Are we going? Aren't we going? - The process (Keir)

Work first called for expressions of interest for a work placement in Malmo, Sweden on November 5th, 2014. At that time the plan was to have people on the ground in Quarter 1, 2015.

I emailed the details to Kristine and 3 minutes later got back this email:

Do it

So I applied.

I dusted off my old resume (I've been with the same company for almost 13 years so it was very much out of date), shook the moths out of my lucky interview suit and put in my application.

At this point it was looking to be a quick process.  An interview and then rapidly packing to head to Sweden within a month or two. We started looking at organizing - fortunately Mum agreed to have Oscar (our dog) as it was going to be a nightmare to get him over with us, and we were going to rent the house out.  But first I needed to get the job.

The first round of interviews were held on the 26th of November, and a second round was held 3rd of December.  They seemed to go well and I was pretty confident.  Kris and I waited to hear an answer but then a third round of interviews was announced - a manager from the Malmo company wanted to meet us as he was in Australia for some meetings.  I was off on leave that week 15th December, but came back in for an interview while Kris took the kids down to the Mawson Lakes park and fed the ducks.  Again it seemed to go well and we were told that we should hear an answer by the end of the week.

On Thursday I got a call saying that they were waiting on some answers from Sweden and we'd need to wait until the New Year to find out.

I've never had a holiday period drag so much...

When we returned I (maybe naively) expected a rush of information and activity, but instead we were told that they were waiting on a response from Sweden and we should hear in about 2 weeks.  Our HR team were great at keeping us informed, but there wasn't much they could do as they waited for Sweden to update them.  We were informed that we would have an initial acceptance and then we'd need to get government clearances from Sweden and that could take some time.

The "two weeks" continued until we got an update on 18th Feburary 2015.  They were still waiting. From then I made myself a nuisance, asking HR regularly if there were updates - obviously the Quarter 1deadline was going to slip, but was it all still even going ahead?

Finally on the 9th of April we got told that the first level of clearance had been passed but now we needed security clearances agreed between Australia and Sweden.  Also there were 6 people shortlisted and only 4 positions available so we still didn't know for sure if we had been selected, or even if it was all going ahead.

So for the next months we kept waiting, being told that we should hear an update in "two weeks" and then finally on the 29th of June 2015 I received an invite to a meeting and was told that I'd got one of the positions!

This was a huge weight off of our shoulders - finally we knew that we'd be going, but the question was when?  The first dates thrown around were August, but eventually they settled on mid-October.  it was when my project finished off, rugby was finished and Kristine's work contract expired.

So then it was on to preparations!  We had a house that was fairly new (we had it built 3 years ago) but still had the cruddy builders paint and had been subject to 3 kids and 2 dogs for 3 years.  We also had WAY too much stuff - offcuts of wood we were keeping, documents and papers for computer games I hadn't played in years and about four archive boxes full of cables and computer parts - not to mention Kristine's scrapbooking and sewing stuff.

The shelves from the boy's bedrooms and looking into the study

 Tom's gear in the study

So to start with we cleared some space in our lounge and then we moved the computers and sewing gear from the study into the lounge.  Next we moved the kids one-by-one into the study while we fixed, painted, and cleaned their rooms.  Then it was our turn.

Us (and all the furniture) in the study

It's now the 31st of August and we've almost finished..  The whole house was painted by Kristine while I was at work and we managed to pack most of the garage and all of the non-essential stuff into boxes in the study.  We donated four carloads of stuff to thrift shops, recycled a full trailer load of metal and dumped three trailer loads of junk.  Not to mention borrowing the bins of all of our neighbors in order to throw away papers and other odds and ends.

The kids "helping"

Cleaning our carpet

Now things have slowed down a little as we run into rugby finals, and we're expecting the contract and exact date any time now, so we'll continue to pack.  We've had a real-estate agent through in preparation for renting and have organized our mortgage while we're away.  We've also booked a going-away party to catch up with everyone before we leave - there's not a lot of free time between now and then...  Hopefully my next post will have the date, the contract and maybe some pictures of the party.