The other week my friend asked me if I (we, including Brian) had any advice to give her niece who is starting out her career. I thought about it for a bit but there are a few things I would say.
Don’t Give It Your “All”
I gave this advice to a guy I used to work with. He would put in extra hours… when there was a deployment outside business hours he wouldn’t count that as part of his 40 hours. He took PTO for errands and appointments, etc even though he was already giving the company more than 40 hours of his time.
I told him to stop doing that. The company doesn’t care… well, they do but in their own selfish way. They owe you, you don’t owe them. You owe them your best work and your time… 40 hours a week. Anything you give them extra, they don’t appreciate.
And I know a lot of people say this isn’t true but I’ve given three of my four companies this “extra time” of mine and received nothing in return. My first company, as I was leaving, I put in 10+ hours of work every day to get them this certification they were working towards. I didn’t see an extra dime in my final paycheck when everything was calculated (PTO I didn’t spend). My second job I pulled a weekend once for a big deployment and we didn’t get anything extra for it. I would stay extra a few times for my various jobs but never received anything… not even a “thank you” some of the times.
Don’t bust your butt for your employer. Don’t be a slave to them. Work your mandatory 40 hours and go home and enjoy your life.
You Have To Jump
My uncle once joked that I changed jobs more than he did underwear. I changed jobs four times in my 14 year career. (Five if you count the “fuck up.” But I needed that “fuck up” to get a better salary… hence this point…)
In order to get a pay increase, you have to leave. Once you’re with a company, they don’t give big raises. Shit, even if you get a “promotion” it could be months before you see a pay increase. And if you do, it’s probably going to be miniscule.
I know of this from experience and talking with other people. My first pay increase was 5%. I was only making $38,000 a year and I got a 5% increase! I thought that was awesome! But I did the math on that. While 5% is huge, I kept going with that… Even if I got a 5% pay increase every year I’d only make around $62,000 when I got to ten years there. It would take me over 20 years to get into six figures.
One company, I was so close to making six one year. I got a 1.5% increase (not even COL). I didn’t get to six that year but I did the year afterwards. And that 1.5% I got, compared to other people, I did really well! Others I know only got 0.5%! And no bonuses.
The only time I have been able to get pay increases is when I switched jobs. So every three years, no matter what, I started looking. My last job I even threatened to quit in order to get what I deserved. My pay they were giving me wasn’t keeping up with inflation and I called them out on it. I put in a two week resignation notice then they started talking. They met me close to my number so I was happy.
You gotta jump. And keep jumping.
Bonuses Are A Thing Of The Past
There aren’t many companies out there that give bonuses. I was lucky to be with two companies who gave out bonuses. But it was miniscule. It was $500… maybe $1,500. Nothing like that National Lampoon’s movie where the dude was able to take everyone on his family a vacation with his bonus. Nope, that shit doesn’t happen in the real world.
Be Good At What You Want To Do And Do What You’re Good At
Try not to take a job that you don’t have any passion for. You’re not going to be good at it. You’re not going to want to give it the time and practice it takes. You need to have a passion for what you do.
I was very good at what I did. I’ve gotten so many complements throughout my career of how good I am; bosses and coworkers alike.
The best advice I was given was from my uncle (not the underwear uncle, lol). I just got a call back from two companies (for my first career job). One offered me $38,000 and one offered me $32,000. I wanted to go with the $32,000 because it seemed like more career growth even though I would be doing Java which is something I did not enjoy at all. He told me to go with the $38,000 one because you don’t want to be miserable.
You need to have a passion and a drive in what you chose to do. Trust me, it does help.
401k’s Are A Joke
When you need to jump companies so much, and especially with the stock market taking big shits every ten years, 401k’s are a joke. It takes years to become “vested.” And if you need to jump jobs so much, you’re not going to be “vested” so that company can take all what they “gave you” away.
Plus… the fucking stock market crashed four times during my life alone and I’m still a few years from 40!
I don’t know what to do for retirement income. I mean, the stock market is so evil and unpredictable and you could lose all your money if you don’t keep up with it and invest it correctly. Remember, that’s on you. Your company isn’t picking and swapping out the best bonds and stocks. You need to keep up with your own 401k.
