300 Hundred Days! Where Did The Time Go?
Yeah, you read that right. As of today/tomorrow I have been on my Colombian adventure for 300 days, and in 35 days more I'll be putting a close this chapter of my life. My year working at Colegio Canadiense has been...interesting, educational, frustrating, exhilarating, exhausting, rewarding, and 100's more adjectives. At the end of the day I have grown a lot after my first year of teaching abroad, and I can't wait for the next chapter of my adventure.
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Back in February I was contacted by another school here in Medellín. From what I have been told by friends, the Columbus School is one of the oldest and best recognized schools in the valley. They were in need of a physics teacher starting with the new school year in August 2019. I decided to learn more and took part in the interview process, and from the moment I first stepped onto the campus I felt like this was a place I wanted to be. After meeting many teachers, administrators, and several students, I was hooked and hoping that my interview went well!
To make a long story short, I was offered the job soon after the interview and will be teaching physics at TCS for the next 2+ years! My Colombian adventures will now take me through to 2021 and possibly beyond. I've been blown away by the welcome and support I've already received from TCS, who will be sending me for AP Physics training in Chicago this summer, as well as having an amazing program that will hopefully allow me to complete a M.Sc. over the next three years.
I'm going to miss the family that I've developed at Canadiense, but with the nature of that program there is a particularly high turnover at the end of this year, and next year would have been a different family regardless. I will always fondly remember my time at Canadiense, and be grateful for them opening the door to my international teaching career.
I'm only making this post/announcement now, as I was waiting until the start of May to let my current students know that I wouldn't be returning to teach them next year. Saying goodbye to my current grade 11 classes was the most difficult part of my decision to leave this school. They are such an amazing group of students, and I will miss them next year. Unfortunately, I get the feeling that there will always be that next amazing group of students that I'll have to leave behind as I change schools through my career. And for me the next step in my professional growth and becoming a better teacher will be at TCS.
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Jumping back to the present and the rapidly approaching end of the school year, I'm slowly becoming a ball of anxiety as I get ready for this transition. Part of my decision to change schools this summer includes also having to change apartments. As my current place is provided by my school, they might want it back now that I'm not working for them next year. There was a possibility that I would have been able to take on the rent myself, but with my wonderful roommate Athena leaving for the USA, it just wouldn't be the same without her.
TCS also provides housing to their teachers, giving me the option of living in an apartment provided by the school or taking the rental allowance and finding my own place to live. I decided to take advantage of my year in the city to strike out on my own to find a new apartment, and immediately came into some interesting problems.
Renting in Colombia is nothing like renting in Canada. Period. Full stop. Etc.
My first discovery is that there is no one place to look for apartments. When I asked around, I was:
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Back in February I was contacted by another school here in Medellín. From what I have been told by friends, the Columbus School is one of the oldest and best recognized schools in the valley. They were in need of a physics teacher starting with the new school year in August 2019. I decided to learn more and took part in the interview process, and from the moment I first stepped onto the campus I felt like this was a place I wanted to be. After meeting many teachers, administrators, and several students, I was hooked and hoping that my interview went well!
To make a long story short, I was offered the job soon after the interview and will be teaching physics at TCS for the next 2+ years! My Colombian adventures will now take me through to 2021 and possibly beyond. I've been blown away by the welcome and support I've already received from TCS, who will be sending me for AP Physics training in Chicago this summer, as well as having an amazing program that will hopefully allow me to complete a M.Sc. over the next three years.
I'm going to miss the family that I've developed at Canadiense, but with the nature of that program there is a particularly high turnover at the end of this year, and next year would have been a different family regardless. I will always fondly remember my time at Canadiense, and be grateful for them opening the door to my international teaching career.
I'm only making this post/announcement now, as I was waiting until the start of May to let my current students know that I wouldn't be returning to teach them next year. Saying goodbye to my current grade 11 classes was the most difficult part of my decision to leave this school. They are such an amazing group of students, and I will miss them next year. Unfortunately, I get the feeling that there will always be that next amazing group of students that I'll have to leave behind as I change schools through my career. And for me the next step in my professional growth and becoming a better teacher will be at TCS.
-----
Jumping back to the present and the rapidly approaching end of the school year, I'm slowly becoming a ball of anxiety as I get ready for this transition. Part of my decision to change schools this summer includes also having to change apartments. As my current place is provided by my school, they might want it back now that I'm not working for them next year. There was a possibility that I would have been able to take on the rent myself, but with my wonderful roommate Athena leaving for the USA, it just wouldn't be the same without her.
TCS also provides housing to their teachers, giving me the option of living in an apartment provided by the school or taking the rental allowance and finding my own place to live. I decided to take advantage of my year in the city to strike out on my own to find a new apartment, and immediately came into some interesting problems.
Renting in Colombia is nothing like renting in Canada. Period. Full stop. Etc.
My first discovery is that there is no one place to look for apartments. When I asked around, I was:
- given several real estate websites that have partial listings available
- told to walk neighbourhoods I like and look for signs in windows and call those numbers
- told that I needed to find an agent who would work with foreigners
- told that I would need at least 1 or 2 people to cosign for my apartment, with be restrictions on who could act as a cosigner for me (need greater income, or own significant property, or, or, or...)
- informed by several agents that they won't rent to someone who hasn't been in their current job for at least 6 months, and that starting a new job I wouldn't be able to rent for a while
- and much, much, much more craziness...
So I've decided on a new tack. I've come across a few places where other foreigners and professionals are co-living together in a much larger and nicer place than anyone could afford on their own. I've reached out to several and am in the process of checking them out and "interviewing" for the roommate position. I realized that I haven't truly been living on my own the past four years, between my time on campus at LCS (always surrounded by friends, coworkers, and students), to sharing my apartment this year with Athena. I know that having my own place would just end with me spending a lot more time alone than I could ever want. So bring on the roommates!
I'll be trying to be more active this summer, as I share my adventures. From heading back to Canada, to my training course in Chicago (never been!), to all the other things going on as I prepare for the next chapter in this crazy life!
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