that’s great, but what about you?

by Andy Posted on February 27, 2010

When I tell people that Alex is joining the foreign service and that we will be moving abroad, the conversation usually goes like this:

Me:   Alex is joining the foreign service and we’ll be moving overseas.
Them:   Wow, how exciting. What does a foreign service officer do?
Me:   Work in embassies to help Americans abroad.
Them:   That’s great. But what are you going to do?

That’s where the conversation usually gets a little more complicated. The truth is, I really don’t know exactly what I will do. The life of a foreign service spouse can be an exciting one, but it also comes with its fair share of challenges. When moving to a new post, the officer is essentially transferring offices – continuing a career in a new location with American colleagues.

For the spouse, though, the change can sometimes be more difficult. The opportunities available at one post may be completely different than those available at the next. Not having a definitive position and role before arriving at post can lead to a great deal of stress and uncertainty.

And so the question remains.  What am I going to do?

Plan A is to apply to be a foreign service officer myself. I’m scheduled to take the written portion of the test on Monday. As Alex outlined previously, the hiring process is a long and exhaustive one, so even if I continue to pass each section, I won’t know if I will be hired as a foreign service officer for about a year. If I am hired, however, Alex and I would serve as a tandem couple, which comes with its own set of challenges. Finding tandem posts can be difficult and often one person will have to take a post that is not ideal so the other can thrive (and occasionally even take an unpaid leave so the couple can remain together). But even with these difficulties, this seems to be a good option. We would both have fulfilling careers with enough benefits to keep us very happy.

Plan B is wide open. It includes:

  • Finding a graduate degree program that will give me good odds of finding a good job in many parts of the world, or one I can do remotely.
  • Getting a teaching certificate and teaching in an American school overseas.
  • Developing another skill like web design, computer programing, photography or online media planning that I could do from anywhere in the world.
  • Figuring out some way to parlay my seven years of advertising experience into…anything really.
  • Picking up odd jobs in the embassy or around town.

Obviously some of these options are better than others. I’d ideally like to find some sort of career rather than a series of random jobs, but I’m trying to be as open as possible to what may come. If I had to take a  job filing paperwork at an embassy while playing computer games during my free time, I guess I could do that for a while.

The good thing is that the state department does recognize the difficulties that spouses face. Agreements have been made with many foreign countries that allow spouses to work legally abroad. There are often jobs that can be found in each embassy doing a wide variety of different things. There are people spouses can work with to find these opportunities.

So the question of what I am going to do won’t be answered definitively for a while. Right now I’m focusing on the foreign service test and then our move to DC. After that, Alex and I will get a bid list and eventually find out where we are heading. Then there might be language training. Then another pack out. There are a lot of exciting things coming up, and eventually I’ll figure out just what I’m going to do.

And if not, then expect a lot of long and needlessly detailed blog posts about my breakfast, our dog and what I watched on tv.

Posted in FS Life | Tagged , | 11 Comments

pantsuits and high heels and pearls, oh my!

by Alex Posted on February 25, 2010

For the next few weeks I’m visiting my mom in Illinois. While she’s at work during the day, two main things are on my agenda: finish and FedEx piles of paperwork back to State, and shop. The first task daunts me, and so I’m distracting myself from it by focusing on the second.

I certainly don’t need more clothes, but I do need more professional clothes. My last job required a very casual business casual, which won’t fly with State. What will, you ask? I’ve been wondering the same thing, and this is what I’ve surmised:

Are suits required? For men, yes. For women, sort of. A jacket is always necessary, but mixing and matching is okay.

Are pantsuits allowed? Sure.

Are dresses okay? With a blazer, yes.

Are pantyhose required? You’ll feel like the odd woman out without them.

What about high heels? Flats are fine, as long as they’re professional.

And peep-toe shoes? Fine, as long as they show fewer than two and a half toes. (Crazy, right?)

Sandals? Never.

What about accessories? You can never go wrong with pearls, but eclectic stuff from other countries will go over alright too.

I could run out and buy loads of suits, but here’s the problem: this is only the dress code for the initial five-week training course (A-100). The standards relax to business casual if you stick around in DC for more training, as most people do. And then the expectations vary depending on where in the world you end up. FSOs dress differently in Paris than they do in Port-au-Prince, not surprisingly.

This is what I’m thinking, at least for now:

  • One more suit (thankfully I already have one!)
  • Two additional jackets
  • A week’s worth of dress shirts
  • Two pairs of professional but comfortable shoes (black and brown)

TJ Maxx and Marshalls, here I come!

Posted in A-100, FS Life | Tagged , , , , | 10 Comments

what i’ll miss most about nyc

by Alex Posted on February 19, 2010

Our NYC days are numbered, and the number is seven.

