No Job, so What's Next?

I got a reply about the job. They need somebody to start within a week's time, so I had to decline since I'll be trotting around Europe instead. That's alright--the pay for that job was DISMAL.

Instead, I've refocused on what I want to do this summer. Should I job hunt right away? Tackle some of that student loans while I'm at it?

My sister lives in Asia where she teaches. She lives there with her husband, and the two of them just had a baby. She asked if I'd like to go and visit, and I'm really debating it. The cost of the return flight would be nearly $2000 I think, but it might be worthwhile. That way, I can stay there for three weeks and then come back and really job hunt.

Job Hunting

I'm still not done my studies here. School isn't quite finished yet--three essays, a report, and three exams to write--all of which are due NEXT WEEK. I kid you not; I don't quite understand these Brits sometimes.

But I digress.

A week from now (eight days to be exact) I will (hopefully) be writing the last exam of my bachelor degree. Then I will spend two magnificent weeks traveling through London, Paris, Rome, and Madrid before I return to England and pack up my things to fly back home. To Canada. At which point I will be confronted with the fact that I AM UNEMPLOYED. Scary.

So I started the job hunt recently and found a short, summer contract for students. It's right up in my field and located close to my home. Even though the pay is dismal (it's half of what I made at my last job) it would be a good job to have since I could start right when I get back while I search for something long term. The problem is that they want the person to start right now, and I can't do that. I explained that in my cover letter and shot my resume at them anyway... To which I got a reply that I'd been selected for an interview. Scheduled for next week. I explained once again that I'm not able to come in for an interview so soon since I'm overseas. We'll see what comes of it.

Wise Financial Decisions in College

I was randomly surfing the internet when I came across a post on wise financial decisions in college by I've paid for this twice already. The two smart decisions she says she made included not using credit cards and only getting student loans to pay for tuition. I started to think about what smart moves I've done financially while in university.

1. Avoiding leases like the plague.
I only signed a lease once during my university stint, and that was on purpose in order to learn about the tenant/landlord minefield. Apart from that one time, I never signed a lease. Leases generally carry a minimum duration of 12 months, and I was never at school for the whole year. Instead, I scoured rent ads for people who wanted lease takeovers and subletters. That way, I negotiated the duration of the lease to only be for the length of time I needed, and sometimes I would also bargain to have internet included in the monthly rent. (I think a lot of people go about this unethically, but I tried to be as fair as possible and not a bully).

2. Working full-time jobs in between classes.
Whenever I wasn't a full time student I was employed full time (except for one summer where I went to a few developing countries to do volunteer work). The money that I made from each of these jobs went first to my tuition, then to paying off student loans. After that I used my money to pay for fun stuff.

3. Setting financial goals.
I never, ever would have been able to tackle my finances if I had never started university with the goal of paying for it myself and walking away without debt. Yes, I still have debt now, but it's my choice (because I opted not to use my money to pay off my loans just yet). That's incredible freedom that I have.

Maybe in a few years I will look back and add a few other things I think were smart decisions.

Cute Reducipe

I just came across this recipe and I can't wait to try it out!

Grace Period

My student loans are officially in the beginning of the grace period, but they're still accruing interest at $1.94 per day. That is kind of unnerving. I mean, that's like a coffee from Tim Horton's each day being swallowed up by my student loans. And I'm kind of forced to sit back and watch it grow while I finish my studies and try to find a job. I don't want to complain too much--I mean, without these student loans I wouldn't have been able to get to the point where I am. And I know that my job prospects are already a lot better than my parents, who never got a postsecondary education. I just mean that I've never liked to be one to sit around and not tackle debt.

The 'Dilemma'

To date I have paid off 50.2% of my student loans, or $10 608.73. I lose interest-free status tomorrow and the last thing I want is to pay loads and loads in interest. I do have the funds set aside to pay off the remainder of my student loans ($10 528.27).

The problem? It's in American dollars instead of Canadian.

