Breakfast above the Indian Ocean

Dec 4, 2014 | The Great Journey, Updates

WI-FI on the plane is some fine invention. Actually it is your profit. 😉

After security controls, passport checks and one step after the other parted me from my parents I boarded the plane towards Dubai. My first serious flight… I don’t have much comparison, but it is all alright, no worries…

I don’t want to go on about flying as there is much to come yet… Only this: The composition of LEDs and small holes in the plane’s ceiling makes for a marvellous nightsky (never as nice as yours, Resa) and let’s the landing appear a little less frightning…

In Dubai there was some time for admiring the airport itself. I mean, who would expect a waterfall a 100 metres wide INSIDE each terminal? 😀 Besides, there was something for chocolate lovers…

World record in Dubai. The biggest chocolate structure. (the competition probably melted already)

I just had breakfast. My my, the fruit was delicious!

The morbid, longish thing is a croissant.

Soon we land in Kuala Lumpur. From there it is Melbourne and after a short stop-over Wellington.

And those planes can shake quite a deal. I only know that from railways, where such movement makes a lot more sense… But as long as the stewardesses don’t sit there pale and eyes wide open, you needn’t worry.

The Separation

Nov 29, 2014 | Before The Great Journey, Updates

It is a colorful collage made out of colorful images, when I think about the last days.
Whether you take a walk with good friends, push a Golf for the last 200 meters cause the rope snapped, whether you have to wrap your arms around people again and again because the stage play is over indefinitely, spend a few last days with your parents at the Baltic Sea, whether you drive through the early darkening Germany to see relatives once more…

Chilly autumn at the Baltic Sea

It is the last laughing fits together, the loving wishes you exchanged finally, the written words that you read over and over again, the wonderful recollection of the past days, the feeling of hugs from people that are yet close to you. That’s what memories should look like.

The last duties are being carried out, the last partings planned and gotten over with, the last points crossed off of my list…
Look at that: My Audi had a milestone today. 😉

Even a long awaited event by many was the removal of my ‘stage hairdo’. 😉
Noone should be spared from this, given that this is the longest my hair ever got and hopefully never gets again. 😀

So one thing after the other has to go. Until I will be on the plane ultimately, preparation and goodbyes won’t cease.

My last Day at Work

Nov 9, 2014 | Before The Great Journey, Thoughts, Updates

The door of the apprenticeship centre closes behind me. The well known snap of the closing mechanism only goes through to my subconcsious mind, but I am aware: This was the last time. Final.
After my last day at work I went there, where it all began. Said goodbye to my trainer. At this time I already gave away my workers ID card and before that signed OUT with it for the last time. My employment-contract is fulfilled.

It was a great last day! Working day would be incorrect as it mostly consisted of distributing cake, inviting colleagues for a coffee, galavanting through the offices, tell every coworker why I visit them today, explain my travel plans, writing down the blog address, thinking hard whether I might have forgotten anything or anyone…

I noticed how you can meet many coworkers only on business level without enjoying their actual smile. But that was never my mission. On the contrary.
I don’t know on which workplaces I will have so many lovely colleagues. And I am not even talking about the close ones next to me. You are a whole other story… 😉

That was the reason I organised something special for the last lunch break.
Right at 12 o’clock my mum delivered 2 trays packed with fresh miniature calzones plus a huge bowl of Tzatziki which we all ate in serious style. Thanks to a slight miscalculation in terms of amount the rest of the company could all have some part as well. In the end about 50 mini calzones and the 3-litre-bowl of Tzatziki has arrived in thankful hands and stomachs.
Here a big THANK YOU to you mum and you culinary arts! 🙂

I am going to miss you all, whether at the testing department, the assembly line, ‘in front’ or ‘above’ in the office. You have all been a grand part of my life and I am happy to have gotten to know you (even if we had our first actual talk on that Friday 😉 ). At the many stations that I went through during my apprenticeship or after I have made much progress, professionally or for my private life. I have learned much and have taken much with me.

Of course personal development, learning, getting to know and taking in will never end. It just goes on at different places and under different circumstances.

