In this cold winter (this winter is really cold), opening this editing page again brings back many feelings. It has been five months since I last wrote and published a blog, and it's time for another year in review. There is so much I want to say, but I don't know where to start. Looking back at the entire year of 2023, I can say it has been a year of many changes for me. This time, I plan to review the events of the entire year in the form of photos, which can be considered another form of a journal. Here comes a multi-image warning ⚠️!
Illness#
High fever
Nucleic acid test after home isolation
Since the announcement to lift restrictions at the end of 2022, I experienced the most severe fever symptoms since adulthood. At the beginning of January, I endured a high fever of 39 ℃. Looking back now, I feel scared; my whole body was cold, and my muscles ached. I thought I would be fine after the fever, but what followed was a cough that lasted for nearly a month. This was my first special "plague" experience. Opportunities to experience large-scale viral infections in life are rare, but the probability of such situations has been increasing recently. All I can do is try to endure each episode and do my best to prolong my life.
First Encounter with AI#
First AI avatar generated using Midjourney
Applied for Bing Chat
During the New Year, the topic of AI was discussed enthusiastically, especially ChatGPT and Midjourney. By reading various blog tutorials, I generated a unique AI avatar for myself using Midjourney. The avatar above is the one I have been using; not only here, but I also changed the avatars of all my social accounts to this one because I feel it fits my image quite well. Looking back over the year, the development of AI has been explosive, and various forms of AI applications are indeed affecting some people's lives.
For example, in areas I don't understand, I first let ChatGPT explain the background and introductory knowledge, then ask it to recommend learning materials for deeper study. During my daily coding, I often ask it to optimize my written code. It's not that AI is better than what I write, but it always provides unexpected optimization methods. Compared to searching for similar coding examples on Google, chatting with ChatGPT allows it to understand my thoughts better. It feels more like an entry to another treasure trove of knowledge, the previous one being search engines. Some people think such applications will replace programmers, but I don't believe that will happen. Just like the advent of cars, the ones who lose their jobs are often the drivers who do not actively embrace cars; those who embrace new things become more like Didi drivers. 😜
Little Ride#
The little electric scooter I bought
One major purchase this year was a little electric scooter. The reason for buying this is that the distance from my home to the company is a bit far, about 3 kilometers, and riding the little scooter to work is more convenient. Moreover, my partner takes the subway to work, and the nearest subway station is a 10-minute walk from where we live, so we decided to buy one as a means of transportation.
But you know, ever since we bought this little vehicle, our activity radius has increased significantly. Previously, we would walk everywhere on weekends, wasting time on the road. Now we can go out more leisurely, and we don't have to rush to catch a movie. We also discovered many places we didn't know about before, becoming more familiar with the areas within our living radius. However, this thing does have its downsides; it needs to be charged, and charging stations are hard to find, plus it's colder riding in winter. Despite this, our sense of happiness in life has greatly improved, making it one of the best purchases of 2023!
Concerts#
Zhang Jie concert in Wuhan
Listening to Jay Chou's concert on a rainy day
My first concert in Shenzhen
The first concert of the year was held in Wuhan, and a big reason for wanting to go was that Zhang Jie was having a concert there during the May Day holiday. It had been a long time since I last attended a concert, which was back in my undergraduate days. After nearly two years of working, I hadn't been to a single concert, and neither of us had been to Wuhan before, so we decided to spend this May Day holiday in this central city. I won't go into detail about the travel experiences, but to summarize, Zhang Jie's concert was definitely worth attending. The sound quality was top-notch, and his singing skills were truly impressive—like a walking CD (compared to the lip-syncing controversy that arose later with Mayday). However, during the public holiday when everyone is off, it’s better not to go out (after three years of pandemic, everyone was cooped up, and there were just too many people, making the travel experience very poor).
After the May Day holiday, Jay Chou held seven concerts in Hong Kong, and I took the opportunity to listen to the last one outside the venue (I couldn't get a ticket, and scalper tickets were too expensive). I must say, Jay Chou has many loyal fans. On a rainy day, a bunch of fans were outside with umbrellas, listening to the music and singing along, creating a great atmosphere. Next time he performs in Guangdong, I must get a ticket!