I don't want to convert that to Canadian right now because the Canadian dollar is still riding too strong and we all know that the Canadian dollar is on a decline right now. Part of me is itching to pay off the rest of my student loans while the other part says to be patient and just wait--I would lose too much in the conversion.

I've always thought I ought to learn about investments, and I have friends who dabble in the stock market with their American currency. I think I should make some sort of investment, but it would have to be long term.

My gut says don't cash in the American and use it to invest. Still, I hate staring at my student loan totals.

T Minus Two Days: Losing Interest-Free Status

I scoured the internet to determine the specific moment in time when I will actually lose my interest-free status on my student loans, and the answer I've come across is that interest begins to accrue the first day of the first month following your last day of classes. So if your last day of classes was April 5th or April 21st, the National Student Loans Service Centre starts calculating interest on your loans on May 1st.

Most people who graduate think that interest doesn't start accruing until the first day of the seventh month after their last day of classes (i.e. November) but this is not the case. Your first payment is due six months after graduating, but interest is being calculated during the entire time.

Student loans are composed of a federal portion and a provincial portion. Loans are generally split as 70% federal and 30% provincial, but this can vary for each person.

The interest rate on federal student loans is prime + 2.5%. Since prime right now is 4.75%, that means the federal portion of my student loans will be accruing interest at 7.25% in two short days. Yikes.

The provincial portion of the student loans will have different interest rates depending on the province.
British Columbia - prime + 2.5%
Alberta - prime + 2.5%
Saskatchewan - prime + 2.5%
Manitoba - prime + 2.5%
Ontario - prime + 1%
Quebec - prime + 0.5%
New Brunswick - prime + 2.5%
Nova Scotia - prime - 1% (yes, that's a minus, not a plus)
Newfoundland and Labrador - prime
Prince Edward Island - prime + 2%

The Beginning of The End (of my Undergrad)

Things are really quite hectic for me right now. I have a zillion essays due and exams are coming up really, really soon. To top it all off, I can no longer claim interest-free status even though I'm still in full-time studies. The reason is that classes for the term are over in Canada (even though they aren't here in the UK) so I have to abide by Canadian class schedules rather than UK class schedules to determine my loan due dates. In the next few days I will be organizing some payment schedules with the help of my family (who continues to receive my mail and check it for me) and my close friends (who help me make general inquiries since it's long distance and there is several hours' time difference). I will post again later once I figure things out.

Where do I Begin?

I haven't blogged in forever, mostly because I'm just having too much fun here, hehe. Also, let's not forget the fact that I'm in my final semester of school. There are quite a few academic differences as well. So I've kept myself busy writing crazy long essays.

Lots of things to update.

First off, something is wrong with my Microsoft excel. I really want to update my worksheets to find out how much I am spending on different things/categories so I know where to reign it in. So far I'm relying on sheets of paper taped to my wall to track my spending. I'll probably do it on one of the school computers later.

Secondly, I feel kind of useless cause I'm not making money while I'm here. I worked for the last two years on and off during school so I could make enough money to come here. And now that I don't have a steady paycheck it's bumming me out. But that's what lovely scholarships are for! I just recently won another one. How I'll be able to cash the cheque while I'm over here in England is another thing for me to figure out.

Something I've wanted to do is post a couple of the costs for things here. What's cheaper or more expensive compared to Canada. Cultural differences with regards to materialism as well. I will get around to that sometime.

I'm off to visit a couple different cities (four or five) in the next two weeks or so. Not doing too much traveling. Most students are going crazy traveling around here but I'd like to take my time since I'm in no rush to get back to Canada.

Last but not least is that I am debating whether or not to temporarily move to another country before going home. I'm really loving the Spanish language so it'd be nice to go to Spain to live for awhile. I considered moving to France but quite a few people made a good point: why not move to Quebec for awhile? You'll be closer to home than France, and you'll be able to work. Plus it won't be that expensive. So, decisions to make.

