Over the course of this blog you will be bored shiteless by me banging on about the planning of our trip to Mexico and our experiences there. We expect to live there for a minimum of two years doing whatever turns up - this could be teaching English, volunteering in a variety of settings and or travelling around the country to learn as much about the culture(s) as possible. We both have vague ideas about what we would like to achieve but the reality could be something entirely different. Our first six months will be spent learning Spanish at Escuela Mexicana in Guanajuato in central Mexico.
But first, please allow me to introduce my wife and myself. We live in rural Australia where I work as a nurse and Heather as the Marketing Manager/Publicist for HotHouse Theatre (www.hothousetheatre.com.au), the only professional theatre company outside a capital city, who bring an eclectic selection of plays to the bush as well as commission and tour new works throughout this wide brown land. Their motto is "created locally, recognised nationally"...y'gotta love it!
A fantastic job which she will find very difficult to relinquish.
She came to this position via primary teaching, assistant exec. officer of the Continuing Education Centre and coordinator of the Performing Arts Programme in Wangaratta. All this on top of an over-active life as a volunteer in the arts field where she was president of the Wangaratta Arts Council, a member of the Regional Arts Victoria board, member of the inaugural board of the Wangaratta Festival of Jazz, president of the Exhibitions Gallery and two short stints as gallery director. This is only a brief overview but it blows my mind!!
And now a bit about me (some would say it is all about me!). I do not understand the concept of volunteerism or community work. Some may consider this very sad but I was never exposed to the idea of working for others without pay - this will change once we reach Mexico. My motives are not entirely altruistic because I see it as a fantastic way to practice/learn Spanish "as she is spoke" rather than the text book version, not to mention meeting Mexican people in a real life situation.
My background is one of seafaring with the British India Steam Navigation Company with whom I did my cadetship, Texaco Tankers (an utter f...ing disaster), the Australian National Line and Associated Steamships over a period of 16 years. In between mucking around in ships I did nursing before settling down for about ten years as an educator at the Austin Hospital and La Trobe University in Melbourne. I left Melbourne in 2007 for lust to join Heather in Albury where I had a succession of crappy nursing and education jobs until I found my current position nursing as a civilian in an Australian Army hospital.
Heather and I got married on the 17th of January 2009.
