Fuck.

[feuervogel]

So, according to a comment on someone else's f-locked post, the age I'm going to be in 10 years, once we have few or no cats and a smaller principle on our mortgage, that is, 45, is considered "too old" to get a job in Germany, really really.

Fuck my life, fuck me, and fuck that bullshit.

I'm never going to get to move to Berlin if neither Ben (who will ALSO be 45, and a 20-year-experienced software engineer) nor I will be able to get jobs to support ourselves.

I was happy until about 10 minutes ago when I read that comment notification. Now I want to curl up and cry a lot.

Comments

[picklish]

Yuck. *hug*

[kriski]

i have to say something about that to put the comment in a bit of perspective, i hope. just not right now, i'm almost out the door to school.

this much right now, don't despair yet, not all is lost ;-)

[feuervogel]

I look forward to hearing it, then :) I hope your class goes better than last week!

[feuervogel]

I was just reading through my Berlin tag, and I found this unanswered comment. I'm still curious ;)

[kriski]

oops, i completely forgot about that. sorry. thanks for the nudge ;-)

right now the economy is down and 45 IS a stumbling block on the way to new/other employment. if you're not applying from a current job, that is. for some reason, the german job market is very unforgiving to people who are currently (and no matter for how long!) out of work. it's a lot easier to get another job if you have a current one on your resume.

however, software enginieers, especially experienced ones, are sought after. we recently changed the way our university degrees work and the industry is not responding kindly to the newfangled bachelors of sciences, they want the old school dipl-ing. or lots of experience. so, for your partner the lookout is not so bad.

as for yourself, the good thing about berlin is, it's cosmopolitan and needs people with other languages than german to cater to a variety of customers/demands. your english will most likely be the "selling" point that lands you a job. and the fact that you know german as well ;-) i doubt you'd be able to work as fully accredited pharmacist, not without jumping though lots of hoops to get your degree validated. but i gather from your recent posts you're not set onto that particular carreer path.

hope this is a tiny silver lining ;-)

[feuervogel]

I'd forgotten, too, actually! I was just reading through tags, and I said, oh right, there's this comment...

I wonder, would freelance translation work count as a current job? (I'm trying to figure out jobs I could do with a PhD in Germanistik that don't involve moving, and academia isn't one of them... I mean, moving to somewhere in the US only to move again a few years later when Berlin happens? No thanks :S Moving sucks.)

zombieallomorph suggested on facebook that it would be hard to get a job in academia over there, since there's no lack of Germanistik majors. (He suggested DAAD or the Goethe Institut.) But translation, or, hell, teaching English (or German) at a VHS or IDK. Something. (And since I'm a writer, I have a selling point for fiction translation, because I can make stylistic choices.) I wouldn't mind teaching at a GI, but I don't know how often they hire or what the criteria are. There are a few in the US, but not here; the closest are in DC or Atlanta.

Gah I don't know what I want to do with my life. It is a silver lining, though, because Ben's got a master's in computer science and (currently) 12.5 years experience coding 3D modeling software. He's presumably staying at this job for a good long time.

[rike_tikki_tavi]

network drive-by comment

Speaking as a German, who lives in Berlin you can't say that 45 is too old to get a job in Germany. It depends a lot on what kind of job you are looking for and what industry you want to work in. And software engineers for example should have pretty good chances, particularly when they have some experience. Plus, trying to say today how the job situation in Berlin is going to be in ten years is insane. Lately we had trouble telling that 2 years in advance.

[feuervogel]

As far as I can figure, it's not supposed to be easy to get a visa, and it seems like they ended the IT visa since the last time I checked. So he learns German, searches at the Arbeitsagentur and applies somehow (the application procedure isn't transparent to foreigners), yay. (It's such a major move that I'd prefer that one of us has a job with a decent income before we sell the house and many possessions and ship the rest over.)

I'm a licensed pharmacist here, but the idea of learning medical Fachdeutsch and basically repeating pharmacy school (or part of it; I don't know if I'd have to take courses or if an apprenticeship would suffice to qualify for the exam) isn't terribly appealing. And the rotating night/weekend thing doesn't thrill me, either.

