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.

Skype Date

Sep 29, 2014 | Before The Great Journey, Updates

Just like many other blogs of this kind I would like to publish a mandatory post. And it’s the one about the first Skype date.

On that saturday morning I set my alarm early, stood up, prepared myself and sat down in front of the computer.
Ability to speak english: Check
Webcam: Check
Microphon: Check
Backgroud: Check
Online: Check

After a short wait I received the call. When the ‘Hi, how are you?’s were spoken we exchanged some questions.
And with the ability to speak english it was rather strange. In fact it doesn’t measure in soliloquy or in converstations with Germans speaking english with you, but it does measure in skyping with ‘real’ english speaking people. Plus when you consider how important this talk is, you quickly begin to stutter…

Nervertheless, I got to know a little more about the family who lives out in the country on the North Island and even got to see the 3 boys, who were rather shy in the beginning.
They’re 6, 8 and 12 years old.
Well, in that age the entertainment demand might be a little more advanced than with toddlers. Otherwise the family is solidly fit for Au Pairs. They have hosted many happy Au Pairs in the past, provide a car for you and know almost anything about being an Au Pair.

In terms of of me choosing a family it means now that this is my only choice. All other contacts and sources either declined or didn’t respond…

No I have 2 weeks of time to give the family an answer and I will think about it well and get in touch with their current Au Pair and talk with my agency.

Because it is about finding a fitting match and not to accept the first family that comes along…

I’ll keep you updated, cause soon it all might take off rapidly when the host family is chosen.

They respond!

Sep 4, 2014 | Before The Great Journey, Updates

5am.
The alarm goes off, my body gets up and stumbles through the room towards the mobile. Alarm’s shut, notification feed: email.

You have one new messages!

Now it’s time. Many mornings ran just the same scheme I described. No I am in contact with 2 familes, from which one lives in the country and the other one in a tightly packed suburb of Auckland.

There hasn’t been more than information exchange via text yet, but even that doesn’t have to mean much…
In the end you always have to remember that it isn’t going to be a nice visit, but a year of living and sharing a time of each others life together…
That should be thought through thoroughly.

So it takes shape more and more and the dream is coming closer to be fulfilled…

 

Besides, today I attended the last part of the baby care course.
A very interesting course, which taught me next to heaps of information some lesson about the value of kids. You are sitting there with going-to-be parents after all.

Now I know how to change nappies, bath, care for and how not to care for babies and so on. Very educating in every sense…

So it might happen that in the future some Au Pair-relevant news pop up here… 🙂