If you’ve lived in American all your life, there might be a part of you that yearns to know what it’s like to live beyond the borders of the U.S. Especially if you love to travel and have already spent some time in other countries, living abroad for a while might seem like the logical next step to you. And who knows, you might even choose to stay permanently. But if you’re just starting off on this journey, there are likely a few things you’re unsure about or that are concerning to you. So to help make this process a little easier to bear, here are three tips for preparing to live outside the U.S. for the first time.

Set Up For Your New Life Abroad

Before you decide that you’re going to move to a particular country, it’s a good idea to begin setting up your life there, including finding a job and a decent place that you might like to live. According to Jennifer Lachs, a contributor to GoAbroad.com, there are tons of work abroad programs available that can help you line up a job while you’re living in this new country. If you work for a large company in the U.S., you might want to see if there’s a chance for simply transferring to an office in another country. And since it can be hard to find a place to live merely by looking online, you may want to book a hotel for the first few nights that you’ll be in this new country so you can get a first-hand look at a few places you’ve been considering before you make a permanent choice.

Prepare The Legal Logistics

Living in a different country is very different from just visiting that country for a short period of time, especially if you don’t necessarily have a timeframe of when you may or may not be leaving the country. Because of this, it’s important that you get all the legal logistics taken care of before you arrive. According to Elizabeth Preske, a contributor to Travel and Leisure, this could include applying for or renewing your passport, securing a visa, setting up a bank account, finding the right medical insurance, and making copies of any important documents you may need to bring with you.

Get Ready For Potential Culture Shock

Even if you’ve been to this country before, living there could be a whole different ball game for you. With this in mind, Diane Schmidt, a contributor to The Spruce, suggests that you prepare yourself for potential culture shock. To best handle this, you may want to start learning any new languages as soon as you can, do as much research about the area and customs as you’re able to, and prepare yourself to be open-minded and accepting of things you may not be familiar with or easily understand.

If you’re considering moving outside of the U.S., use the tips mentioned above to prepare yourself for this new adventure.

To improve productivity and ensure better camaraderie in the office, our LGU planned and simultaneously conducted a team building. Our office together with the Rural Health Unit, OTRU, and a few OCC employees constituted Group II, we are grouped into four groups because most event places can’t accommodate a larger crowd.

Our group consists of 117 participants, before the event we conducted a site inspection of the possible venue of our team building, and after deliberation and carefully considering the best options, our team building was held at Blue Pebbles located at Alcantara, Romblon.

We agreed to meet up at 9:30 in the morning to prepare for departure at ten o’clock in the morning to Alcantara, I went to work earlier than that and waited for my workmates, we had a group picture in front of the municipal hall before departing, several vans were hired to accommodate employees who don’t have their own car or motorcycle.

We arrived at the venue after an hour, and since I was the one assigned to billeting, I have to assign rooms to every department, and with that, I wasn’t able to help a friend, who had motion sickness. We rested a bit and lunch was served, unlike our previous team-building food this year’s team-building was catered.

The team-building activities started at one o’clock in the afternoon, and as host of the event I have no choice, but to be at the front and do most of the talking.  The usual preliminaries during a program were done, followed up by short messages from the present SB Members, and in between were the intermission numbers from each department.

After which, were short learning, discussion, and games with our GAD Focal person, who teaches us about the difference between Gender and Sex, as well as the do’s and don’ts in the workplace, the things we should avoid doing, because without knowing we may be violating someone’s privacy and someone’s being.

We all enjoyed the activity, we are grouped into four and had a mind teaser game, as well as creating and performing our own group chant/yell.  Our municipal Mayor arrives just right after we divulge into our snack, I let her rest a bit after acknowledging her arrival. Although I know that our Mayor is always prepared and ready to speak, it was epic that I  asked her if she is ok or ready to give a speech at the exact moment because I felt like it will be unpleasant if I called her right away without asking her, hahaha.

Anyway, before our municipal mayor shared an inspirational message I asked some participants to dance for entertainment, which made everyone burst into laughter because of the notable dance move of the participants and how they run and their body stretches when our Mayor’s aide and some councilors throw in some cash for them to enjoy and to dance more.

Our mayor shared an empowering and inspirational message, she also reminded everyone to serve the public with a happy heart and to love each other, but not to the extent to develop a love relationship with a workmate, our municipal vice mayor also shared an inspirational message right after whom he talked about honesty doing our work well even there was nobody looking at us, and with his permission, the bar was opened, what I mean the boys were now allowed to group and drink. You know, boys will be boys, they will not enjoy a party without something to drink, so they found their own corner in the resort.

The second part of the program started right after listening to inspirational messages, where it was all about group games. It was a lot of fun, the participants enjoyed it and even requested another game before eating our dinner.  We ate our dinner, and we rested a bit to prepare for the social night, where our vice mayor hired a band for everyone’s enjoyment.

Anyway, Blue Pebbles Beach Resort is located in Poblacion of Alcantara, it is along the highway with a nice landscape and surroundings and with a great view of the sea. Its location combined with the tranquil and peaceful surroundings creates a very relaxing atmosphere for anyone looking for a restful time.

The beach resort has small and big cottages for rent, they also have rooms for visitors who want an overnight stay.  Their family room can be rented for ₱4,500.00 and cater to up to five people but can be maximized to upto seven or eight people, costing ₱350.00 for an extra person which is a bit costly for those who can’t afford, they also have a room beside the pool which is designed for two people at ₱1,800 .oo, and ₱250.00 for an extra bedding or person.

The downside of the resort when we had our team building was having no water in the middle of the night, in short, we are not able to wash properly after dipping in the pool. Ha-ha

Disclosure: This is NOT a sponsored post. The above-written post was my own personal experience and might be different from yours.

My officemates have been asking me to go with them after office, to unwind and chase sunset or spend an overnight escapade somewhere, but I keep declining, I would love the idea, but the introverted me doesn’t like it. I don’t feel like being away from home and from the comfort of my comfort zone, but then one day I went with them to chase sunset at a hill top a few minutes away from the town center.

The hill top was owned by a relative who also happened to be one of the town councilor, I thought it will be going to be a long walk, but I was wrong, it was only a few minutes walk and I have not even sweated going up hill. The place wasn’t fully develop yet, but there was already a trail to use, so it wasn’t that hard to reach the top.

The moment we reached the peak, we became busy snapping pictures while the others immediately prepared and feasted on the food, the view was very mesmerizing, seeing the shore and a little bit of sunset.

[ Tagged In ] Chasing Sunset, Hill top, Hilltop, Sunset