Today is #1. I’ll be spending it tying up things at work; Andy with be picking up the rental car and getting ready for tomorrow’s drive. We’re headed to the Midwest to spend a month visiting family. When we get back at the end of March, we have a day to arrange our stuff (#2), a day to supervise the movers (#3 — see Andy’s post) and then four days (#4 through #7) at a hotel before heading down to DC. I’m especially excited for those four hotel days, although the list of things we want to do and people we want to see then is growing exponentially…

What I’ll Miss Most About NYC

  • Easy access to any kind of food I could possibly want
  • Very few of the chain stores and restaurants that make most other American cities feel like any other American city
  • People-watching on the subway
  • Walking, rather than driving, to run errands
  • Cobblestone streets lined with brownstones
  • Dog parks
  • Clothing swaps
  • Exploring new neighborhoods — and knowing I’ll never run out of new places to see (because by the time I get through everywhere and start over, that first place will be completely different)

What won’t I miss? Well, having so little space that kids have to resort to things like this. (Although I will miss the city’s innovative spirit, perfectly demonstrated by this kid!)

Posted in Personal | Tagged | 1 Comment

it’s our move

by Andy Posted on February 18, 2010

One of the terms that becomes familiar to everyone in the foreign service is “pack out.”  This is government lingo for packing up all your stuff and moving it from one home to the next.  Our pack out process started on Tuesday when a representative from the moving company visited our 300 sq foot apartment to make sure they bring enough supplies and a big enough truck to handle all of our stuff on our moving day.

Despite the fact that our apartment is smaller than the elevator at our neighborhood subway station, and despite the fact that the professional movers will be doing all of the boxing and wrapping and lifting, the pack out is still a complicated process that takes a lot of planning.  The reason is that we essentially have to divide all of our posessions into five categories:

  1. Stuff we’ll never, ever need again – This is pretty simple.  This category is for things we just don’t want, like the unfortunate bistro table we carried home from Red Hook on a freezing winter day, or the microwave with the buttons that usually work.
  2. Stuff we need immediately – This category is for things we plan on physically taking with us on our persons to DC and will need immediately, like toothpaste, socks and our dog.
  3. Stuff we need sort of immediately but not absolutely immediately – The government calls this category Unaccompanied Air Baggage (UAB).  This is stuff that will arrive in DC within a couple of days (or when you go overseas, within a couple of weeks).  It will include clothes we don’t wear much, cooking supplies beyond what is included with our corporate housing and our collection of Law & Order DVDs (to remind us of NYC).  We are permitted a total of 450 lbs of UAB.
  4. Stuff we don’t need while living in DC but will need overseas – This is the stuff that will be placed in storage while we live in DC, but will be taken out of storage and shipped as our Household Effects (HHE) when we move overseas once training is finished.  It will arrive overseas anywhere from a few weeks to a few months after we do, and we won’t have access to it while in DC, so it is a category for things we don’t need in a furnished corporate apartment, but might need for a two year post abroad.  It includes stuff like the rest of our cooking supplies, our dishes and our collection of books (to make people think we read, but let’s face it, there’s a reason we won’t need these in DC).  We are allowed something like 7,000 lbs of HHE, I think.
  5. Stuff we don’t know if we’ll ever need but don’t want to throw out – This category is for things that will be put into storage on a semi-permanent basis.  Since our television might not be compatible with the standards used in the country of our overseas post, but we also don’t want to get rid of it just yet, it will end up in storage.  Since our overseas housing will probably be furnished, we would put our bed and couch into storage too.  We are allowed around 18,000 lbs for this storage  It may or may not include the 7,000 lbs of HHE.  I’m not really sure about the details since, as I said, we live in a 300 sq foot apartment and when you live in a 300 sq foot apartment you don’t really need to worry about 18,000 lbs of stuff.

Our official pack out date is going to be March 23.  When the movers come it will be critical that we clearly indicate which of our posessions belong in each category.  One lapse of concentration and we’ll be stuck with two beds at our furnished DC apartment while our clothes sit happily in storage somewhere in Virginia.

Posted in FS Life | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments

what language will we learn?

by Alex Posted on February 17, 2010

One of the requirements for being tenured as a Foreign Service Officer is proficiency in a language other than English. This really excites me. It’s a personal goal of mine to be able to communicate intelligently in another tongue. Unfortunately, foreign languages have never come naturally to me, and although I studied four different ones in high school and college, I never advanced beyond the elementary or early intermediate level. Before the FS, I was beginning to worry that I’d never have the chance to go further.

While the FS’s language requirement is exciting, it’s also scary: what if I’m not able to achieve the necessary level? But people in the know keep telling me not to worry. There’s a big difference, they point out, between studying a language for an hour or two a few times a week, as I did in college, and the instruction I’ll receive at the Foreign Service Institute. If I’m assigned a post that requires a language I don’t yet speak, I’ll stick around in DC for up to a year, during which time language learning will be my full-time job. (If there’s room, Andy will be able to take classes too.)

