The title might not reflect the content of this blog post but indeed, back in my hometown in Indonesia – people tend to glorify the diaspora life, or in my case, since I am living in Germany – people thought I have super easy, nice life here (with a lot of €€€€). Unfortunately no it is not. I do have a nice life but it doesn’t justify that I can get all the thing I have now in easy ways. Every day is a struggle that makes every step counts. It has been started as I stepped for the very first time here.
I can’t understand the language at all. I still remember how the German language frustrated me, how disappointed am I as I could not get a place in the university because after six months I could only speak German until B2 level (they need C1 level – although I call it blessings in disguise), in the end paid thousands of euro to get an MBA degree, meanwhile I was being a cleaning woman for financial matter, landed on my first job in Germany, got an internship on sustainability in leading German companies – got the contracts but in the end I can’t do it because of the matters on work permit (most of the time it sucks to live as a foreigner if we’d talk about “regulations”), landed on the second job in Germany and worked together with tremendously smart people…
And now here I am. Married to the man I know since eight years ago (seriously a German joked that I am an ordered bride that come from Indonesia because my husband and I met online – very funny dude), speak fluent German, and my dream since I was young comes true – got a master degree abroad. The journey for me is not over rather it is just started again. I’ve heard even from my German friends and colleagues that to get a full-time job in Germany takes time and patience. As Germans, it took four to six months – time for them to finally landed on the jobs. Could you imagine how it would work for me as a foreigner?
I’ve told my husband on which point I’ve missed? Work experiences – checked. Language – checked. I speak German and English fluently. Good notes – checked. Both in bachelor and master. Work permit – checked. He only added “ein bisschen Glück gehört dazu” – a bit of luck belongs to the job application. I have been this far. And the most important lesson is the persistence – because no matter how hard it is if you really want it you’ll get it no matter how. In my case – if there’s no scholarship for me, I worked two jobs as I was in Jakarta, save hard because I have no “rich” parents to simply ask them to finance my master – saying mostly “no” to fancy lifestyle and holidays the people at my age have and had a German boyfriend belongs to it also (and I am thankful for that). As said – if you really want it so bad, in the end, the universe brings you to it. Seriously.
Meanwhile, I am working already for some market analysis projects in a management consulting in Bonn. Oh, I just get back in Germany since two months and I already complained how it is so hard to get a job here. Patience is something that I still need to learn to 😉
Karaleva's Crib 