Greetings again blogging world! It has been some time I suppose since I have written, but I am excited to now report that we in fact have things to write about. To catch you up on what has been happening in the Martin's lives:
*We started our graduate program at Concordia University in Portland, OR
*We became Jojo (uncle) and Joma (aunt) thanks to our little Landon
*Moved back into my parent's basement to save on rent
*AND recently just got jobs abroad that we will begin in 5 months
and thus - the blog.
As I said before, we recently went to Iowa to look for employment overseas. As you know, that job market in America is AMAZING right now, especially for teachers. Portland Public is no longer taking new substitutes because there are so many, so we decided to explore our options elsewhere. So, obviously, we decided to catch a flight to Iowa in order to secure jobs abroad. We were also lucky enough to be traveling with 3 of our friends who were also hopeful job hunters.
In our defense, we had been preparing for this fair for a long time, but amazingly enough, as soon as we started at 7 am on Friday, all of our preparation went out the window. The fair is set up in such a way that it creates a high stress situation. Someone described it to me as 'running with the bulls' and I could not tell you how spot on they were. We ran around for about 2 hours and were able to secure 5 interviews (2 that day and 3 on Saturday).
The interviews on the first day went well. We were very excited about a school in Colombia (most others aka mom and dad were not) but sadly they gave away Luke's position the interview before us. We left heart broken and feeling sick. Our friends had the same feeling as well. We went to dinner that night not feeling the greatest but met up with a recruiter at the 'cocktail' hour and heard all about a school in Jakarta he wanted us for.
Lifting our spirits with the offer in Jakarta, we went into the second day optimistic. We spoke with some people and ended up interviewing a school in Syria, El Salvador, Honduras, Colombia and Nicaragua. It was a long day of interviewing, but we became very excited about our prospect of living in Honduras.
Luke and I were waiting in the hotel room for our last interview when our friend's David and Lisa came walking in the hotel room waving a signed piece of paper in the air. They were moving to Honduras! The secured jobs at a school in San Pedro Sula, only 3 hours away from where we could possibly be living. It was then and there that we decided to re-introduce ourselves to the principal just to remind her of our faces.
This is where I believe we changed our luck. I thank my husband for his courage to walk up and stick out his hand again because I was so nervous! After being rejected several times by different schools, I really needed a confidence booster. But what do you know, just saying hello really made the difference. We went up and spoke to them saying how we were still extremely interested in their school and wanted to just refresh their memories of who we were. The results were amazing! We made their favorites list (of course) and they wanted to ask us specifically a question because they wanted me to possibly be the school librarian! When they saw how excited I was (I mean come on, best job ever!) they told us not to sign anything until we spoke to them again.
We went off to our final interview not even wanting to do it. We were semi relieved when she came out and said she had filled the positions. I do not think a recruiter had ever seen two people smile so widely and skip down the hall. We returned to the convention center and waited in the lobby, waiting for our phone to ring...
And then, the call.
Mrs. Counsil asked us to come back and sign a contract and we did without hesitation. We were/are so excited about our new life that we get to live in Honduras and cannot wait for this new adventure! However, it starts now with me having to get a library media science certification (not too hard, just more classes) and Luke preparing to not only teach history but also philosophy, psychology and sociology. We move to La Ceiba in July and cannot wait.
It was fantastic walking back into our hotel room, waiving that signed piece of paper and knowing that we were going to the same country as our friends. Jakarta would have been great too, and we also would have been with a friend, but Honduras just felt right.
Here is our school website if you want to check it out (http://www.mazapanschool.org/), but we will be posting on this blog of our adventures before and after we arrive in La Ceiba. Thank you all so much for your love and support. We cannot wait to start this new adventure... and to have REAL jobs.
Abrazos!