The last concert I attended this year was Mayday's concert. The reason for choosing to attend Mayday's concert is that my partner and I had our first close encounter at a Mayday concert, and it was also the first concert I ever attended, so this concert was quite meaningful, reflecting different stages of life. However, in terms of concert quality, it was far from Zhang Jie's concert; the sound was muffled, and considering the recent lip-syncing controversy with Mayday, the relationship between the two is self-evident. Nevertheless, the essence of a concert is the celebration of a crowd, and in that regard, it did deliver.
Travel#
First time eating Wuhan hot dry noodles
Immediately went to buy tea in Wuhan
Street view of Hong Kong
Victoria Harbour on a rainy day
Hong Kong night view on a rainy day
Macau casino
Street view of Macau
Dianchi Lake in Kunming
First time eating fried grasshoppers
First time seeing such a blue sky in Dali
Cycling along Erhai Lake, the weather is really nice
Sunset over Erhai Lake
The demand for travel has been suppressed for three years. After the restrictions were lifted this year, I went to Wuhan during the May Day holiday and to Yunnan during the National Day holiday. I also renewed my travel permits for Hong Kong and Macau, taking advantage of the holidays and weekends to visit Hong Kong and Macau several times this year. Traveling always provides an opportunity to rest, meet different people, experience different things, and create different memories. Overall, my travels this year were quite good. My plan for next year is to take it a step further—travel abroad (after all, I just got my passport). I went to Wuhan and Yunnan during the public holidays, while trips to Hong Kong and Macau were on weekends. These two types of travel timing show a difference; public holidays are crowded with people and long queues, but the longer holiday allows for more playtime. In contrast, weekend trips are more leisurely with fewer people, but the time to enjoy is shorter. It's hard to balance, the helplessness of a working person.
Accidents#
Hand injury
First time in a police car
Because I bought the little electric scooter around March, I rode it to work every day. However, one morning in May, right at the company entrance, I collided with a small car. I lost control, causing both me and my colleague to fall, resulting in varying degrees of injuries. My colleague couldn't stand up at the time. After I got up, I staggered to move the scooter to the side of the road to avoid blocking traffic. The driver of the small car was a pregnant woman. Yes, a pregnant woman. After she got out of the car, she asked if we were okay and if we needed to go to the hospital. The funniest part was that my first response was to ask her to help us clock in first; she was also a colleague from our company (the instinctive reaction of a working person), haha. After clocking in, we went to a nearby hospital for emergency treatment, where the doctor disinfected our injuries and gave us a day off work—what a joke! Later, when the traffic police arrived, I even got to ride in the police car to the accident scene for responsibility determination. Ultimately, the small car was at fault for not yielding while turning. The owner of the small car then went through her insurance, and I was compensated for one day's salary and the damage to my scooter. My colleague, who was injured more severely, couldn't work for three days. 🤣 Afterward, due to inflammation of the wound, my leg swelled up like a pig's trotter, and for a month, I walked with a limp. Overall, this little car accident left a deep impression.
Resignation#
Submitted resignation on June 15
Processing resignation
In the few monthly reviews I posted at the beginning of this year, I should have mentioned the basic situation. After the New Year, there was a major restructuring in the team, with many people leaving and others being transferred from different groups, resulting in significant changes to my work content and nature, shifting from development to team management. I was responsible for tracking and handling team issues, which meant I hadn't written any code for over half a year. During this time, I communicated with the team leader about this issue, but to no avail, and the desire to resign began to take root. That saying is true: once you think about resigning, you think about it until the day before you leave.
Although the pandemic has been lifted this year, the level of recovery has not met everyone's expectations; in fact, it feels like life has become even harder than in previous years. So, in mid-May, I tried to update my resume and opened Boss Zhipin. Without even submitting applications, I had already scheduled several interviews. I took leave during workdays to attend a few interviews and found that I couldn't even remember the standard answers; I wasn't prepared for the questions, and I hadn't organized the project information. This showed that my resume was still passable in the job market, but I wasn't prepared. However, I didn't have time to prepare for interviews and standard answers anymore. So, in early June, I told my team leader that I wanted to resign.
When I expressed my intention to resign, my team leader was surprised and said that you post-95s resign so suddenly and rashly. He told me that I wasn't the only one in the team wanting to leave; three people were leaving this month, including my mentor who had brought me into the company. Later, when I asked my mentor about his reason for leaving, he said that the current project the team was working on had no value, and he wanted to leave quickly to switch to to-C backend development.
