Ac-cen-tu-ate the Positive

I sometimes have a hard time sleeping on Sunday nights. In fact, I sometimes have a hard time relaxing on Sunday evenings, because I dread what Monday will bring. Last week was New Year’s holiday and my school was only open on Monday and Tuesday, but no students were present. My coworker had talked with the Vice Principal on the previous Friday, and they told me I didn’t need to come in either of those days. I wouldn’t have had any work to do if I had.

But this morning, my coworker told me that I had misunderstood, that I really should have been at work. After a few minutes of venting to Paul over Instant Messenger, we figured out the problem. On Monday, the English teacher from the High School next door came to my school to ask me for lunch. Likely, they were embarrassed that she was asking for me and I wasn’t there.

It seems like every time we write on our blog, we have another story to tell like this one. Every night we have new stories for each other, and we save the best for telling the folks at home. Sometimes I wonder what we’re doing here, and I know some of you do, too. So, I’ve decided to write about the things we enjoy about our life here.

First of all, we’ve saved more money in five months here than we could have saved in five years living in North America, For those of you who know what it’s like to be in debt or to be ‘just starting out’ this means a lot. Secondly, the experience of working in a foreign country is quite a nice thing on a resume these days, for any job or any kind of school. And, we have the opportunity to travel, which we wouldn’t have from North America.

These are the top three reasons we always cite in reckoning with our time here. But there are more reasons. If we were in North America – either in Canada or in the States, we would have the paperwork and the waiting for work visas and family visas. There are a lot of hoops for both of us to jump through for citizenship or even just a green card. With both governments, the process is easier after being married for two years.

As much as we complain about things, our life here is pretty nice. After work, we’re free to pursue all the leisure activities we could want: I’ve read plenty of books, practice piano, go to the gym, etc. We have friends nearby that we see often for social events, and we have a lot of time to spend together. Our life moves by at a rather relaxed pace, which we certainly won’t experience in a few years. It’ll be nice to have this time to look back on as the first few years of our marriage.