It is quite a long time I wrote an article on this blog. Even I had a finished one from New Zealand I haven’t posted it yet. The reason was simple – since I left that beautiful country I haven’t found enough enthusiasms to continue with updating new articles.
Fortunately, my energy is back. 
Since I returned from Zealand I have been working on my technical skills to open some new possibilities for visiting a new country. For many years I have been dreaming about the USA, especially about New York City. The hardest part is to get a work permit and I can imagine how the process could be frustrating based on experience of my good friends. I believe the best way is to demonstrate exceptional skills, but how to demonstrate anything when you are not skilled enough?
In my case there was no much fun at the beginning based on this experience. On the one hand I found some great jobs in Prague, but there were a lot of question in my mind whether it is the right decision to go there or not. Not far from then my friend presented me an opportunity. It was an external cooperation with a company called GoodData. Not in Prague, it was in Ostrava, but the potential was great – a big chance how to learn something new and get significant skills and have a chance to make my crazy dreams come true.
There was an interview with my further boss Martin and happened one interesting thing – I simply failed. For me, a failure is a natural process how to learn something new, but at that moment I wished to make a better impression. However, despite the results of interview I got a chance. Unfortunately I had no guarantees and my contract could be ended any time. I strongly believed this kind of opportunities are very rare and so I agreed.
I always believed a remote cooperation is a good way how to solve problems. You are in an environment you know very well and you should be concentrated on tasks you want to solve. I have to say for me the remote cooperation of this range was very challenging. I probably created more problems than I solved. It was really difficult and many times I was really close to give up. Just one thing helped me to keep my mind open. When I looked back I was surprised how big progress I had made. However, it took me about six months to decide the best thing would be to come back to Prague and work for GoodData directly. The first months there were also very difficult, but I believed when I am really good at what I do, I will be able to turn anything I want to reality.
I have worked quite a lot, wanted to cope with anything I could. I think I was quite successful. No matter I made a lot of mistakes, I was hungry to learn and wanted to get as much experience as possible, good and bad. I believed in success and I was right.
In November 2012 we started to talk about possibility to go to San Francisco for three months from end of January. It was a great idea from my point of view and I started to preparing everything I needed. The lack of time made me little bit nervous, I had to get a new passport, pay taxes and so on. I finished everything on time and on 30th of January, 2013 I really landed in the United States of America. The flight was good. We had a short delay from Prague to London due to bad weather, but the trip from London to San Francisco as well as immigration controls were absolutely all right (I don’t count crying children) and my new adventure should begin. I had just problem with my old cell phone because I didn’t have a signal. I had to solve that situation immediately because without functional cell phone I wasn’t able to get my roommate know I was there. I bought a new one and everything was all right.
I have a small jet lag and I think it is time to finish this article. I just want to say I am really glad I have this opportunity and I should thanks many people who helped me to get here, especially people from my team – Managed Services who gave me this chance, Hana Kozuchova who helped me to get all documents for visa and my lovely parents and extraordinary girlfriend Helca who support me in most things I do. I am really appreciated for all your support and I am really proud of you.
By the way, London has also a great atmosphere from above. Thank you also to great employees of British Airways I met (a very nice person from Lebanon) who helped me to orient at Heathrow Airport very quickly (I used a shuttle bus twice to get from Terminal 3 to Terminal 5 and underground line to move from one building to another one). I have also experienced the first moments in San Francisco. The first impression is very good. Skyscrapers during the night are amazing. My first photos are just from the airports. I hope I will write another article with photos from the city very quickly.
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