I was recently attending a seminar in which this question was asked by a student
Q) Getting a Linux jobs for new Linux professionals is very difficult
as mastering Linux requires years of practical experience and companies don't allow internships or entry level Linux jobs for mission critical servers and environments so how should someone gain real life experience
and what are the hottest technologies around in Linux world

to be honest i feel its true and sad so i wanted to have opinion of other professionals here

You keep your eye out.
There are entry-level jobs out there.

Server work is hard to get regardless of the OS.
You can gain experience in some tertiary institutions, you can also build a small network yourself and play with configuring it in as many ways as you can think of. Write about it online. Frequent troubleshooting websites - get a rep for fixing hard problems. Attend conferences and network. Your path to experience is outside the mission-critical area.

The hot technologies change - find something that interests you and do that.

switching to linux at home pc, htpc, mobile phone (N900) and study for certificates

checking this forums and answering threads helps