Aisha Chowdhry is my awesome international journalist friend, currently working freelance out of Southern Africa. I met her in Pakistan,...

If you’re in high school right now and you already know you want to be a Foreign Service Officer I say: good for you! Many FSOs will...

Gertje is an experienced Human Resources professional who worked in the private sector, public sector, and now as an entrepreneur. She’s...

Yes, you over there! There are many people who read my blog and then email me to say they want an international career but doubt their...

Some six years ago I thought I’d found my dream job. It had everything I wanted: working on a variety of international issues (migration,...

As I’m writing this, the presidential election is in full swing. It looks like Biden is going to win but it’s still a nail-biter. Yet all...

The more people ask me for career advice, the more I realize it’s an art in itself. Or maybe not an art, exactly. Frankly, there’s a...

Before I started, I thought consular work would be first and foremost about applying the law. And that consular officers get their...

Two aspiring Foreign Services Officers, one cool podcast. I'm happy to present this new tool to study world history and culture. Even...

Anytime you ask a bunch of diplomats what they would like to improve in the State Department the answer includes: technology. We simply...

Early on in the COVID-19 pandemic I decided that if I couldn’t travel physically, I’d travel with my mind. I started reading books about...

Having dual citizenship is not a source of pride in the Foreign Service. How could it be, when patriotism and representing American...

I’ve been in Berlin for over two months. I haven’t been anywhere outside of the city limits, thanks to COVID, and I’ve adjudicated about...

Okay, maybe my conclusion was a little rash in my last post on visa work—there’s no lack of visa applications after all. While COVID-19...

Before I had kids, the availability of good schools overseas was just about the last thing on my mind. As soon as I got a kid, however,...

It’s been almost two months since I moved here but I’m hard-pressed to describe Berlin. The best I can come up with is that it’s full of...

Well, it was fun while it lasted. Four weeks ago I walked into a busy consular section in Berlin—so busy, in fact, that I started...

I’ve wanted to write something about interior decoration in the FS but never really knew what. I’m not exactly good at decorating, nor do...

I just wrapped up my second week in the consular section in Berlin and I feel good. I was a little worried about the work before I began...

After two weeks of quarantine in Berlin I started working in the office of consular affairs. I go to the office every day and apart from...