In Part One, Jose shared his challenges of starting in Australia. Here, Jose tells us about his turn-around and how he overcame the challenges to make the most of his experience in Australia.
A mental challenge
A few weeks into my new city and life, I felt depressed because I had moved away from everyone I knew. The gap between expectation and reality was also to blame. I had spent weeks at university and didn’t have any friends. I had to spend hours speaking to old friends on the phone to keep me going. It didn’t help when finding a part-time job seemed impossible. Everyone seemed to expect work experience and perfection. There were moments when I thought to myself; ‘Why did you come here to study more, you had a job that you enjoyed’. I was not adjusted to the food style to eat properly and was losing weight. Now, in my third month at university, I look back at those challenges and smile. I now have a huge circle of friends and enough part-time work to keep me going. Being persistent paid off.
My turn-around
It all started when I took a short trip to Maleny. A handful of scenic moments and a refreshing dip at Gardners Falls reset my mind. I was talking to someone I had just met and he told me about the market store that he ran on Sundays. He invited me to assist him run the store and promised a decent pay. I had just scored my first part-time job in Australia and I knew nothing about it.
The tasks involved shopping for the stock during weekend, setting up shop on Sunday morning, selling the merchandise, packing up whatever remained and so on. I was a software programmer till now and all these were new to me. The best part was that whenever the job challenged me to my limits, gathering new skills and remembering the days when I had yearned for a job kept me going. Now, after a few weeks on the job, I can run a market store by myself, something I never imagined I could do. I had also completed training and was now a licensed security guard. Apart from all that, I was also trained on the job as a professionally qualified data center cleaner.
If three challenging months taught me so much, merely thinking about all the positive changes keep my spirits up. Life ahead can only get better, I can’t wait to experience the challenges ahead of me and the thrill that success brings.
– Jose
Image credit: Visit Sunshine Coast
