Job Discussion Forums

Muff Daddy · Joined: 10 Feb 2003 Posts: 15 Location: CaNaDa

Yes, there is such a thing as Canadian Muff Daddies... why do you think the Beaver is our national animal!?!?

PS. thanks for the info, I think working in Andorra and then travelling sounds good to me right now...

Ludwig

gugelhupf · Joined: 24 Jan 2004 Posts: 575 Location: Jabotabek

Phil_b · Joined: 14 Oct 2003 Posts: 239 Location: Back in London

I would warn you that Andorra is not an EU country, so a UK passport on it's own would not legally entitle you to work there.... I have no idea how easy it is to get a visa, probably not that hard given the small size of the population there.... Tourism being pretty big there must be some demand...

Good luck

Roger · Joined: 19 Jan 2003 Posts: 9138

I think this chap is seeing a fata morgana even before he has arrived in the Maghreb!
Perhaps his teachers - if or when he attended school - were backpackers too? Two weeks teaching maths, then gone; another bearded and unwashed individual taking over until the third specimen of this species arrived for another 2 week stint...
Sorry, I hope you are not going to teach anywhere in those countries!

nicdoering · Joined: 28 Mar 2004 Posts: 45 Location: Beijing

Muff Daddy, I have no experience of working in Europe, but I think I do have experience with what you are feeling - this is a fantastic idea and you're thinking about it all the time but you secretly know you haven't really done enough research into the realities of this idea.

Or at least this is what it seems like to me from your postings (my apologies if I'm wrong).

Sit down and find out about the places you want to teach. Search through the posts on this forum and others (you can find lots if you Google). You can probably tell from the distinct lack of postings on Andorra that it might not be as simple as you think to find a job there.

Standards are a lot higher in Europe than in other places, and in most jobs anywhere in the world they will of course prefer someone who is going to be working there for at least a year, and who is not simply backpacking and teaching for convenience.

Don't get carried away by a lovely idea. Do your research, THEN get excited!

Nic

spiral78 · Joined: 05 Apr 2004 Posts: 11534 Location: On a Short Leash

mistakingly as an American), but excellent business English

[i]Yeah, Muff Daddy will be in Great Demand...........[/i]

zaneth

How realistic would it be for me to just pack up and leave an ESL job in Russia and go to Toronto for a job in the TV industry as a Transcriptionist without arranging work ahead of time?

I am an American with a Rusisan visa, a TESL certificate, a little transcription experience a general BA and no money.

My ideal situation would be to travel and work in Newfoundland, Ontario, Toronto, Saskatewan, White Horse, Prince George, Vancouver, and Vancouver Island starting October/November this year until July of next year. I am American but I can pass as Canadian so I hope I'll be able to miss out on the hostile stares during this trip.

Or, conversely, would it be better to secure employment in, say, Buffalo, NY, and then just travel to these places on my holidays?

Please advise! Thank you!

(The preceding has been an attempt at humor, arising from a spontaneous impulse. Absolutely no information was meant to be conveyed. No statement was intented.)

Muff Daddy · Joined: 10 Feb 2003 Posts: 15 Location: CaNaDa

shmooj · Joined: 11 Sep 2003 Posts: 1758 Location: Seoul, ROK

Muff Daddy,

perhaps you didn't come equipped with your own sarcasm distiller. If you had done, you would have been able to read between the lines. In fact, some lines here actually say what I believe to also be the truth: your idea sounds great but is impractical and therefore not great. If it was possible, believe me, we'd all be doing it.

This is not fruit picking. EFL jobs involve contracts. EFL jobs happen in areas of large population where rents are not cheap and you cannot just bed down on some grass under a tree and slumber until the birds awake you with their twittering.

You mentioned a possible 9 countries, thousands of kilometers apart, with a huge range of culture and language and EFL opportunities and you want to do all this in a total of 9 months. No one is going to hire you to work for a month at a time. In fact, it could take you a month simply to settle into any ONE of these countries, let alone find a job, find a place to live, get paid and move on.

But the thing that I really wonder if how you keep your suit for your job interviews clean and pressed when all you have is a rucksack? Wink

I hope this goes some way to answering your OP.

Ludwig · Posted: Sat Jun 12, 2004 6:26 am Post subject: Re: Thanks Dave

'Muff Daddy', the mere fact that a question can be framed and posed, does not make it legitimate or sensible to do so.

Perhaps you should re-examine the sarcasm you allude to and begin to interpret this as an answer to your question as to how realistic it would be for you to tramp around from the Alps to North Africa seeking short-term employment with neither a teaching degree nor teaching experience (and with no pre-arranged work visas).