During my last month, I had no significant tasks, mostly just handing over responsibilities, and it was incredibly easy. Thus, my first job came to an end at the end of June.
Career Gap & Job Search#
Healthy meals I made at home after resigning
Climbing mountains during free time
The road I must take to pay respects to my grandfather
After finishing an interview, the sun was already setting
Experiencing my first-ever resignation, the oppressive feeling that had weighed on me vanished as I walked out of the company. No one was @ing me anymore, and it felt great not to think about project progress every day. However, what followed was a sense of loneliness and confusion about the next steps—what to do, whether to look for a job, what kind of job to look for, and when to start searching, leading to a fear of not being able to find a job. Sigh, when working, I think about resigning, but when I can actually not work, I think about going to work.
During my time off after resigning, I gradually ran errands to handle my affairs, such as transferring my personnel files, changing my household registration, and applying for a passport. Taking advantage of not having to work, I completed all the things I usually had to take leave for. Then I started exercising daily and cooking for myself. The first month passed quickly, and I lost nearly 10 pounds. One day, I met up with former colleagues for a meal, and they all said I looked thinner (heh).
Days went by, and before I knew it, it was October. During this time, besides working out and cooking, I also took the opportunity to return home to pay respects to my grandfather. Due to my low daily step count, my mom guessed that I had resigned (finally understanding why so many people still go out to cafes to study after resigning). During this trip home, I also experienced many things, including treating my dad to beef hot pot for the first time since I started earning money (this was also my dad's first time eating hot pot outside). The rest of my time at home was spent starting to learn computer-related courses from scratch, truly beginning from the basics, covering topics like logic circuits, assembly, and compiler principles (I recommend a great self-study website: https://csdiy.wiki/). I can't say that what I learned had any immediate use, but it made me feel like I was starting to touch the edges of the computer science field.
However, time flew by, and three months had passed since I resigned. Fearing that I might not find a job if I didn't start looking, I began to panic. I thought to myself that although life was going well and money wasn't tight, I couldn't get past this mental hurdle. So, I started cramming for standard answers, organizing my past projects, and began practicing on LeetCode.
I revised my resume countless times, flipped through standard answers in Obsidian, and even subscribed to Boss Zhipin to increase my exposure. Finally, companies began to invite me for interviews, both online and offline. Over the past month, I traveled to various districts in Shenzhen, attending up to four interviews in a single day. Each interview felt like being interrogated by the police; I felt guilty, and it was quite uncomfortable. After several interviews, I finally received an offer from one company. I even thought about accepting it immediately without further interviews. However, I felt that the job content and environment of this offer weren't ideal, and after much consideration, I rejected my first offer.
The following time was spent in a cycle of interviews and reviews. After applying to 47 companies and interviewing with 15, I finally received three offers. Now, I have been employed for a month, and I am quite satisfied with the company's environment, team atmosphere, and job content, mainly focusing on search-related work. In the short term, I won't be changing jobs again; my current priority is to get confirmed and delve deeper into this field.
Through this job search, I discovered that at the end of the year, companies looking for new hires prefer candidates with relevant experience. I interviewed with many companies, and after finishing HR interviews, I often didn't hear back, indicating that there were better candidates or that companies suddenly reduced hiring. It can be said that experiencing the economic downturn while job hunting has shifted my mindset more towards stability.
In summary, there are no jobs that can't be found; job searching is a process of continuously adjusting and matching one's expectations with those of the company.
Conclusion#
This year, the country is at a turning point, and I am no exception. Not only is the real estate industry sluggish, but all industries and individuals are also struggling, especially as the year comes to a close, with many companies announcing layoff plans, creating a sense of unease throughout society.
This year felt like it passed quickly, whether working or staying home after resigning. Some say that time flies when you're working. The savings goal I set at the beginning of the year was also unmet due to my resignation.
The new year of 2024 will arrive on time, whether you are ready or not. Looking back over the entire year, I believe the most important thing is still maintaining physical and mental health!
Here, I set my goals for the new year:
- Successfully get confirmed in my job
- Develop a habit of reading
- Achieve my small savings goal
- Learn Japanese and travel abroad once
- Lose weight
- Successfully pass certification exams
I hope that when I look back at this year-end summary next year, all these goals will be achieved! Well, I hope so! 😝