I know it has been a little while since I last posted anything here, but to be honest, not a lot has changed. Essentially I spend half my time out partying with people and drunk and the other half thinking about the fact that I am spending too much time partying and drunk. All the while making no money whatsoever; so obviously this situation is completely unsustainable.
In my last post I suggested that I might go to the UK – where I know the language – and give some of my entrepreneurial ideas a go there. Realistically though this is a horrible idea just because everything is so much more expensive there. Even living like a total bum in the middle of nowhere (an idea I loathe, knowing how little care for the idea of living in the country or small towns), the money just wouldn't go very far at all. This means I would have to work something out extremely quick; and while this is possible, it would also be a big gamble.
Instead I have opted to take an alternative route, one that I have been thinking about since long before I left the States. That is, to get a British Council recognized TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) International Diploma. Denver actually had one of the few language schools in the States offering the CELTA (the Cambridge University TEFL) and I got all the information and all. However, they didn't have courses that worked with my schedule (leaving the US at the end of August 2008) so I opted not to get the certification as this would have caused a major – and costly – delay in my primary plan. Once I got to Europe, I would think about it now and then, but was having too much fun on my extremely protracted holiday to be bothered (bear in mind, I haven't worked since July 31, 2008).
Anyway, I have now decided it is time to get this done. I still have the money and have found an extremely reputable school in the Czech Republic that is offering a class cycle I can work with. Further, they offer extensive job placement assistance (currently all of their graduates are employed), university recognition (i.e. their courses are recognized as credits towards further education in a myriad of universities around the world), Czech (therefore EU) & Chinese government recognition, and can provide work permits for graduates teaching in the Czech Republic or Slovakia (both EU member states). It will cost me a decent amount of money, but not enough to sink me yet and opens up an entirely new range of opportunities. [Yes, I know that theoretically you can get TEFL jobs without proper certification, but this is very difficult in Europe and to be honest, despite having a decent grasp of the language, I don't really know anything about teaching it to others.]
Today I paid my initial deposit (a fair amount of money in its own right), so I am pretty much “locked in” to this option now. This is probably a good thing since I have had a bitch of a time making up my mind about any possible option up until now; total freedom to go in any direction can be quite daunting. I'll have a lot of online work to do before hand, but the actual classes (and thus my relocation) begin in May and end in June. By all accounts it is a very intensive process, so I'll have to get myself back into the mindset of having some sort of daily structure and the like.
To be honest, it feels nice to have finally made a decision and locked myself into it; I actually have some idea where I will be and what I will be doing in a couple of months. Frankly I'm pretty confident that I can be a decent English teacher for people wanting to learn the language.
Of course this means I still have have about a month and a half of free time. I suspect I'll stay here in Bucharest, but now that it is getting warm I'll probably spend more time exploring around the rest of the country, and probably Moldova and Ukraine as well. Further, I can still work on my other little business ideas and perhaps I'll work something out that I can do on the side. Otherwise, I can still live here without going through too much money until it is time to go to the Czech Republic.
So there it is, my new plan and one that it will cost me a lot of money to get out of at this point.
Otherwise, there isn't a whole lot more to report. I've still been going out a LOT and exploring Bucharest in much greater detail. The other night I was hanging out with some of my Romanian friends for St. Patrick's Day and it seems I know more about cool little places to go than even many people who live here now; at least here in the center of the city. I am, in fact, getting know the city very well and still like it a lot. :)
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