acquaintances at the foyer.

5. Read non-fiction

Freakonomics, The Omnivore’s Dilemma, The Obama Diaries, Blink!, The God Delusion … books like these line our bookshelves. Reading non-fiction sometimes make us feel smarter and more worldly-wise. Plus non-fiction have higher conversational value; what are the odds of meeting someone at a social event who has read Throne of Jade?

6. Watch cable TV

Chances are we are well-to-do enough to have cable TV at home. No one watches free-to-air TV anymore. We hanker after commercial-free up-to-date movies, educational Discovery channel programmes, and TLC shows that unleash the wanderlust in us all. Which brings me to the next point -

7. Travel

We yearn to go somewhere. Anywhere. Preferably exotic. The unbeaten path. Or really somewhere to get away from our real lives, somewhere to rest and relax, somewhere to go shopping, somewhere to pretend we are someone we aren’t. Some of us can’t stand not going for vacation once in a while. We actually enjoy the planning and logistics, we love free-and-easy, and those whose shoulders can still take 15kg– backpacking. We cross out countries and cities on a list and we post pictures of our vacation on Facebook. Our inner wanderlust is not easily satisfied.

8. Have a religion

Some of us have a religion and we are fervent. These people go for religious classes, attending meetings, help out in the community, outreach to the lost and damned.

9. Drink

We drink alcohol, and not only during special occasions. Some of us meet for a TGIF weekly unwind, some more frequent. Some swirl cocktails and martinis, others beer or harder liquor. To us, shaken not stirred isn’t necessarily a joke.

10. Joke about sex

Regardless if we’ve been there-done that, we are able to laugh at sexually charged jokes, and even tell a few of our own. Some of us practically eat, live and breathe double entendres.

Evidently some of these things don’t take a 20-something to do but come on, look at your Facebook page and you’d realize many of your 20-something friends do at least one of those things.