Use *Parting* with *Stress*

Oct 29, 2014 | Before The Great Journey, Thoughts, Updates

I don’t have much to present. But that’s the essence of this interim report…
Maybe it is a little try on a ‘To-Do list for a year abroad’.

I am anxiously awaiting my new laptop, travel bag and credit card confirmation to book the first hostel.

My head is spinning quite well about the undertakings, duties, errands, plannings.

– You have to declare yourself unemployed if you are going abroad for more than one year. Otherwise there might be trouble with the receivables. And the Employment Agency doesn’t save on forms and paper…
I now have cancelled my job as planned and will be ‘unemployed’ after next week.

– Last appointments at the dentist and so on have to be taken, relatives have to be visited for the last times, farewells have to be planned and gotten over with…

– Any documents (especially for a trip longer than a year a certain health certificate for expample) have to be ready correctly.

– You have to think through the journey that lies ahead. After all many people tell me all the time that I do good, that they envy me, that I should do this for sure and that it is going to be the time of my life.
Sure, I am aware of that… But inbetween many theatre rehearsals and errands there is too little time to really sit down and think about it quietly. Though that should change for the better in the time of ‘unemployment’… 🙂

– My Audi will have to be sold at last. My first and only car… But as you have to part from everything eventually, he will have to go as well…

It is getting serious!

Oct 20, 2014 | Before The Great Journey, Thoughts, Updates

I have booked my fligth!!

From now on my days in Germany are counted.

On the 3rd of December I leave this patch of earth that was home to me for so long. After a few stop- and changeovers and 50 hours of flights I will arrive at my destination, Wellington.

My plan?
I will spend the first few days at a hostel. Resting and stuff. Discovering the city that for a long time (without further thoughts, believe me mum and dad) I was looking at on the map next to me head before I went to sleep. Meeting people (hopefully not as many fellow native speakers :P). Seeing the final Hobbit movie. Solving regulatory and document matters. For Wellington is known as culturally rich I might look for some concerts.

After 2 weeks I would like to get a car with camping gear and travel the South Island. Whether it is going to be a stationwagon and I sleep inside it or a good tent I will see there. With this I willingly submit to the school of flexibility and spontaneity. 🙂

First it will all work with the regular visitor visa and thus for only 3 months. (If my budget is not telling me off too soon…)
At the latest after that I will activate the Working Holiday Visa and IF I shouldn’t have found a host family by then I have the chance to work for 3 months in agriculture IN ORDER to extend the visa for another 3 months.
I think the paper-warfare will be worth 3 more months in the country of my dreams. If it should come to that…

The next days I would like to give you some details on my Gear and Gadgets, because NOW I finally have to say something (and to plan first and foremost).

Well well. A post without a cheesy picture of the sunset would’ve been boooooring, right? ;D

New Plans

Oct 9, 2014 | Before The Great Journey, Thoughts, Updates

An experienced globetrotter once told me: ‘Plans exist to be thrown away.’

Well, I haven’t thrown my travel plans away. But I well rearranged them…
The family I skyped with has called off. They weren’t sure if I was fit for the role. For any role you can prepare, so even 3 boys wouldn’t have been THAT much of a problem for me. But considering that I haven’t put the label ‘dream family’ on them, it might be better this way.
Just now the hopes to find a family in time are reduced to the little sources that haven’t given notice yet.

Therefore my new plan. The Au Pair thing is always about the Working Holiday Visa. That is valid for exactly one year and you can use it only once in your life (in New Zealand). So..without a host family it makes no sense getting one…
But what if you were to activate that visa when you are already in New Zealand? It is for traveling AND working after all. As a regulat tourist from Germany you don’t need any special visa at all. You can stay for 3 months. Just like that. And once you find your family, you can activate the Working Holiday Visa then.
And that is my plan.

I can go to New Zealand in December just like as planned (dreamed of). Independent of whether I have found a family by then or not… I can enjoy the country as a free and simple backpacker for three months and look for a family on the way.
And it is so much easier to talk to a family being in the place rather than sitting on the other side of the world. 🙂
I don’t know what is waiting for me, but I know that it is going to be wonderful! And soon I will be able to begin with concrete plans.

The last weekend I visited the South once more, only this time as a ‘farewell’… There I got to take this picture, which should serve as decoration of this post.