From Mexico to Malaysia.

Two years ago, at the age of 55, I gathered up some courage and quit my job. I had been teaching in the public school system for 24 years in the state of New Hampshire,  United States. My passion for classroom teaching had started to wane, my three children had grown up and moved on with their lives, and I had the choice to teach for another 10 years to collect a great pension, or to take a risk and try something new. I chose to move to Tampico, Mexico, and to continue my teaching career there for one-half of the salary I was making in the U.S. (That story is in my blog Lisa in Tampico.)

I grew in Tampico. I met people, learned Spanish, traveled the country, and continued to teach. Before I left for Tampico, I had posted my resume all over the place, and I had applied for many jobs of all types. After a few months in Mexico, I got a request from Dynamic WordWorks to be an SME (Subject Matter Expert) for an on-line world mythology course. I accepted and learned how to be an SME, which was challenging and delightful. This experience started my wheels turning, and I plastered my resume all over the internet one more time as a subject matter expert.

In June, I got an e-mail from a head-hunter who had a job for me in Malaysia. Malaysia? I did not want to move half-way around the world. So I tucked it away and finished the school year. But they persisted. My rule of thumb at that point was (and still is) to apply for a job a day and to follow through on interviews.

On the last day before I flew home for summer break, I called a friend and said that I was thinking of packing up and leaving Mexico for good. I was still tired of teaching, and I needed to take my second step. He convinced me not to, and the rest of that chapter is in my Tampico blog.

I agreed with Malaysia to have a Skype interview once I got to the states. I was honest about my limited experience as an SME. The interview was a disaster. The man who interviewed me asked me questions I could not answer, and he cut the interview short. I was relieved that I had not left my teaching job in Tampico. The next day, I was offered the job as an SME for ESL at an e-learning company in Kuala Lumpur. After a few weeks of deliberation, I accepted the job and flew to Malaysia on August first.