January Spending in the UK

I'm trying to graphically show how my spending patterns are in the UK. Granted, it's the beginning of term and I'm in a new country, so some of the amounts are higher than normal. I.e., I bought a new phone to work in this country so I don't expect to spend that much on phone fees in months to come. And I bought a whack of food and split a taxi with my flatmates so I wouldn't have to go shopping for food for awhile.

I am trying to come up with a budget and appropriate categories for my spending in the UK. They're going to be different categories than I'd have back home since I plan to travel, and won't have regular transportation patterns since I plan to walk as much as I can.

The categories include:
- Phone (basically my mobile phone costs on a pay as you go plan)
- Transportation
- Travelling (not sure how to separate this from transportation)
- Shoes and clothing
- Entertainment
- Gifts (people back home will kill me if I bring nothing back for them)
- Household
- Food
- Miscellaneous
- Eating Out
- Alcohol
- School (i.e., photocopying and printing costs)

£200, Gone Just Like That

Every time I move to a new place I have to spend money to buy things to settle down, and this time was definitely no exception. I had to spend money on plates, a pan, laundry detergent, toilet paper, plastic containers for lunch, etc, etc... Basically anything that wasn't worth carrying in my suitcase from Canada--especially since I'd be travelling alone. I spent £20 on a taxi ride to the university from the airport since I wasn't going to bus it with my bags. I also spent £25 on a pair of boots because, hello, it rains here A LOT (which I was told) and there are puddles and ponds and lakes to contend with on the way to class (which I wasn't told, but should have realized). All in all, I've already spent £200, although a lot of it was for "one-offs" as they say here.

Back in Canada I would tell myself not to go out for coffee with friends and not allow myself to eat out for lunch since I was saving for the UK. Now that I've arrived and I'm letting myself spend the money I budgeted for this experience I feel so happy. It was well worth it to scrimp and save those extra dollars so I could be here, complaining about the cost of food and buying it anyway.

Experience of a Lifetime

When I decided to go on exchange, I knew that I would be coming here by myself. My friends back home are quite happy returning to what they already know. They're in their last year at university and they're quite happy with it. Also, many feel like they can't afford to go on exchange.

Today I asked another exchange student why she came here to study without any of her friends from home. She said that all of them said it would be nice, but they didn't plan for it. When she told her friends that she was going on exchange, they replied "Oh you're so lucky." She commented that it wasn't luck that got her here to study abroad; it took financial planning on her part. I agree as well. The only reason why I was able to make this exchange opportunity a reality is because I planned for it financially. That's why financial goals are so important. It means the difference between the experience of a lifetime or just another term at school.

So Begins the UK Adventure

I've finally arrived in the UK! I've been planning this study abroad/exchange experience for over a year now, ever since October of 2006 when I thought it would be nice. Since then I've been working out a financial plan to make this a reality and I'm so incredibly happy that I did it.

I had guessed a lot of my expenses for this exchange because there were no published figures. I estimated it would cost $10 000 CDN in total to do it, and a friend who did this said she had set aside $10 000 as well so I suppose I'm not too far off.

I budgeted $7000 for tuition and accommodation fees. Turns out the amount is closer to $7500 (oops) but that's alright because I got two awards. One is for $500 CDN and the other is for £500 (about $1000 CDN). That will help me out a lot in paying for this experience.

Living expenses here are quite high. I was told often by my parents that would be the case, but it's still hard. I'm constantly multiplying all the prices I see by two to get the Canadian figure and it's still quite expensive here. The only things that aren't as expensive, so far, are shoes. £20 for a pair of quality shoes is not bad at all. But the last thing I need is to bring home more shoes for myself! And so far I haven't found anything for my mother.

I had not budgeted for a cell phone either but realized it's kind of important. All the other students use it as a social networking tool and when you're an international student, you need to put an extra effort into making friends and meeting new people. Quite a few people have asked me so far if I have a phone and I've said no. Back home, a cell phone was more of a convenience but here I see it as an expense to make sure I stay socially connected. So I'm looking into it. So far the plans are about £20+ ($40 CDN) per month.