There are no pensions anymore, thanks, Boomers! So if you don’t want to do a 401k route, you can save up to buy a rental property. But even there, that could be a shit show. I did it and it didn’t turn out like I’d hoped.
Disclaimer
I know others have had different, wonderful experiences with companies and I’m not one to judge all companies. These just have been my experiences with the four companies that I’ve worked for. And I know I’m not the only one who feels this way.
You just have to be cautious and look out for yourself. Your company usually isn’t.
Again, these are just my opinions and my two cents. I’m sure a lot of people have had a lot of success doing the opposite of what I’ve stated here. But they’re lucky. And you can find really good companies that you want to stay and work for for the rest of your career. I wish I had found one.
In the end, this is what worked out for me.
There are quite a lot of things I wish I knew before moving here. The journey still isn’t over yet as we’re still not settled into a place of our own. We are days away from closing on our condo we bought in Lagos. Getting this far has been a really difficult journey.
I thought I’d write down some of my thoughts on this as this process isn’t for the faint of heart and it has definitely been depressing, trying, challenging, and downright draining. It feels like the universe is against this decision I made and it’s trying to tell me to abandon hope of this dream.
Here are some things I wish I knew before and how much I’m so depressed about this difficult situation:
- Getting stuff shipped to Portugal is a VERY DIFFICULT PROCESS.
- Bri flew back to the states on December 3rd to try to get all the paperwork we needed together, titles mailed, inventory, organization, timing, etc. He STILL wasn’t able to do it in THREE WEEKS!
- Bri flew back a few days before Christmas without having much progress on getting our stuff shipped here.
- We had to go to the Junta to get a special form like four times. The shippers fucked it up, the Junta fucked it up, and the Junta had very difficult requirements for people to meet.
- We paid another $2,000 around January then another $6,000 in June just to get our stuff due to the shippers delays. All done I’d say we paid around $30,000 just to get our stuff here. Not worth it.
- UPDATE 6/13/2023: We finally got our stuff on May 30th 2023!
- You STILL need a US address for a lot of things!
- Shipping is a big one as they need to mail back the certificado de bagagem.
- Having your mail forwarded somewhere. The USPS won’t forward to Portugal!
- You need some people in the US to help you!
- My sister was able to help me with the certificado de bagagem as she can mail things and it gets there a lot sooner (and cheaper) than from Portugal.
- Brian’s parents have helped us a lot along the way. Our mail is forwarded to their house. We still use their address for official things that need a US address.
- Working with the embassy requires a US address.
- Shipping stuff!
- The dollar to euro kills you. The conversion rate varies and it makes A HUGE difference.
- Another reason Bri flew back to the States was to move our money from our US bank to our Portuguese bank. You can do this online but it is a lot easier to do it by going to your bank. Quicker too. Our big condo purchase we had a budget; we have exceeded it since the dollar dropped so much in value by the time we hit closing.
- Having a US credit card doesn’t help. I do minor things with euros (cash) but a lot of things I put on the credit card. It does a poor exchange rate and might charge extra since I’m out of the US.
- I’m not sure what others do. It really is like playing the stock market on how much it changes cause it changes constantly.
- When buying a house or a condo there are A LOT of taxes and fees. We are paying 8% of the price in taxes. There are also other fees the buyer (me) needs to pay such as 1% for the lawyer, a notary fee of 1,000€, registration fee of 250€, legal fee of 6,458€. All of these are on top of the full amount which is paid directly to the seller. No money goes into an escrow or anything like in the US.
- Finding things can be difficult.
- Sometimes you need to know the right things to search for in google. Example is finding carpeting. We are carpet people. In Portugal (maybe even Europe… and the US is starting to do this too) people like hardwood. Carpeting isn’t common. Finding a place that does wall to wall carpeting has been challenging. Turns out you need to google “custom carpeting” to find places that can hopefully do what they do in the states. We’re still not over this hurdle!
- Finding a furniture place is proving to be a little difficult too. There are quite a few places that do “custom furniture” and it can be very expensive! We luckily found a few places like Marlo (in the US) that has furniture you can buy already made.
- Without transportation, some things aren’t accessible.
- Getting your cell phone switched was challenging. I wanted to keep my US number so I can keep up with friends and family.
- When I originally arrived here I used my roaming which was $10 a day. Not ideal.
- I bought a sim card for 15€ for a month with 6 gigs. Great deal!
