
It is officially ‘Chaos Week’
In exactly 7 days I’m starting my journey towards Central America. My good friends Miranda and Ruud will be dropping me off at the airport Schiphol and then I’ll be on my way to Costa-Rica. The journey door-to-door will be just under 24 hours, a serious day of travelling! I’ll be spending 2,5 months total in Costa-Rica and after that, I’ll be briefly home for just over a week to then leave again for Hawaii. So needless to say this week is all about preparations, like I wrote in my last blog, there are checklists everywhere. My room is an absolute mess, my desk is cluttered, my clothes are pretty much not in the closet anymore…. atleast I know where my passport is!
Preparing to leave home for 4 months
When you’re preparing for long-time travelling you’re not so much just planning to be somewhere else but mostly in my case, planning to be gone. Especially when you’re in a stage in life when you own a house, have frequent bills coming in and all it is not a matter of packing your bag and leaving. Sometimes I truly wish it was just a case of that, but at more sensible times I also realize I always have something steady to get back to.
Top 10 things to sort out before departure:
Sell my car
Install Windows 10 on desktop
Apply for USA Esta Visa
Do my taxes
Find new roommates
Apply for a new credit card
Move the DVL website to my server
Buy a laptop
Resubmit my thesis
Eat all the remaining food
All these things have no direct connection with Costa-Rica or Hawaii, well except the USA Visa, but they need to be sorted before I leave so things don’t go wrong whilst I’m gone. Little things need my attention like my previous credit card expiring in June 2016 (whilst I’m in Costa-Rica) or Windows withdrawing their free Windows 10 offer when I’m in Hawaii. One of my friends is in Australia right now, so I also sorted his laptop out with Windows 10. It’s just worth it thinking ahead and not missing out on these ‘deadlines’.
And then there is the financial situation, selling my car and finding new roommates would have made the situation a lot more stable. Am I screwed if I don’t sort it before departure? No, not really, but it’s just not ideal. For the car I’ve gotten a few offers but none that came close to accepting, truth is, it will cost me a bit to leave it parked somewhere but that will cost me less than accepting the wrong offer. For the roommate situation, I thought I found one perfect candidate but he turned out to be bonkers with our final conversation resulting in him threatening to call the police because he found I was scheming him. After he wasted my time for 2 weeks promising to make our rental agreement final he came up with more reasons why to postpone, for me those are red flags. So I told him he should find a different room…. I just can’t deal with people who feel it’s okay to waste your time these days. So you know what, I much rather have a car and two empty rooms to get home to than bad deals that might haunt me for a while. You can always make more money at the end of the day, but you can not easily get rid of bad roommates. And also, I can continue my search for roommates whilst in Costa-Rica and my friends were happy to help sell the car if someone is interested. So who knows, maybe everything will be sorted soon. Wishful thinking!
The worst thing of that list is by far that I have to resubmit my thesis. My university finally got back to me with all elements of my thesis being graded sufficient except for the chapter conclusions. They feel that I’m not answering the main thesis question. I feel I do. This is going to be great. Next Tuesday I have a feedback conversation with the examiners. Hopefully I don’t have to let my own beliefs go into regards of this in order to finally get my bachelor’s. As sad as this is, I would just do what they want, they have all the power…. and anyone who knows me well knows I can not deal with impotence. So seriously, fingers crossed for upcoming Tuesday. I’ll inform you, don’t worry!
So because I heard so late the thesis wasn’t satisfying the universities wishes, I now need to do my assessment through Skype. Which is fine, except I don’t have a laptop yet. I needed a laptop anyway to continue my blogging and working whilst in Central-America but now I really need it even more. The blog I wrote before this one I wrote on my phone at an airport lounge, harder than you think! Mobile just doesn’t have all the features yet that desktop/laptop offers. The good news is, I found someone who sells refurbish / second-hand laptops right here in my town so I’m going to stop by his shop on Monday to check it out. Hopefully, that is me sorted for a laptop so I can blog on the beach in Costa-Rica!
Oh and something not on my list,something fun, is having dinner / meeting up with everyone. Pretty much my entire week is packed with lunch and dinner dates where ever possible, which is funny because sometimes I don’t see people anyway for months. But then when you know for sure you won’t see each other for a long time you try to meet up prior to departure, which I really like.
A day before departure I’ll try to write another, shorter blog, to see if I managed to get all my checklist boxes checked in green! Woop woop!