If you went to school, got a degree, maybe got another degree, and then took any job in your field to make it all seem worthwhile, there’s a good chance you’re sitting at a desk in a claustrophobic office building wondering, “is this it?” Were this our parents’ generation, you would press those thoughts deep down into your colon and go on about your duties for another 40-50 years until you can retire. We can do way better of course: in this reporter’s other life, I wrote for the NY Post about a London-based site that just launched in New York called Escape the City, which is sort of a second-chance job board for people who are burned out on corporate gigs and eager for a career adventure.
Lots of people have used it to switch from drab to fab careers, like someone who quit a finance job to sweep mines in Cambodia, or another who left a hedge fund to run a travel lodge in Mozambique. Big companies including Google, Groupon and the Clinton Foundation have started using the site to recruit. Check it out, then send a postcard from a Kabul cafe back to your friends at Pret A Manger in the FiDi.