In Search of Adventure

by Helena Blankespoor

Have you ever picked up your life to move to another country? Left everything you know and love behind in search for a brand new adventure? Over the last fifteen years I have done exactly that - moved countries four different times to start fresh and see a whole other part of the world.

My name is Helena; I am a thirty-five year old Dutch female automotive engineer. Yes, I'm from that flat as a pancake, tiny little country in Europe, of which about fifty percent is below sea level. I do have a real pair of wooden clogs, the yellow variety that the farmers wear. I have found that they come in real handy when working in the garden or on your car. I have lived in four countries in Europe: the Netherlands, United Kingdom, Germany and now, Italy.

Cars play a big part in my moves. My fascination with cars came from my family who earned their living with cars. This started early in the 20th century when my great grandfather initially shipped oil and parts to the few car drivers in our town, and later started repairing and selling cars. My father was the third generation that owned the business.

When I was about fifteen years old, I discovered motor racing. Yay! Like real teenagers, my friend Esther and I were not only interested in the obvious aspects related to motor racing, like the race itself, the competition and the cars, but also, of course, some very cute drivers! We followed every Formula 1 race, knew all the drivers by name, helmet colour and picture, and all the gossip, as if they were pop stars. For me, the fascination also went into the technical side, and during this time my dream was born.

I wanted to be a F1 race engineer. I dreamed big. Specifically; I wanted to be Ayrton Senna's race engineer. For those of you who haven't heard of this name, Ayrton Senna was a Formula One race car driver, and arguably the best driver of the 20th century. He was F1 World Champion three times.

I considered all the options, and decided that the best way to go about it was to get myself a degree in automotive engineering. I had already realized that to be active in high-level motor racing and make a living out of it, you had to live either in the United States or in England. In order to fulfil my dream, I had to figure out a way to get myself there.

In college in the Netherlands, a bachelor's degree includes working in industry for 200 days during the third year of a four-year course. During this time, I managed to arrange a placement of five months at Jaguar Cars' Development Center in Coventry, England.

My goal for the five months in England was work there, find out what it was like to live and see if I could stand it enough to stay. My dream was coming true - more so than I imagined.

After completing my five months in England, it was back to the Netherlands. But with a great experience, a relationship with an English guy and the knowledge that I would be able to live there long term, I finished my bachelor's degree and returned to the UK. I studied for a Master of Science degree at Warwick University and after graduation I found a job in the automotive industry. I started out as a technical services engineer and after a few years I was promoted to design engineer. However, some time after that promotion, I realised I was rather bored with that type of work and I wanted to move from a design engineering position to a project management/project engineer type role and was headhunted for a position by a U.S. contract house to work in Germany. I saw it as my chance out of the rut I was in and jumped ship.

Off to the land of sauerkraut and bratwurst. I found an apartment in a town called Groß Gerau, which is just south of Frankfurt. I worked in a town called Rüsselsheim, which was 15 kms from my new home. After one year, due to employment legislation, I was offered a permanent position with the company to which I had been contracted to; the only condition was... move to Italy. I did not have much of a choice, and after only one year, I was ready to leave the sauerkraut behind anyway, and so I ended up in Torino.

Each of the countries I have lived in have their own quirkiness and customs. Each is unique in its way of doing things, and each has an adaptive phase for me. Some things suited me down to the ground. Others annoyed the hell out of me. Still, I have no regrets about any of the moves, I learned new things in each country and will continue to do so.

Now that the introductions and the reasons why I have moved around so much are out of the way, you're likely to want to know how to know how I dealt with the culture shock and language barriers. In the next issue I will tell you more about the first move to the United Kingdom that started this trek and some of the language barrier issues I faced there.