Chloe will be turning 7 next month. Since she was in Reception, two years ago, they have been encouraged to use the computer and the mouse. I would occassionally let her use my nearly 10yr old Toshiba but I would often lose patience with it haha!
At work, we have an internal market place, sort of like a virtual garage sale. I have been on the lookout for a nice deal since the site launched. Patience is indeed a virtue, and one early Monday morning, a guy from the ICT drop in centre posted his old laptop for sale. It had a nice spec too: Lenovo, 64bit, 4gb RAM, 500gb HDD, i5, preloaded with Windows 10. I emailed him and had it reserved for pickup on a Friday. It cost me just £80!!! Or less than Php6000! Beat that!
When Chloe was still a baby, Zayd and I created an email account for her. We have been sending her email since. Not as regular as i wanted, but it's there.
I have always imagined how touching the day would be when Chloe would read my messages for her. It was a lot more intense than i expected. As she read it, i was somehow transported to the time i wrote the email.
She was teary-eyed as well. I never expected that to happen.
I promised to myself that I will update this blog as soon as I hit the one year mark at work. So here I am now.
Yes, i survived my first year at work here in the UK. It wasn't an easy one to begin with. Chloe was in Year 1 and in school till 3pm while Blythe had just started Nursery that ended at noon. In the first few weeks, i had to do two school runs: one to pick B up to bring to the new child minder's and then to Chloe to bring to the minder's. I initially thought taking the bus would be easy. But looking at the timetable, it wasn't going to be easy. I had to take a cab. Good thing we had our "suki" (aka regular guys, Mr. S and Kuya J). So I spent about £150 a week for transpo plus childminding fees about £300 a month. Wow. Wala nang natira sa sweldo ko! On the upside, my employer had a childcare benefit that we can buy vouchers before tax, so that helped immensely; and my managers were understanding of my situation. It must have been after a two months that C got in their After School Club, so I had one less school run to do. It was tiring and stressful.
So when summer came, I did my happy dance! No more school runs! Mr. S was actually surprised that I lasted a whole academic year doing that. He was waiting for me to give up. Lol.
So why did i decide to work here in the UK? I had no intentions really, i was enjoying my time with the kids, baking, crafting (hmmm or trying to), colouring, etc. But i miss my financial independence. I felt guilty about spending my hubby's money (mind you, i did not have an allowance, i only had money for grocery and pay rent) to buy nice clothes for my girls. I then decided, if i were to try and break in here, i wouldn't go the consulting route. I would try to get in an internal IT department. I had my fair share of consulting, I am thankful for the experience. It is time to be on the other side of the table. I did not care if i had to start at the bottom. (Don't we all?) So I am now employed as a Business Intelligence (BI) Developer. The application process here is different from what I am used to in Manila.
I was first asked to take an aptitude exam. #$%&@! I haven't taken one since 1998. I was in a room wirh fresh grads. They all finished ahead of me and I was literally shaking after. In fact, i bid goodbye to the post at the back of my mind. That was how disheartened I was. The following week I was called in for an interview. To my surprise, it was a speed-dating type one. Having the experience I had, I whizzed through it. I felt so pleased then and I was confident I made it. A week after, i was called in for a technical interview. I think i aced it as well, since I got offered a job after two weeks.
I had a blast "turning on" my IT brain and switching off (for a few hours) my "mum mode". It is very much like riding a bike, you never really forget those SQLs, C# .Net, etc. I got along really well with everyone I worked with. And now, I am really in the "feel" of working 37hrs a week, fulltime. I get to work from home too on some days. Over the summer, my kids have forced me to work from home on Fridays, when they do not go for Holiday Playscheme.
So there. I haven't been updating this blog because of that.
My kids have grown and I have had a lot of experiences with them over the past three years since we moved to the UK. I am thankful that amidst all the trials, our family has managed beautifully with this big change.
So do I miss my old life? Yes. Sometimes. But now that the girls are in school full-time, i think getting this job last year was a blessing. I still get to play mum.
Xxx