How about a job which suits your 'travel-craze.' A job that is flying around the globe visiting different places. If you think it's is impossible, then you need to check out the cool 'Travel-Job' story below.
While other students of Santiago University took up more conventional jobs, he took up a job that would let him circle the globe. This student, Felipe Neira signed up to be a seasonal flight attendant.
The BBC World reports, that in his early-20s then, he got his first taste of the wider world. Flying abroad and living out of a suitcase was a lifestyle he could get used to.
"When I graduated from college I looked for a job that would allow me to continue travelling," Neira said. He was an export manager for Concha y Toro, Latin America's largest wine producer who travelled seven years representing the brand in Sub-Saharan Africa and eventually landing in Stockholm as the commercial director of its Nordic division.
Neira now works for the Baltic region's largest wine importer, Global Wine House, as a managing director overseeing the Chilean portfolio. He meets the Chilean winemakers to develop new lines for Europe. He launched six new Chilean wines in 2015 and plans to release another three in 2016 in the supermarkets of nearly two-dozen European nations.
His one foot is in his native Chile and another in Europe, the continent where he's spent much of his adult life. He travels across the Atlantic from his chosen home base in Berlin to Santiago five times per year for up to 10 days at a time and to the company's headquarters in Tallinn, Estonia, where he spends one week every month. Add in the monthly trips within Europe for market checkups, educational sessions and relationship-building, and Neira is on the road up to 20 weeks each year, racking up about 350,000 air travel miles in the process.
Learning to trust
Neira explains "the trust system in Europe is something that is very foreign to us in South America" when he found his lost bag in the same train where he had left. He had filed a complaint since the bag contained his passport, laptop and 2,000 euros ($2,276) which he left in his cabin on a train from Oslo Airport to the Norwegian capital.
"In Chile we are very cautious in the way we conduct business with regards to whom we trust and who we don't," he said, "but in much of Europe they start by trusting you automatically." That's led him to begin meetings with business partners from a position of faith - rather than scepticism -in their abilities.
Another difference the Chilean learned on the job: when to be polite and when to be straightforward. "In South America we don't say 'no'. We'll say 'maybe', 'yes' or 'let's talk about this later' when we really mean 'no'," he said. "We think we're being polite by doing this, but ... there is no space for that kind of indirect talk in Europe."
Neira has also found his recent work in Eastern Europe to be a lot more confrontational than he was used to in Scandinavia. "A small issue can turn into a big fight where there's shouting and you feel that a business partner will completely break off the relationship," he explained. "But then you learn that that's just the way they do stuff. They like to scare you and put you in these really challenging positions to see how far you'll go."
The Reality of Travelling
As it turns out, the travelling life he once dreamed of isn't nearly as glamorous in practice, said Neira.
"The reality of many of these trips is that you're just office-hopping," he said. "My friends don't believe me, but going to Prague, Oslo, Madrid or wherever, it doesn't really matter anymore because you go to the airport, get in a taxi, go to the office, go back to the hotel, go back to the airport and off to the next destination."
Neira goes back to the same hotels time and again because having a familiar atmosphere can save time and effort. That's helped him not feel like he's always starting from scratch looking for the nearest restaurants or scoping out routes to get to and from meetings.
In places like Estonia, which have become like a second home, Neira said he frequents the hotel gym, goes to the movies and hangs out with some friends he's developed over the years. This helps him maintain continuity in his travelling life. When he's back in Santiago he'll often stay with friends or family - instead of a hotel - so that he doesn't lose touch with the people who've known him since he was a child.
This article is copyrighted by Travelers Today, the travel news leader
