The Turbulent Life of Katsuo / 30s / The Kosen Graduate's Story #7

英語版も作成してみました！日本語版もあるので是非読みやすい方を！

👆Chapter 6 (Job Hunting — ) - Continued...

Chapter 7 | Starting My Career — The Job I Thought Wasn't for Me

■ Only Three of Us Were Kosen Graduates
After graduating from Kosen, I left my hometown and began a new life in central Japan. Living far from home—and sharing a dormitory-style life with strangers—was a first for me. But even more nerve-racking than that was my first day at the company entrance ceremony.

The first thing I noticed when I walked into the room was:
Wait... there are barely any Kosen students here.

There were nearly sixty new employees in the room, and most had graduated from industrial high schools. Among all of them, only three of us came from Kosen.

To make things more unusual, Kosen graduates at this company were categorized the same as high school graduates. That meant not only salary but also training programs were treated the same way.

And the training itself was nothing like I had imagined.

Instead of diving straight into technical work, we spent our days learning the basics of being a working adult. Every morning started with group exercises, followed by practical training sessions, ending precisely at five o’clock.

That routine continued for nearly ten months.
At first I thought,
This just feels like an extension of school.
But little by little, something inside me started to shift.

■ The First Time I Felt Real Confidence
As the training entered its later stages, practical exercises became more frequent.
And that was when I noticed something surprising.

I understood the work better than I expected.
And I was actually doing pretty well.

Back at Kosen, I had spent years near the bottom of the class. I had even repeated a year. Somewhere along the way, I had convinced myself that electrical engineering simply wasn’t for me.

But this felt different.
When instructors explained circuits and machine systems, the ideas entered my head naturally.

Of course, there were classmates who were far more skillful with their hands.
But surprisingly few people stopped to think:

Why does this work this way?
And suddenly, a thought crossed my mind.
Maybe being bad at school tests doesn't mean I'm bad at the work itself.

There had been plenty of problems I couldn’t solve in class.
But the things I learned at Kosen had stayed with me after all.
That realization meant more to me than I expected.

I also became closer with the other Kosen graduates. We started hanging out on weekends, going places together, and before I realized it, my anxiety about becoming a working adult had slowly faded.

■ The Department Everyone Called "Special"
After finally completing the long training period, I received my assignment:
Quality Assurance.

The work mainly involved handling product issues, conducting tests, analyzing data, and using circuit diagrams and oscilloscopes to investigate problems.

But there was one thing I soon learned.
That department was usually reserved for university and graduate-school graduates.

For someone with a Kosen background to be placed there was apparently very unusual.Honestly, I was nervous.

Am I really good enough for this?
That thought stayed in the back of my mind.

But once I joined, the people there surprised me.
The senior staff were unbelievably kind.
They asked me things like:

"So what's Kosen actually like?"
They invited me to lunch, drinks after work, and even called me over during breaks.
On weekends, they invited me golfing too.
I had never played before.

Still, when they asked if I could join, I answered:
"Sure, I can do it."

And somehow I ended up at the driving range.
Because back then, I felt that becoming part of the group mattered more than anything.
What I appreciated most was that the senior employees seemed amused by me in a good way.

They looked after me.
Accepted me.
And because of that, asking for help—from senior coworkers or partner companies—became easier.
Work flowed more smoothly than I ever expected.
Life as a working adult had become surprisingly fulfilling.

But then—
something slowly began to change.