the hunt

Being in Norway and having our money just flow in one direction (and to make us feel it all the more, the moneys are our Taiwanese savings...not the direction one really wants to take savings due to cost-of-living differences in the earned-vs-spending countries) is taking its toll in terms of stress.

To alleviate this issue, I began my hunt for work two weeks ago. The positions (three so far) I have found online all have application deadlines in the first days of January, thus I cannot expect to hear from them yet. This is causing some pins-and-needles action as they all range from pretty to very perfect for me (on paper), so I am hoping the HR people think so too, and am anxiously waiting their call.

Then I have registered with a few placement agencies, but since it's Christmas there's not much going on there at the moment.

Then today I finally took the leap and headed in to a few businesses that have not advertised positions but that I thought could be a good match for me. Two of the three I went to are a bit bigger, and thus I was shot down before getting to even hand over my letter of interest and CV, as they advertise all open positions.

The third is Visit Tromsø, who said they're in fact looking to hire two people immediately, and when they heard that I speak English and Mandarin fluently, they basically offered me a job on the spot. I could wait to start until first or second week of Jan if I wished (my sister and BIL are coming up this Friday, so I'm in no mood to be working while they're here).

The positions are in customer service - helping answer tourists' questions when they come in, help them plan excursions, and due to my Mandarin skills I'd be the key person to help all the Chinese and other Mandarin speaking tourists (whose numbers have been increasing a lot these past few years), along with the TV shows that come from that neck of the woods. Plus, working there would give me intimate knowledge of all that is fun in northern Norway, Sweden and Finland, and so I'd be kick-ass at planning what to do when friends visit us.

Yay! you would think, right? The only hiccup is that it pays about half or 2/3 of what I need to bring in for us to feel comfortable and safe.

Boo, you would think, right? But then I got to thinking that while I'd love to get to chat in Chinese and help TV shows plan what they're going to shoot (and maybe even head out with them as their local guide), perhaps the main bulk of the job - answering tourists questions day-in-and-day-out (and in the high-season there can be super high traffic through the shop) - may not be what makes me giggle and dance.

So though the stress of needing to find a job still persists, I think I will be holding out for interviews at those perfect-for-me jobs I've applied to. Unless of course Visit Tromsø decides they need a management accountant who can double as Mandarin question-answerer-and-TV-contact-n-guide ;)

[Me with sleeping-babe-in-sling with Tromsø City lit up behind me - taken about 1:30pm last Saturday]

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