- Renewing this was a pain in the ass if I didn’t want to buy a new one every month.
- I had to port my US number to another service (leaving AT&T). I needed to provide the latest bill, your account number, password, and all your information. I’m using iPlum (which turns out to be really shitty). This porting over process can take more than a week.
- My US calls and texts are through an app on my phone (iPlum).
- iPlum is charging me $108 a year for their service.
- According to their Fair Usage Policy for Unlimited Plans “unlimited plans” are limited to 2,500 “credits” a month. Sending or receiving a text is a “credit.” Every minute you spend on the phone is a “credit.” I had to buy extra “credits” since I ran out last month and my service was going to be suspended. I bought $20 worth of “credits” which gives me 2,000 extra. It’s bullshit.
- The iPlum app is a piece of shit!
- Half the time I don’t know who is calling (I don’t recognize many phone numbers).
- When someone sends a picture, I don’t know who sent it.
- Sometimes I can’t even tell who sent the text message as it’s just a phone number.
- It’s clunky as I need to touch many things and menus just to send a text or make a call.
- I had to change my credentials since my phone is now Portuguese number and NOT US so it thought all my contacts where Portuguese numbers.
- The calls drop sometimes and it’s difficult to hear. I have my volume to the max and I still can’t hear my uncle very well.
- UPDATE 6/13/2023: I currently cannot text since iPlum has now required registration which I can’t prove that I’m an individual without paying a lot of money. It’s ridiculous.
- Bottom line: be prepared for a few days of hardship and stress and don’t get iPlum. They’re a rip off and a piece of shit. I will be replacing them next year.
- You get nickeled and dimed a lot when going through these processes. It feels like death by 1,000 cuts.
- Don’t import cars or motorcycles over.
- We did some research online and it felt like it was going to be a fairly simple process. It isn’t. We’re in the tenth circle of hell with this.
- The government agencies (IMT) and Hyundai and Honda do not help you.
- Your vehicles might need to be converted and it’s just a miserable situation. It isn’t worth it. Sell your shit. Let it go. Don’t bring it for the love of God.
I will be updating this post maybe from time to time. Many times I’m getting and got depressed about everything and it feels hopeless a lot. I wish I could go back in time and change some of my decisions.
So far I would change:
- I would have sold/given away a lot more stuff and went with UPackWeShip or something similar.
- I would have sold my car and my bike. It would have killed me because I love them but I would have.
- I would have quit my job sooner in order to accomplish more in the states and have done more research before I went over so I could have been more ready for the bureocracy which is Portugal.
I miss my friends and my sister a lot.
When we were at Myrtle Beach, during the night, my phone started having a coniption. The charging port was wet. During the rest of the trip it has been iffy to charge the phone by cord.
When I got home, the phone fully wouldn’t hook up to a cord. The wet “moisture detected” warning was always on. I could not plug my phone into any port. Not the PC, not our cords, nothing. I had to charge my phone with our ghetto wireless charger. It didn’t do a good job.
So I went to a place in Gaithersburg to see if they could fix it yesterday. They could not. The dude even lectured me about how the phones aren’t supposed to be underwater… I’m sorry… what? Why would they advertise they can? Why would they have an option to take UNDERWATER photos?
That place sucked. Bri called Samsung and they said go to one of their certified places. I took it there today. They originally said over the phone they had the part but when I got there, they did not. They could not fix my phone either. They suggested calling Samsung.
We did when I got home. After pronouncing my last name 23432359 times to the lady, she finally got my information and emailed me a postage. I was to mail my phone to them since it was still “under warranty.” However, I think I would be paying them since it was a “my fault” kind of thing since I took my phone to the beach and got it wet.
I couldn’t get my photos off my phone! And their fine print said they would wipe my phone. I had to get these photos off!
After trying various things, nothing seemed to work.
Bri wanted to try to charge the phone with it powered off. For some reason, IT WORKED! My phone was able to charge with the cable with the phone turned off! When we turned the phone back on, the wet/damp warning message was gone! Finally that nightmare was over.
However, it said it could not reach a network (the no sign in the top right). After another restart, everything was fine!
Let’s hope it doesn’t come back. WTF, Samsung?
I hope if someone looks for how to solve the wet/warning issue, they come across this blog and maybe it could help them.