Today marks 6 months since we left New Zealand.
People have often asked me what I think of Ireland and why I moved here, and I tell them that we wanted to see Europe, and that you can't go to France for the weekend from New Zealand, and that there are so many places we want to explore, we will probably be here for 5 years.
Even if you're not entirely enamoured with your new homeland, you need to at least pretend to the native people. In Ireland, this seems to be even more pronounced, as the Irish seem to be of the national belief that their country is a bit crap, and so if you like it, then it's really affirming to them, and if you don't like it? You're from New Zealand, go back. It's where everyone else from here wants to go anyway!
I am one of those people who can always see both sides of the coin in most arguments. I can think of a bunch of reasons as to why Ireland is a great place to live, and also a bunch of reasons as to why it is not. Here is a top 10 of each.
Reasons to Stay
- Great craic
Ireland is renowned for its craic, its fun and good times. On an island of drinking, dancing and story telling, there is always a good time to be had and a person to serenade you when you're out and about. It lives up to this reputation well, with live music in most bars in Dublin, most nights of the week. Monday nights a bar near us has a singer each week that is so loud that we need to close all our (double glazed) windows in order to sleep.
2. Always something going on
We have Croke Park just up the road, where each weekend lately there has been hurling matches or GAA football games. Pride parade had a whole week long party here if you were of that persuasion, George RR Martin is coming to town to talk at the Irish Film Institute. Riverdance, the original, is in town and this weekend there's a festival at Malahide, in around the castle there.
3. Close to Europe
4. Climate
The weather is very similar to New Zealand in a lot of ways. It doesn't seem to get as cold in winter, there's no snow of significance here, there's less wind, summer is a balmy 20ish degrees, so not too hot. It is changeable yes, but again, this is also true of New Zealand, and pretty pleasant most of the time, just remember to bring a brolly in all situations.
The weather is very similar to New Zealand in a lot of ways. It doesn't seem to get as cold in winter, there's no snow of significance here, there's less wind, summer is a balmy 20ish degrees, so not too hot. It is changeable yes, but again, this is also true of New Zealand, and pretty pleasant most of the time, just remember to bring a brolly in all situations.
5. Street music
From Galway to Grafton street you are never far from a busker or 10, and I've yet to hear a truly bad one. The Irish start teaching their kids music early on, Irish dancing is common and most start learning the tin whistle as we would the recorder, but many actually enjoy it and progress from there instead of going half deaf from squealing it as hard and high as you can, then giving up.
6. Everything with a side of potatoes
Particularly pub grub, things like Irish stew - comes with mashed potato on the side, as well as fries. I love this country!
7. Architecture
Dublin is replete with Georgian style buildings, and they're gorgeous. It looks like an old city, and it is a bit parochial and a lot lovely. I also adore the hanging flower baskets everywhere, I bet the bees do too.
8. We have to stay, we're stuck here now
Jared, despite being newly qualified, has had only a small increase in salary, and I have had a 40% decrease in salary since arriving here, as I cannot go straight into the job I had. I'm hoping to turn this into only a 25% decrease through relief teaching for a couple days a week in between nannying, but trying to get a job here has been a real struggle. The cost of accommodation worth having is also extortionistic. At present 50% of our combined income is going in rent. This means that between paying rent, paying bills and trying to send money home to our NZ bills, we have very little in the way of spending money, and unless we skip our paying rent for a month, there's no way we could currently return home, even if we wanted to. So now we're forced to enjoy Ireland, so a minimum of 2 years I'd say.
9. History
The Vikings settle Dublin in the 800s. There have been people living in Ireland since around 500BC. That's a full 2500 years. Some of these people have been fully preserved in peat bogs, hair and fingernails and all. This is unfathomable compared to New Zealand where Maori people have lived since maybe the 1100s, Mori Ori from a bit before that, and settlers came from the 1830s onwards. We are nearly at 200 years of being a 'country' as we know it today, although that statement smacked of Western white privilege and a bunch of other biases I'm sure. But the fact remains - there are very few historical places or archaeological sites of interest, where as here they litter the country side to a point where locals are rather ambivalent about them - the Dublin City Council building was built upon a viking village that was discovered when laying the foundations, and despite protests, it was just built over, and very few relics salvaged in the 6 short months archaeologists were given to do so.
10. Local exploration
You can fit a lot into a weekend because Ireland is delightfully small. There are no 10 hour drives to get from Auckland to Wellington (although if it takes you more than 8, you're doing it wrong) Ireland is not physically big enough to have that. The longest drive would be from 8 hours from Northern tip to Southern tip. Most places you can get to in under 3, particularly if you're starting from Dublin. This gives great scope for weekend adventures, because there's so much that's only a stone's throw away.
While it is a bit cliche that there is no place like home, these are the reasons that there is no place like home.
Reasons to Go
- Professional limitations
I cannot yet work here as a teacher. Aside from the €300 needed for the teaching registration process, I cannot speak Irish. Another limitation that I've heard about Irish teaching is there are very few permanent full time jobs available, and not just anyone can apply for them, but simultaneously a teacher shortage? You need to do your time in the relieving teacher pool first, and make it to the top of a list before you can actually apply is what I've been told. I'm not necessarily sure of exactly how this works yet, but I can work in a special school, I can work as a reliever for 3 years without Irish, as long as I either only do 3 years or learn university level Irish to proceed.