[rike_tikki_tavi]

Well, for job search I wouldn't just count on the Arbeitsagentur. He should take a look at monster.de, stepstone.de and other online job search sites. Those are usually better bets as a lot of interesting job openings don't even get advertised to the AA.

I'm afraid, I can't help with the pharmacist stuff. Maybe you could try looking for something that ustilizes your education, but is not a pharmacist, because I think you might have to re-take at least some of your courses over here.

[feuervogel]

Well, I want to be a novelist. I'm on the third draft of my first novel, and I intend to outline the second after this draft. But that doesn't pay enough to live on. I wouldn't mind a mini-job as a tour guide (1 year residency required for the English-language places), but I have no idea how to work the visas for that. (A question for the embassy, no doubt, when I get that far in planning. I'm equidistant to the Atlanta and DC offices.)

acari found the Apothekenkammer websites for Berlin and Brandenburg, and they'd be the most logical place to ask. I just haven't yet. I know from Anabin that my degree doesn't transfer, though from what I can tell from the Charite Pharmazeut page, the education is similar. (But good lord, re-learning biochemistry and pharmacokinetics, plus German drugs and laws? ;_; )

[rike_tikki_tavi]

Hmm, if you really want to re-qualifiy in Germany, you might be able to transfer parts of your degree. They might recognize some of the courses you've taken, like biochemistry and other purely scientific stuff. It'd depend a lot on how your courses were structured in the states and which school you'd apply to here in Germany. Or they might not recognise it at all but the chance is there.

But you'd definitely have to take all the law stuff and courses that pertain to being a pharmacist and Germany/Europe.

[feuervogel]

Yeah. With any luck, I'll have a book or two in print by then and be able to call that my full time employment, even if I'd need a mini-job or two.

[amakarie.livejournal.com]

They have job restrictions after turning 45? That seems kind of...harsh. o_O;

[feuervogel]

Not restrictions. Active discrimination.

[beth_leonard]

I wouldn't worry too much about it at the moment -- Google has failed me, but there was an article in the Wall Street Journal not too long ago about how many medical and high-tech professionals are leaving Germany, creating a bit of a shortage. You may want to look at the demographics of the field in which you wish to work and determine how many will be retired in 10 years before you give up in advance. Germany may well be importing professionals in your field to support their boomers' medical needs.

--Beth

[beth_leonard]

Found it sort-of. You can do a two-weeks-free log in to read the bit behind the cut:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704913704575453652182261156.html#articleTabs_comments%3D%26articleTabs%3Darticle

I already used mine so I can't see the rest.
--Beth

[feuervogel]

It's possible. One of my German friends said pharmacists are in demand, especially in Brandenburg, but no way will I live in Brandenburg. The number of towns within a reasonable commute from Berlin (30-45 minutes by train, preferably accessible on a Berlin ABC transit pass) is pretty small.

I still have no idea what would be required for me to work as a pharmacist there: whether I'd have to go back to school and learn from scratch, or if I could just spend a year as an apprentice in a pharmacy and then sit the license exam. I really don't like license exams; if I sat down to take the NAPLEX today, I'd fail. (Most of us would, after a few years of work, when we don't have everything we learned in school fresh in our minds.)

Ideally, this writing career will happen by then. It doesn't pay much, most likely not enough to be proof that I can support myself (currently E10,000/yr). I don't know whether you can get multiple visas (ie one for freelance/self-employed writing, one for part-time work either through an employer or SE). http://www.toytowngermany.com/forum/index.php?showforum=180 has lots of discussion on visa issues, and http://www.auswaertiges-amt.de/EN/EinreiseUndAufenthalt/Uebersicht_node.html is the official site (English version).

I honestly wouldn't mind being a tour guide with one of the English-language places there, but you have to have lived in Berlin for a year before you can apply. I would need to somehow support myself, or Ben would need to find a job that can support us both. That may be the hard part.

[donaithnen.livejournal.com]

:( *hugs*