The cat and the conference

First off I had to put my cat down earlier today. It really really sucked. She had started to exhibit signs of sickness on Sunday but we thought she'd shake it off. Cats barf. Hairballs and stuff like that. But she deteriorated rather quickly. Hoku was the best cat I've ever known and had. A peaceful and loving pacifier. She used to cry and get between us when mbh and I would argue. It always had the effect of calming us down. She loved to knead on your lap before she sat on it. She used to lick my hair to groom me. She would drink water from her bowl by dipping her paw into it and licking the water off of her paw. She didn't meow that often it was mainly chirps. I had trained her to come to me which she did 90% of the time (she was still a cat), and one cat trick is equal to 5 dog tricks. She wasn't very demanding except to sit in your lap with you. A whole lot of personality for one little animal. I miss her right now. 


In an effort to not have to obsess about my sick cat at night, I made a spreadsheet about various schools. Mbh and I also talked about what schools we would choose to interview with first and would immediately say yes to. When offered a position you pretty much have to decide either that day or by the end of the conference. If we can get a gig in a Western European country with good health care and hospitals then we would immediately say yes to that. If not, I am really crossing my fingers for Santiago, Chile. The international school in Santiago seems to have the best benefits of the Latin American schools that have openings for us.


However, I've also broadened my horizons to include some other places too. I knew nothing about it until today, but Curitiba, Brazil seems to be a really cool fucking place. Real eco-friendly city that is supposed to be some good urban planning dream. Ho Chi Minh city also seems pretty cool.


When we get to the conference, we are also going to drop off resumes and attempt to interview with some schools that don't have openings listed. At the end of the day, these private schools are looking for good teachers. They are private schools, we don't need to be credentialed in a subject to teach it. So they'll want mbh and they will get me too.


Also, it's good to hear from other teachers that they have friends that went the international school route and they got great postings with far less experience. Mbh has a decade worth of teaching experience and I'm entering year 6. I'm pretty sure we'll get a position though I won't rest on it.

Gameplanning

Mbh says these recruitment fairs are a monster. We need to have a plan of attack. Which schools do we want to interview with in what order? Which school if offered a position would we immediately say yes to? What is the average airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow? You know, stuff like that.

Mbh being socialized as an American woman got all anxious and excited to buy a new outfit for the interview days. I wasn't looking to buy something new, but why the hell not. It is better to look marvelous than to feel marvelous. We got a lot of different reasons to teach abroad so we have to take all those things into account. ISS has a job search engine that finds all the schools with open positions. They also have an email alert system when new jobs open. I love getting emails from them. It makes me giddy.

Thinking about doing a spreadsheet (nerd right) on the school location, salary range, benefits, housing allowance, potential savings amount, taxes, and stuff. We're going to have to weigh a number of factors. For one, mbh and I want to have another baby. Babygurl! Quality of hospitals and coverage matter. Shit is ridiculously expensive for health care in the US. We put Mr. Babyman on mbh's health plan and it went from the $100-200 range to now where it's $800 something. Shit like that just pisses me off so bad. Anyways, I want to be someplace where my health isn't a commodity. I don't want to have to think about money when someone is in the hospital. I shouldn't have to think the way about people the way that I would think about my cat in the hospital.

Anyways, life is busy so we're planning to really gameplan Wednesday night. Hoo rah!

Our big decision

So my better half (mbh) and I have decided to go on an adventure with Mr. Babyman and teach overseas. We have many reasons for wanting to do this. First, how fucking cool is an overseas adventure with the family. Global adventures are the spices of life for me. Second, we'd like to stack paper and be able to put ourselves and Mr. Babyman in a house with a yard, preferably in the Bay Area. Third, I want to learn Spanish fluently so that I can come back and talk to my Latino students' parents. Well that and yell at them in Spanish. OMG, am I gonna be Ken Jeong in Community? Fourth, I gots me the travel bug. I wanna get the fuck out! I'm tired of the BS here. I want to be tired of some International BS.

Mbh used to work at ISS (International School Services) and knew someone at COIS (council of international schools) so we decided to set up files with both to improve our chances.

First, we set up a COIS file. This was good because it got our butts in gear, and COIS was free. We quickly realized that it was all about the recruitment fair. These companies don't spend all their money paying people and setting up these fairs overseas to have you get hired online. At the end of the day, people still want to do the face-to-face-meet-and-greet. That and I'm sure human resources want to travel around the world too. COIS had fairs that we could go to but their first one was in London. Their fair in the US was in Chicago with ISS, but it was the week after the ISS San Francisco fair.

Since mbh, Mr. Babyman, and I live in the Bay Area, it made sense for us to set up a file and go to the ISS fair in San Francisco. That fair is from February 6-10, 2011. But before we could set up a file and attend the conference...we had to get beaten over the head by the setup and registration for ISS. $185 per person to set up a file and $290 a person to register for San Francisco. That's right. $950 for the both of us to set up files and attend the conference. Like I said, they ain't trying to get me hired via Skype interview. We figure that schools probably go to the files and online interviews if they don't get good bites at all the fairs or they have mid-year emergency hires. That's what they did to get mbh's friend when she set up a file too late and had missed all the fairs that year. Even though I feel violated by the setup and registration costs, it's still better than the cost of plane tickets, hotel, and the hassle of figuring out childcare for Mr. Babyman and catsitting. Plus, who wants to go to Chicago in February? The average lows are all below freezing. I'm not going skiing.

My top 6 choices for places to teach are The Netherlands, Spain, Venezuela, Ecuador, Chile, and Peru. The Netherlands. Great health care and it's the fucking Netherlands. Spain, where better to learn Spanish? Plus, I'll be able to easily make trips to Mondragon to study cooperatives. Also, I got a few good friends on the continent and the island. Venezuela, I have a good friend that lives in Caracas and I hear the country is just beautiful. Ecuador, I hear this is also beautiful and the Galapagos are here. Biodiversity baby! Chile, My friend that worked on the Canadian-French-Hawaiian telescope said that the two best places in the world to look at stars were the Big Island and Santiago, Chile. Peru, Mbh and I had a great time in this country and the Incan civilization is fascinating. Machu Picchu is amazing.