Christmas Letter

Dear Friends, Family, and Everyone Else

What a year, eh?

This year has been one of amazing opportunities, changes, and dreams come true for me.  I spent most of the year living in Oak Harbor, a small town on in island in Washington State.  Most of my life centered around my job working in a Go Wireless cell phone store selling Verizon Wireless products and services.  In May, I accomplished my primary goal with that company by becoming a store manager.  I was extremely fortunate and was left with a stellar crew, and was able to add to it to make it one of the highest performing stores in the area.  Of the five months I was manager, four were the highest profit months in the store’s history.

Towards the end of the year, another fantastic opportunity opened up.  Since university, I had been keeping touch with someone who worked with an EFL placement agency.  Basically what they do is work with native English speakers to get them employment as EFL (English as a Foreign Language) teachers in South Korea.  I’d wanted to do it for years, but had never been in a place financially or mentally to do so.  Finally, after several years of working, waiting, and dreaming, I decided to go for it.

I expressed my interest and started the paperwork process.  Then I agreed to a position.  Then my work found out about my plans/I gave notice (they were extremely gracious about it too!).  In what seemed like a chaotic maelstrom of occurrences, I found myself moving out of my apartment, quitting my job, selling my car, and moving across the world to South Korea.

And let me tell you… I have no regrets.

I make more than enough money to live on comfortably.  I am able to maintain voice and face-to-face contact with my friends and family back home through Skype.  I’ve made wonderful friends here in Pohang.  I feel almost none of the stress I felt back at home when it comes to work and bills.  I am truly happy.  Finally, I am traveling the world and seeing things I have only imagined.

In spite of my excitement for the road ahead, and the many things I plan to do and see, I cannot forget or be ungrateful for the people I have at home.  To my friends and family that I have left behind, I miss you so much.  Thank you for your support, your prayers, and your excitement in hearing about my travels.  Thanks for always having my back when I need it.  You mean so much to me, and I can’t wait till I can see all of you again!  To my family back home: I hope you have a wonderful Christmas together with lots of good food, good cheer, and hopefully a better Santa experience this year for my dad’s side 😉

This will be my first Christmas away from home.  But I am lucky and blessed enough to have the love of my family and friends with me, and that makes more difference than anything in the world.  Know that my memories of you make it so I can have a piece of home with me wherever I am in this huge, crazy world.

Merry Christmas everyone.  I love you.

Now for a little special something (I stole the idea from Brandon…)