1. We have accepted the jobs officially. We received our contracts and are sending them to Slovenia, signed, on Monday, the 14th.
2. Our current school district, along with many others in Texas and across the country I'm sure, are having intense budget constraints. Inevitably, jobs will have to be cut. However, the district offered an incentive to the first 300 teachers who inform the district that they're not returning next school offering them 10% of their paycheck as a bonus. Well, that's a great deal for Kayla and I, so we took it. So, our move from our current school is official as well.
3. We've been in contact with QSI's official travel agent and our flights are booked. We'll be headed out August 9th, arriving in Hong Kong the afternoon of August 10th. We have a 10 hour layover in London and we plan on riding the London Eye, seeing a sight or two, before being surrounded by a completely foreign language for ten months. I'm excited because I love London and haven't been in close to 10 years. Kayla had an experience there and it wasn't too pleasant, but I'll leave that story for another time.
Also, we've been busy researching, watching videos, perusing forums, etc so we can buy important stuff in preparation for our move. Two things that we decided that we would splurge on were new computers and carry-on luggage. I've never owned nice things of either.
With our hefty tax refund check, we bought new 13" Macbook Pros, the refresh models that just came out a few weeks ago. As cliche as this sounds, I don't know why I haven't bought a Mac sooner. Amazing quality, nice looks, and little learning curve makes this thing ideal...I'm blogging on it right now.
We've also bought carry on luggage and our +1 personal items from a Seattle company called TOM BIHN, a small bag/luggage company owned by Tom Bihn himself. He designs classy, incredibly well-made bags for travel, all of which is put together here in the US. I googled "best carry on luggage" and they came up #1 on numerous sites. Kayla and I checked it out for a good while before taking the plunge. We both bought the "Aeronaut" model for our larger carry on for clothes, etc, and the "Imago" for our laptop +1 bag. In addition, we bought various pouches and packing cubes specifically designed for the bags. When we found Tom Bihn, we were introduced to this whole "one bag" traveling concept. (It's pretty self-explanatory, you take one carry-on/no check on luggage when you fly). It's a whole different world when you look in to it. Our Aeronauts will help us achieve this goal when we take smaller trips throughout the coming year, especially when we go to Germany to visit Caroline. The quality of these bags are out of this world--you can tell great care went in to designing the bags, along with the highest quality of materials. Can't wait to really try them out.
We'll be posting a video review of our bags soon, next week hopefully now that it's Spring Break.
Well, that's all I got for now. A lot of stuff is in the works. Moving feels close yet far all at the same time. Shoot, in 5 months we'll be out. Crazy thought.
Anyways, peace out yall and much love.
Stephen
