“One in five 16 – 25-year-olds in the UK can’t find a job. In Spain, the figure is two in five. But Alexander has a plan to get ahead of the competition. In a few days time he’s heading to China for several weeks to work in a firm there.

“There’s no way that you couldn’t stand out from the crowd having done something like that because it’s not on everyone’s CV. I’ve worked in a Shanghai law firm practicing Chinese law with a Confucian basis that can’t not be a talking point really,” Lerner noted.

Sitting beside Alexander is Kay Michael, a UK boss of CRCC Asia, the company organizing Alexander’s trip.

“We’ve got a lot of people coming in from Ireland, Spain Italy, economies in Europe that aren’t doing so well,” she said.

They have seen the number of European graduates apply for their Chinese internship programs double every year since 2008. And the graduates that do go, even if just for a month, don’t always come back.”

Read more about Alexander’s experience with CRCC Asia on Voice of America’s article European Grads Target China Job Market for Employment.