The career options that would be sideways moves for me are then corporate trainer, TEFL teaching, ECE teaching, working with an NGO to help students finish leaving certificate, or nannying. I have interviewed for all of these positions except TEFL teaching, as I do not have a TEFL qualification. But none of them are as well paid as teaching.
2. Financial consequences of professional limitations
I spent a large part of last year talking about how the amount of money that teachers are paid is simply not good enough in New Zealand and we should be paid more. This led me to the expectation that somewhere like Ireland would have decent pay for teachers. They do appear to, in state schools, be on par with NZ.
However, much like in New Zealand, if you work in ECE, it is not a lot above minimum wage. A living wage here is considered to be €12 an hour, or around €25k/year, and given the depth and breadth of my experience, I thought that would be the LEAST I should be asking for. When I was granted this, I literally had to hide my contract from the prying eyes of others in the staff room as this amount was more than some who'd been working for the company for a decade and had management roles. The suppression of wages here is shocking!
An 'average' salary is €30 000, but there must be some who are pushing up that average a lot, because most of the positions I've been interviewing for have been €25k if I'm lucky. Management roles are around €30k for the NGO/Education sector.
The consequences of this is that our disposable income - which we were hoping would be greatly increased while we were here, because we'd both be able to walk into great jobs and get really good experience, and be on about the same money as in NZ, but in Euros so we'd be rich! - has been eviscerated down to nearly nothing due to the fact that our income has gone down sharply, and our rent is nearly twice as much as our mortgage for our 4 bedroom house in New Zealand.
3. Need to pay to find a good job
So my career options from here are that I can
- Nanny: Be a part time nanny and make about €25k a year, but I need to pay for a first aid course myself and also change my NZ license to an Irish one, so already I'm €150 out of pocket to secure this job
- Relief Teacher: Pay €300, get my teaching registration and hopefully pick up some relieving work, supplementing this income quite nicely with another €300 or so a week, another €12000 a year if I'm super lucky, but probably more like €6000, which gets me to my goal of earning €30k a year
- Teach English as a Second Language: I can pay between €250-€2000 and get a TEFL qualification which is internationally recognised and teach English here, then perhaps migrate to Asia and work there for a couple of years also, and make about €23-27 an hour.
- Full time Teacher: I can learn Irish at €300 a year for 3 years and hopefully pick up enough to be fluent in Irish and sit an Irish exam to be able to come a 'real' Irish teacher
- Software Programmer: I can pay €5500 or €400 a month for 16 months and learn coding, and tap into the tech industry that flourishes here, and then hopefully eventually combine that with teaching, and start my own company teaching teachers how to incorporate tech into their classrooms and teach coding.
But all of these options require me to have money behind me to start a decent job. Early childhood teaching is the only job that so far I've just been able to walk into without needing further financial commitment from me. I just wanted to be able to walk into a really good job and be acknowledged for the fact that I'm smart and organised and plucky. Alas.
I have been well and truly put in my place, and I am now grateful for any job, regardless of how little they are paying, knowing that the extended probation periods they have they use on a whim to get rid of anyone who is remotely outspoken or counter culture, and the speed at which hiring works over here, that is the makings of financial ruin, as since I was 'liberated' from my ECE job, it took me a full month to start new employment, 12 interviews later, and the financial consequences of that we are still recovering from.
4. Tiny living spaces
We have a beautiful apartment. It has 2 bedrooms and looks out onto North Great George's Street - Georgian beauty of the North side of Dublin. We never hear our neighbours and it is beautiful and private. Also the shower pressure is great. But ours is bigger than normal, and our entire apartment would be about the same size as the front half of our house in New Zealand.
5. Unaware of environment
The lack of consciousness from individuals, businesses and also from local and national governments here around environmental impact here is just astonishing. I cannot believe how stuck in the mud they are with everything. There is desire from the public for these changes, but they are not happening any version of fast enough.
6. Difficult to connect
Ireland has a reputation for being very friendly. Irish people are, to a point. We've yet to really make any friends here, partly due to living paycheck to paycheck so we're too poor to actually do anything, and partly because the people we have met are very friendly, but those that have said they'd invite us to their rugby club, or we should come over for dinner, or go out for dinner sometime never come through with the actual time and place.
7. Ireland is not Europe
We haven't had any version of disposable income so far to actually be able to explore Europe as yet. I had my heart set on Paris for our second wedding anniversary. Instead we did a DIY Dessert buffet from bakeries all over Dublin, because we couldn't afford to go to Paris.
8. History is overrated
All my life people have lauded the history of Europe as being so beautiful and whimsical and important. However, Irish history is just sad. From being conquered to famines to emigration, the story of the Irish is one of survival under some horrendous conditions, and fighting to keep their culture alive, of struggle and overcoming against great odds. And everywhere there are monuments to this struggle. Reminders of the lives lost in the fight for freedom from the British.
The narrative is so pervasive that we went to a film about housing in Ireland and there was even blame to the British for the regions being poor. So we have the same problem in New Zealand.... yet we didn't have a famine or crazy British tyrannical rule to the same degree. Perhaps there's another explanation.
9. So expensive
So the prices here for most things are the same number as NZ, but in Euros. Some things are about the same, but I've yet to find anything of substance that is cheaper.
10. Lifestyle
As a consequence, this amazing lifestyle that we thought we would have over here is an illusive dream. I'm hoping that in the coming months that we will be able to regain our middle class spending money and that we will actually be able to go our to a bar at the weekend and spend €40 without it being a super big deal, but at the moment, we are living the life of immigrants - still converting everything back into NZD and going OMFG that's insane, how can we justify that?!?!
