Got into the office early today, because it’s one of those days when Laurie is in. He hasn’t yet arrived. There truly is a limit to the amount of random subjects you can think up to Google just to keep yourself occupied.

The morning passes. I take a two-hour lunch. Bored, I walk to the beautiful Botanic Gardens where I light up a joint I rolled this morning.

Stoned, I walk round to the Opera House, then through Circular Quay.

At three in the afternoon, while I’m flaming an illiterate yahoo on an Internet forum, Laurie walks in. Finally, I’m about to get some work.

But he says, “Roy, you’ve got to give up the cigarettes, they’re no good for you.”

I attempt to remind him that I quit the habit three years ago, which I’ve told him several times, but he holds up his hand to silence me.

“Nup, just give up the smokes!” he says, and then he’s out the door.

I have a job. I accepted it officially on Friday, so you think that would have warranted a post (but oh no, I’ve been at my crap-ass airport job forever).

Anyway – HOLY CRAP, A JOB! In Korea! Teaching English!

I am definitely in the minority of the graduating seniors I know right now. I not only know what I’m doing, but I’m excited about it, as well (beats the hell out of settling, no?).

So I’ve started learning Korean (the letters anyway) and Michael and I have looked up everything there is to know about the city we’re moving to. It’s a little smaller than most, but it’s super centrally located – not to far to either Seoul or Pusan (and just far enough away from both that I don’t have to deal with smog!).

I leave at the beginning of July.

Let’s repeat that for emphasis. Woo!

I am going to Korea at the beginning of July.

I’m teaching at a hakwon (or private school), which many people were like, noooo, teach in public school. The nay-sayers served me well, though, because it made me look over all my potential offers with a fine-toothed comb. In the end, the job I took ended up winning: a) free rent and free utilities (I live above the school), b) while I have more teaching hours than public school teachers, I only have to be physically there when I am teaching (ends up being 30 hours at the school vs. 40); and oh yea, only there from 2-8pm everyday, and c) I decided when I spoke on the phone with the current foreign teacher; he loves the job and is signing on for another year. Sounds good to me.

New! Visa Update Below:

The U.S. economy keeps going South and job prospects are diving with it. There’s nothing pretty about pink when it comes in the form of a slip.

Now is a great time to take your tax returns, savings, etc. and turn that pink into red, as in muy caliente red, because Latin America is where the jobs are at!

Teaching English abroad is a great option and the benefit of working in Latin America is that a number of countries do not require college degrees or previous teaching experience to get hired!

Forget high paying South Korea, Taiwan, or Japan. High wages can equal high costs of living!

Had your sights on Europe? Unless you’re an EU citizen it can be nearly impossible to land a job. On top of the grueling “get your foot in the door“ policies, EU countries are facing their own financial woes, bankruptcies and 20% unemployment rates. Ouch!

Now is the time to brush off your Spanish-English dictionary and immerse yourself in a culturally, gastronomically and geographically diverse Nuevo Mundo.

Here are my top reasons why a career change in Latin America has its perks:

1. The U.S. Dollar is rebounding! In Peru it is (3) THREE to (1) ONE!*
2. The food is cheap and fresh which makes it “Mmmmm…Qué rico!”
3. No Bachelor’s degree or TEFL certificates required in many countries.
4. Low cost of living – Did I mention the exchange rate?
5. Cheap travel. It’s a backpacker’s paradise!
6. Learn a new language or two!
7. Meet friendly & warm people from around the globe.
8. Get paid an above average salary.**
9. Plenty of low cost to no cost fun!
10. Lax immigration laws.

Don’t take my word for it! Come and discover your own reasons why Latin America is a great place to work!

Don’t know where to get started? Take the First Step Here.

General Entry Requirements for South America Found Here.

Get in the know, Latin America Tips & FAQ for EFL Teaching.

As I sit here in the dark with naught but the glow of various monitors to currently keep me company, whilst back on the nightwatch tending to the ill of the parish, I have been considering that which is my recently hectic schedule and wishing greatly it were not thus .

Within this small slice of time I have had time to reflect that it was almost a year ago to the month that I was privy to a week spent dwelling in the company of strangers. That the strangers were in France and, for the most part, French makes no never mind to me but it does play a small part in that which is to follow. I shall elucidate….

I had agreed a while before, after much badgering from my other half, to attend the wedding of a couple she had known for many a year but who were utter strangers to me. So far, so blah blah blah. Nothing unusual there, I know. It happens to the best of us all at some point to be counted in the numbers to attend such formal affairs. It is the way of things, I concede, but I am never greatly pleased by these calls on my time.

I am not by nature very keen on the attendance of these things when they are arranged by my own family. I am sure as hell not getting any more excited about being summoned to attend the various hatches, matches and dispatches of people that I hardly, if at all, know purely based on the fact that I am the ‘plus one’ in the deal.

A touch grumpy, I will admit. Not one of my more endearing qualities but there we are. As Popeye said, ‘I yam what I yam’.

Any how, the crux of the matter was that I had reluctantly agreed to this attendance. The larger issue was that it was to be held in the South of France. Amongst French people. French people whom I had never clapped eyes upon afore. French people who, as far as I was aware, spoke no English.

Oh joy be mine….

Before it be said to me, I personally have nothing against the French in the least. I am not afflicted by the tendency of others in the UK who have an ingrained distrust and general dislike of all things Gallic. I have actually always liked France and the French. Every time I have been there I have had un grand temps altogether.

No, the trouble I foresaw was that I had not been to France for many a long year and my command of the lingua franca as a working, living, spoken tongue was all but forgotten. I don’t like doing small talk in my own chosen tongue with strangers. How to get around this as the only paddy in the village, then?

The solution was as timeless as it was simple, really. Alcohol. Lots and lots of lovely alcohol! Well, it was a wedding after all. I won’t bore with the details but, suffice to say, that once this concept was grasped and embraced, the whole affaire was a grand success and everyone had a whale of a time all round.

Which leads me back to my reverie and thinking that I could do with a top-up on my on-going education in spoken French.

Well, it would be rude not to reinforce the entente, n’est-ce pas?

As they say in another French(ish) speaking part of the world; Laissez les bon temps rouler…..!!

I am the Purple one

I must be turning into a twitcher! It’s just that there is a Great Bowerbird building his bower under a bush in the corner of our garden. So I have spent a couple of hours this afternoon under my swag with camera watching the male chase the female around his bower, through his bower.

Go on chase me!

It reminds me of a Carry on film.
The male upon seeing the female entering the bower puffs up his lilac patch of feathers on his nape, drops a wing, jumps up and down in the air and tries to get lucky. Amazing really.

Female Great Bowerbird

Sometimes it gets confusing well for me anyway because at times there are about 6 Bowerbirds. I thought the bower belonged to one male. It’s as if if he has got his mates round to give him a hand. Then the girls drop by and it’s game on.

Ready for action

You had better make REAL sure that you are stepping very carefully around the darling wee ones you are in charge of in case their parents feel that you are potentially corrupting their little cherubs!I fully appreciate and have long ago conceded that we are all now living in a “world gone mad” but what the hell!?!  

Check this out and tell me the world is not going down the tubes….!!