I’ve been thinking a lot about language training lately, and more specifically, how it relates to my first post. Both because of the tenure requirement and because I’d genuinely like to learn a language sooner rather than later, I hope to be assigned a first post that includes language training time. I don’t have final say in the matter, of course (FSOs are public servants and must go wherever they’re most needed), but my preferences will be considered.

So, what language do I hope to learn? Something like Thai or Cambodian would be interesting — and living in Bangkok or Phnom Penh would be great — but it would probably be wiser to study a more widely spoken language that I would be able to use at various posts throughout my career.

Some good options:

French – Spoken in these countries, mostly in Africa and Europe.
Spanish – Spoken in these countries, mostly in South America, Central America and Europe.
Arabic – Spoken in these countries, mostly in North Africa and the Middle East.
Russian – Spoken in these countries, most of which were formerly part of the USSR.

If you’re interested, check out this outdated but still interesting list of where other languages are spoken.

Suggestions? Advice? Feel free to comment!

Posted in A-100, FSI | Tagged , , , , , , , | 6 Comments

excitements

by Andy Posted on February 7, 2010

As Alex outlined, the process of applying to, and being accepted into, the foreign service is a long one.  It’s been well over a year since we trekked to Philadelphia  on a February morning for the written test.  Through all that time, the foreign service has mostly remained vague – a fuzzy “what if” in our future.  But now that offers have been made and accepted, and Alex’s A-100 class is confirmed, the foreign service is starting to become much more real.

We are now, for the first time, planning the real logistics of our transition to foreign service life.  A moving service has been confirmed.  Alex has quit her job.  We decided on an apartment in DC.  We are trying to find a new tenant for our current apartment.  All is not done.  We still have to arrange our transportation to DC and our accommodations for New York after our apartment has been packed up, but before we can head to Washington.  On top of all of this, we are planning a four day trip to San Francisco with my parents and a four week road trip to the Midwest to spend some time with our families.  Needless to say, we’ve been very, very busy.

So I thought that now, as a break from planning our every move for the next two months, I would list the top five reasons that I, personally, am excited about the foreign service:

5.  We get to move to a nice apartment in DC that will be, literally, twice as large as our current place, complete with washer/dryer, dishwasher, balcony, gym, breakfast, pool, more than one closet, an actual kitchen and few, if any, mice.

4.  We have a rare opportunity to move almost anywhere in the world and not only see, but live in places we’ve only read about in books (or not even heard of, as the case may turn out to be).

3.  I’ll finally get to try my hand at something besides working at an advertising agency – whether I am able to join the foreign service myself, teach English, get a master’s degree or find something totally new, I think my advertising days as I know them are behind me.

2.  Alex will embark on an amazing career with great benefits.

1.  I get a diplomatic passport and diplomatic immunity.  I’m not quite sure how I could use these, but it’s just nice to say.

Posted in FS Life | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

non-required reading

by Alex Posted on February 5, 2010

Interested in learning more about the Foreign Service? These books are a good place to start:

Career Diplomacy – A thorough and intelligent account of the history of the Foreign Service.

Inside a U.S. Embassy – These first-hand accounts of foreign service life are a little hokey, but still informative.

Realities of Foreign Service Life – Similar to Inside a U.S. Embassy.

Fellow Travelers – A historical novel about Foreign Service life during the McCarthy days.

Posted in FS Life, References | Tagged , , | Comments Off on non-required reading

hello, arlington

by Alex Posted on February 5, 2010

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4T1RMuoQnKo

While I’m in training we’ll be living in a corporate housing joint in Arlington, Virginia. This particular corner of Arlington isn’t the most happening of places. Let’s just say, we would be lucky to be among the suburban sprawl the video pokes fun of. Instead, we’re pretty much surrounded by office parks. Hmm.

Top Ten Reasons Why We Decided to Live There Anyway

10. It’s three blocks from the subway (or “Metro,” as they say in DC) and very close to DC proper. Not bad.

9. It’s a short walk over a bridge to Georgetown, with interesting shops, restaurants, etc.

8. Lots of other people in my A-100 class will be living here too. (Two months before we arrive, game nights are already scheduled.)

7. It’s right by a bike path Andy can use to train for the NYC Triathlon.

6. Our apartment will have about four times more space than our current apartment.

5. And a balcony.

4. And laundry in the unit.

3. And weekly maid service.

2. And continental breakfast Monday through Friday.

1. And, it’s free. (Thank you, taxpayers!) It’s also pre-arranged through the Department of State, so it’s hassle-free too.

Posted in Life in DC | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments