Hello, friends! Long time, no see! 👀 Tommy and I are still alive, and we are still teaching online while traveling with VIPKID. It is very different from teaching at a physical school in another country, but we have been enjoying the experience and plan to continue it for at least another year. We have a lot of photos and stories to catch up on, so I recently made a birthday resolution (why does New Year’s have the monopoly on fresh starts?) to write a blog post at least every 10 days for the next year. This first post will be a brief(ish) summary of our many adventures in the past 8 months, and future posts will randomly dive into further details on the individual trips! If you don’t want to miss out on any of the fun, subscribe to our email notifications! 👇
Germany: A tale of 4 cities
Because the cheapest flight can sometimes mean the most roundabout journey, Tommy and I got to see Dusseldorf, a city we probably never would’ve thought to visit otherwise. We spent a couple days visiting museums and fighting off the germs that had latched on during our flights. Then a day trip to Cologne, and next it was off to Munich for Oktoberfest! … where our hunt for a reasonably-priced hotel led us to the nearby town of Dachau. Our week in Germany was full of history, food, art, cars, and of course – beer!
Keflavik, Iceland: A relaxing, otherworldly layover
The other day Tommy asked, “So, will our family ever get to read a new blog post?” What a subtle reminder that I have not posted anything for almost two months. 😉 But I guess it is time to catchup! Everything has been going really well. We left as scheduled on September 18th and since then we have visited Iceland (Keflavík), Germany (Dusseldorf, Cologne, Munich, Dachau), and France (Paris). We’ve been in Romania (Bucharest) since October 2, during which time we’ve mostly just been working and walking to the park/grocery store. We did go to a wine & street food festival at the Parliamentary Palace last weekend and next week we will be visiting “Dracula’s” castle!
So, first up was Iceland and the Blue Lagoon!
Continue reading “Keflavik, Iceland: A relaxing, otherworldly layover”
What’s next? Plans for 2018-19
If you’ve asked us, “What’s next?” anytime within the past year, you’ve probably gotten a vague and confusing answer that changed within the week (or even the day). For a long time, we had every intention of teaching in person in a traditional setting. We’ve considered teaching everywhere from China to Mexico to Spain to Morocco to Turkey to Thailand to….. you get the picture. Well, the long wait is finally over – we have a plan!!! We have jobs, our tickets are booked, we’ve paid for our housing (yes, family, you can finally tell people where we’re going – It’s not going to change, for real!). So, where to? (Can you guess from these photos?)
10 Things I WON’T Miss About Living in China
Last week I wrote 10 things I’ll miss about living in China, so to keep it balanced I figured I should also talk about things I WON’T miss about living in China. This post could easily be renamed, “Things in China that drive Emily Absolutely Crazy,” but that’s mostly because it’s nearing the end of the school year and I’m ready to go home! Overall, Tommy and I agree that moving to China was 100% the right decision for us, and we’ve had an absolutely incredible year. So please, don’t take this post as me being a Negative Nigel (I really do enjoy China) – but do keep these less-than-awesome factors in mind in case you’re considering taking the leap yourself or are simply getting a little jealous after hearing about our 13-hour workweeks!
(P.S. As I mentioned in last week’s post, if day-to-day life in China posts are of interest to you, check out these older posts: food in China, housing & toilets, Christmas in small-town China, traditional street markets, and teaching English in China.)
1. Missing out on things back home.
Thanks to the magical powers of the internet, we can video chat, call, or text our friends as often as we want! We’re so thankful to have communication (literally) at our fingertips, but as awesome as this is, it just isn’t the same as physically being with family and friends. Being a 16+ hour plane ride away for the past 9 months means that we’ve missed out on lots of family events and hang-outs with friends. We love hearing about them and looking at photos, but we can’t wait to see everyone and make some memories in person this summer!
