Over here I just finished working on the kiwi orchards, did a few extra days after picking on maintenance type work. My plan is to now travel with a friend from work and her siblings are joining us in a few weeks. I picked her up on Sunday and will try and see the north island before August 13 when she goes home to German. I'll leave soon after I sell my car, hopefully to a couple I made friends with here.
But while working the last month and a bit I've been trying to figure out what I wanted to do next. My visa expires July 16th and I have the work experience to extend another year. I was applying to jobs and started applying in England since a friend there refered me to her company and suggested a few other places. I looked into Australia and a few other countries also. I also knew I didn't want another year in New Zealand without a real job but considered other working holidays instead. Unfortunately I'm too old for half of them. I started applying to jobs in countries that had working holiday visas with the main one being Germany. I've made a lot of German friends, always liked the country, and the visa is free.
During this time I kept applying to jobs in Canada. I received some help on my resume and cover letter and applied to a lot of different jobs. Most were consulting and sampling jobs like my old job but for bigger companies so I would make more money, less hours, hopefully more diverse work. (Also international offices so i might be able to work elsewhere in the future) Others were industry jobs like working at a mine or manufacturing plant. Others were more unique jobs like a professor of environmental studies at Cambrian College. I never held much hope for these applications since over my times of unemployment or when applying while at Adomait, I've sent in literally hundreds of applications and never got responses. Ever interview was from visiting an office or through a friend.
So imagine my surprise when I got an email asking for a Skype interview with RWDI, which was followed a few days later for a request to call New Gold, a mine in northern Ontario. Both were not my top choices to hear from but it was encouraging. I worried because New Gold would require living in a small town on the Ontario/ Manitoba border. 4 hours from any decent sized city. After New Zealand, I am little over small towns with few people and no ammendities. RWDI, on the other hand, was listed as an entry level field tech position but in Guelph. I worried it would be taking a step back in my career, being just a sampler, doing less them I did at old job on the engineering side. This means less money, less responsibility, less or harder growth in company, and being pigeon holed into all future jobs as just a sampler. I was happy to have interviews and if offered one, could take it and leave in a year or two if need be.
New Gold's interview went well if short. I had to get to work and she didn't want to keep me on the line since I had to call internationally. It was a decent job but a little to low level and bad location. A better job for starting a career but not where I am in life.
RWDI went really well. Due to my experience the one interviewer's usual spiel was usless since I knew it all. When talking about why I was in New Zealand (burning out from hours mainly), the other guy said he worked with my old boss 16 years ago and he was a work horse then. So congratulated me for lasting 7 years there. I mentioned wanting my P. Engg licence but put it off due to lack of encouragement and professionals to sign of on it, which they were happy I mentioned it first since they would like me to get it. The biggest thing that happened is i mentioned going where ever a job was offered, Guelph would be awesome but I've been applying internationally and was not set on any particular area. The one interviewer made a comment about the Windsor position which I said I thought I applied for. He was surprised to have not seen my resume for it, so either it was filtered out or I didn't apply correctly (online applications usually take dozens of steps through an online form and one can take over an hour and I lacked decent internet). I answered other questions, low balled salary expectations since I thought it was a entry level field tech job and didn't want to lose the opportunity. Luckily they mentioned recognizing my experience and the position would be adjusted based on that. The posting only said entry level since they had to pick something and didn't want to discourage new graduates. After that they said they should have an answer by end of the week (was a Monday EST).
Two days later I received an email from the one interviewer to discuss Windsor since it is a more diverse and all round better job. We set up another call between just us. This position works mostly out of Michigan with Chrysler. An employee worked with them to make RWDI their exclusive environmental consultant (which is really good of him) but he was being promoted up. They are also trying to expand the team since they can't handle all of Chrysler work. This job will require me to go sampling, but also work at becoming the client contact for Chrysler. I will also start on business development, finding new clients and selling the environmental services. Eventually they talked about hiring a Michigan team and I would help train and run the new office. There is more, but it is a better position then just a field tech with great growth potential.
As of last week, I signed the job contact there. I have a start date of August 20th. Since I plan to travel until August 13, I will be returning around the 15th or 16th. I've looked into apartments and found some nice cheap ones by the office. I have a friends wedding in KW area on the 25th of August and not sure if we are actually family camping. I will be really busy the first bit I'm back, need a whole wardrobe, get car up to date, rent and furnish a place. Unfortunately Windsor is farther away but i will find to to visit.
So that's that,
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