I’m Taking a Break
Last summer I returned to The Netherlands for the third time in my life for a close friend’s wedding. It was a gorgeous celebration of love and also a great party 🙂 After the festivities were over I decided to stick around and see more of the country. I cycled to Nijmegen, went to a few festivals, and most importantly got to spend time with friends. All in all, I had a great time.
I think I had too much fun.
In fact, I had so much fun that it got me thinking… “Could I see myself living here?”
And the more I thought about it, the more the idea of living in Amsterdam appealed to me. But that would also mean that I would need a job since I’m not a European citizen. And to find a job, that would mean I’d actually have to devote some time searching. So on the one hand while I wanted to move to Amsterdam, I didn’t want to spend time trying to find a job since I was still travelling. Yes, I can be that lazy.
BUT as fate would have it a friend sent me a job posting in Amsterdam back in September. I responded to the offer with some questions about the job since the description was a bit vague. Eventually I was asked to send over my CV. Now where did I put that darn thing… It took me about 20 minutes to find a recent copy of my CV and another hour to update it. I sent it off then returned to enjoying my time in Germany.
The view from our balcony in Dubrovnik.
A month went by with no word back. Then one day I got an email saying that a company was interested in having a phone interview with me. Interesting! The phone interview began on a balcony overlooking Dubrovnik and ended 30 minutes later in the kitchen (there was too much noise outside).
Travel Tip Unlike in the US, incoming calls on your mobile phone are free in Europe. In fact, they are free in most countries. If you need to receive a phone call, just buy a local SIM card without any credit on it and have the other party call you. You will, however, need an unlocked phone.
Back to the story… I thought the call went well even though it was scheduled for an hour but only lasted 30 minutes. Could have gone either way I guessed. But instead of dwelling on it, I went on a hike with my travel mate Amy from Canada to the fort on top of the hill. The views over the city were amazing!
The old city of Dubrovnik as seen from the fortress.
A week or 2 later I heard that the interview went so well that the company wanted to interview me in person! Even if I didn’t get the job, I was getting a free flight to Amsterdam! As it turned out, the in-person interview went well, I got an offer, and I accepted it. So there you have it, I’m an Amsterdammer now 🙂
While I could have easily continued travelling for another year, I was starting to realize that I ought to take a break.
This is going to sound terrible but when you’re going to amazing places so often for such an extended amount of time you start to appreciate it less. Or to put it another way, you can eat gourmet dry-aged steak so often that you don’t really appreciate eating steak anymore. (I’ve never had this dry-aged steak issue before.) There comes a saturation point, a point where it’s too much of a good thing. Even while travelling, people take a day off to chill and watch a movie. It’s perfectly normal. Except this time I’m going to be taking a longer break.
But worry not! I still haven’t finished writing about South Africa among other places and topics. There’s still more to come, the travelling never really stops!