The Desert Awaits

Part 1 - Intro: How I did it

Part One: How I did it

I woke up one day and decided to quit my job and accept a job offer seven thousand miles across the world. That's how this all started. I had been interviewing for jobs in China, Oman, Japan and Saudi Arabia for about a month before I hopped on a plane without a plan, but with a lot of excitement and dreams of adventure flowing through my veins. I didn't tell anyone of my plans because I didn't really have one. I weighed multiple job offers in various countries. Chose the best one AKA the one that paid the most, processed my visa within a week and was packed and on a plane all expenses paid. I had recently graduated from college with a degree in Linguistics and knew for sure my dream – like most young adults – was to travel the world. My only catch was that I wanted to make money doing it (and not as an influencer). I was 22 years old at the time, working as a CNA fulltime and an ESL teacher part-time. I had recently gotten the job at the language center teaching adults in my city and knew I was meant to be a language teacher, but the feeling teaching locally was not the same as I'd experienced in my time abroad.

So let me back track, I had already had some experience teaching abroad through study abroad student-teaching in Mexico, Spain and China. Then, my graduating year I went to Morocco for an Arabic study abroad program to learn Arabic for the summer. I guess you can say I made the most of my time in university. My first student-teaching experience was in the spring of 2016, and then in the summer that year, and the following year (basically two trips a year until I graduated) and it was a life changing experience for me that solidified my career of choice. That was in my junior year of university and I'd gotten a scholarship to help cover my expenses. Once I realized that I didn't have to pay for these experiences, I was sold. Well, also, I didn't have any money at the time and couldn't possibly have went on all of those trips without the university paying for it.

Through those experiences was how I realized that life abroad was meant for me and I couldn't see my self being happy any other way. When I returned home in July of 2017, after my final study abroad trip, reality hit me HARD. I'd already graduated in May that year and now I needed to make a living. At that time I was 21 and there was only a couple of things I was sure of: 1. I wanted to teach adults. 2. I wanted to teach abroad. 3. I already had some experience from student-teaching. Being the savvy person I was taught to be, I might've glamourized my experience a bit on my resume and used the infamous Dave's café online site to start my job search. I reached out to listings posted and got responses! This was laughable because while I'm the most confident person on the planet – I HAD NO IDEA WHAT I WAS DOING! I didn't have any guidance or connections. I didn't know how to brand myself or use my experience well in interviews. It did help though that I was at the time working as an ESL teacher, so I had never stopped teaching after graduation and the interviewers seemed to like that I was currently employed for some reason. Anyway, I worked there for 3 months, if that, before I quit to move across the world to live the next 3 years and counting in Saudi Arabia. Dropping everything to follow my dreams was the best decision I've ever made. I've since stopped counting how many countries I've visited since I started my journey abroad. I'm 25 now with a lot of experience....in life and teaching. What conspired after I landed I never would've imagined and still look back over the years and shake my head. Where in the world did I get the guts, stamina and confidence? And why did I choose Saudi Arabia of all countries to live out my dreams? Let's just say I wasn't your average black, single, 22 year old. I'm an English Teacher by trade and a lover of life and experience at all times. What's that saying?..."Try anything once" or something like that. If my life was a movie, you would think I was crazy.