My Background: Part 2, Berlitz

During most of the time I was studying as an undergrad, my plan for the next phase of my life was to study as a grad student. It seemed like it would be a smooth transition with a lot of continuity. When it got closer, however, I started feeling like I should be doing something more active, working to make a contribution to society. Plus, none of my top choices among graduate programs accepted me. Without any special connections or qualifications that I thought would lead me to cool jobs, I considered various ideas, and ended up living temporarily with my parents (then headquartered in New Hampshire) and focusing on looking for a job in Boston, where I had some good friends and which I regarded as a great town. I was mostly looking at jobs in journalism (even after earlier doubts about being able to find a career there) and at customer-service positions.

Since my father was also looking for a new job at that time, he happened to be looking at a position at the Princeton, NJ corporate headquarters of the Berlitz language schools, and he noticed a posting for overseas English teachers. That sounded fun and adventurous to him, so he shared it with me, and I also thought it looked adventurous and fun, plus it was easy to make a connection to my International Studies major, so I applied. For some reason the particular Web site he'd found only mentioned jobs in Korea, so I only thought of applying there; as I would later tell my students, I knew that I didn't know much about Korea and that I would be interested in learning more, and I also knew I liked Korean food, so there was enough attraction there that I didn't even think of researching teaching possibilities in other countries.

I got the job, and although the visa process took a lot longer than I expected, eventually arrived there and had a fantastic and highly educational year in Seoul with frequent travel to various other parts of Korea. By my third month there, I had decided a few things: that I enjoyed teaching English, that I was good at it, that I loved not only seeing a new part of the world but living there and getting to know it well, and that I could envision myself combining these things by hopping from one country to another and working at Berlitz in each one. That world-wide aspect of the Foreign Service dream career seemed to be within reach as reality, so the thought of actually becoming a diplomat was pushed to the farthest corner in the back in my mind. By my sixth month in Seoul, I had decided that my next country would be Japan, and I had applied for and gotten a job in Tokyo (although I would later find out that I didn't have a specific position, just a general kind of job offer) and started Japanese lessons (alongside my continuing Korean lessons - there was a great employee discount).

When my stopover in the U.S. grew from the two months I'd planned to four months because of that tenuous nature of my employment in Tokyo, I decided to fill the time by making myself even more marketable in my chosen field by copleting a one-month intensive TESOL certification course. Even though I already had my next job, I was looking ahead to the future - I wanted to make sure I'd find a place easily in my third country of choice, and my fourth, and so on, perhaps eventually getting enough experience to come back to the States permanently and work at Berlitz headquarters developing textbooks or something. I was completely satisfied with what looked like the rest of my life would be, and it would have taken something pretty big to change that plan.

To be continued!