Soooo! About two months ago I heard that one of the team leaders in my department was pregnant and thought, okay, self, you have been passively going with the flow at work for long enough, it's time to tell them you want a change.
My thought process was this: in a few months she will go on maternity leave (3-6 months) --> she will need a replacement --> I still do not want to be a team leader in my department --> yet again, someone whom I trained into the job when they arrived in the company will become a team leader and technically be higher up in the hierarchy than me, and... if something needed to be the last straw for getting me to get myself off my ass and finally ask for a change, that was it.
It was not a surprise to any of my bosses (who, at this point, have all been in our department for less time than I was); pretty much every periodical evaluation I've had in the past 2 years has included "we're happy you're with the department, but let us know when you want to move on so we can help you find a place in the company", and I've just been, like, not doing it. But I finally went to my own TL, who is also a friend (yet another person I trained --> were friends and colleagues --> she was promoted to team leader), and told her, "Okay. It's time."
She was sad but supportive, as was her manager, and I went to HR after consulting with a former manager who still has a senior position in the company about what she thinks could be likely options for openings. I went into the meeting with a vague idea of what role I could play (moving into a project management type job), and was frankly pretty stunned when HR told me that when she heard I was looking to change it up, the first thing she thought of was of an opening in--
DUM DUM DUM
...China.
I'd known the company was planning on opening an office in Beijing in 2016, but had ruled out anything to do with that, mostly because I'd assumed they'd want to relocate someone there long-term, and that... wasn't something that really ever interested me: I don't know anyone there, the language and writing and culture are entirely foreign to me, I'd be pretty much alone; I didn't even consider it. But HR told me that they were actually looking for someone to just go there for 2 months or so (which in later convos turned into 3-4 months? idek), and she and a few others thought I'd be perfect for the job.
It's been a mostly vague and kind of strange process of figuring out what exactly this job would be (I don't entirely know yet), how long it will be for (a "few months"), and when it will begin (as of now, sometime in March), and since it really wasn't decided I haven't talked about it and couldn't talk about it at work at all. But I did tell HR that I was interested, and this week HR told me they were looking at visas, and that I could tell people and start making arrangements. It feels weird to me to have it "finalized" without my signing any kind of contract or having a plane ticket yet, but for now I'm treating it like it's actually happening, meaning
TL;DR in March I'm going to move to Beijing for a few months for work! SO THAT'S HAPPENING.
I am excited/scared, and... treating it like an adventure. I'm sure I'll meet some people while there, but uh, if you know know any nice people in Beijing, or like, if you know fangirls in China, so let me know or let me know where I can find them :-) I also expect to make at least a short trip to Singapore while there to visit family friends (and fandom friends :D?), at some point - like I said, it's all very vague at this point, and I am not too stressed about the logistics, mostly because I'm in a lucky enough position of not renting an apartment and so not having to worry about subletting it while I'm away.
I feel kind of weird and even guilty that I'm not as excited about it as I feel like I should be, or as I would be if we were talking about going to the US again. I especially feel that contrast because I did have the opportunity of working from the US two years ago (and how has it already been two years, jesus.) There are a bunch of reasons for it, I mean - the US feels in a way like a second home, and I'm comfortable with the language and the culture and I have so, so many friends there, so obviously it's an entirely different experience. I'm just -- China's going to be an entirely new level of travel for me. I've never been in any country where I couldn't read the letters they wrote in, at the very least, for more than a few hours. And neither google translate nor google maps will be as handy as they are here. So there is certainly some trepidation. But, I mean. I am looking forward to it.
Yay?
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