The Start of My Adventure

It was Christmas 2007, a friend I had met whilst travelling in Asia in December 2006 had sent me an email talking about his upcoming backpacking adventure. I would really have loved to join him but the timing was all wrong. I had only just come back from Brazil and needed to save some money before I went travelling again.

This got me searching the net on places to go. Whilst searching one of those annoying pop-ups caught my eye "Travel the world and get paid". This sounded like a fantastic solution. No need to save! I looked into it further. Before I knew it I had signed up to do a TESOL (Teach English to Speakers of Other Languages) course. By the 11 January the information had arrived.

I was focused. I saw this as an opportunity to travel and also get out of an employment situation I was most unhappy in. I had signed up to do the Foundation Course, Tutoring, Business English, Hospitality and Catering and Elementary.

I spent every night doing 3 hours of study. My weekends were consumed with completing this study. I had given myself to Easter to complete the course. By the 14 February I received a valentines present, - My Teaching License. It arrived in the mail on the 19 February. That night I got on the internet and started applying for jobs. I applied for 15 positions across the world. By the 23 February I had 14 contracts.

Now I had the task of deciding which job to take. I completed a spreadsheet and got down to 6. I then made my final decision. That contract fell over. Within 1 hour of that falling over I was in contact with my second choice and the green light was on. I was off to China. OMG what have I done!!!