A job interview in Frankfurt, Germany

The European Central bank in Frankfurt in Germany

The buildings of Commerzbank and Deustche Bank in Frankfurt in Germany

I apologise that I have not written anything recently about my life here in Germany. But this week I had to go to Frankfurt twice for a job interview. And took me around 7 hours in a train each time, plus the stress, being nervous, preparing myself, considering the implications of moving to Frankfurt in case they offer me the job, etc. My head was somewhere else and I just was not in the mood for writing about it.

Right now I am a little bit better, but still a little bit in deep thoughts. Anyway, everything turned out like this: two weeks ago I got a call from one of these job agencies (a good one) and they asked me if I would consider moving to Frankfurt, because there might be a company with a job offer that might be interested in my profile. I said, yes, I would. At first I did not take it seriously, as I got a similar call and interview from the same agency in march, and is still time that I have not heard from them.

Well, on wednesday I got a call again from the same guy from the agency and he told me that the company was interested on my profile and that the director of the company was going to call me on thursday or friday. I was astonished, but still a bit sceptic. But a little bit nervous. On thursday, I wait for a while and nobody called. I was a little bit angry then. But on friday morning, I did receive the call and an invitation for an interview for tuesday (last tuesday).

I prepared myself very well then, I had the name of the company and time enough to do some research about it. The trip to Frankfurt went really well, and the interview as well. I think they did like me. And I got an invitation for another interview for friday, in Frankfurt again. On that day, the weather in Germany was particularly hot. Very hot. I had a suit and everything and I was very warm. I just had time for a small walk in the center of Frankfurt (I'd been there already in 2001), take some photos for the blog, eat some pizza in Pizza Hut (sorry Sascha, I don't know any restaurant in Frankfurt), and go back to the Hauptbahnhof. The trip back to Hamburg was longer.

In Germany you have the ICE (Intercity Express) and the IC (Intercity). The ICE is faster, which is the one I used to go to Frankfurt, and the IC is slower, but still faster than the regional trains. With the ICE it took me around 3 hours and 25 minutes to get to Frankfurt, and with the IC it took me 4 hours and 25 mins to get to Hamburg. I left for Frakfurt at 8:30 and I was back in Hamburg at 21:00.

And then I prepared myself again for the second interview, as I had some days to think about it. On friday, I left at the same time, but then I bought an ICE ticket for the return trip. Now, in these trains, if you want to be sure you have a seat, you need to make a reservation (2 euro). But for the trip back, there was no possibility to make one.

I had a bif of delay (Verßpätung) and I arrived around 13:10 to the interview, but I called them before to let them know about it. The second interview did not go as well as the first one. I am not saying it was bad, it just was not as good as the first. And that let me thinking about the job offer in general again, about moving to Frankfurt, the stress, etc. My wife and me already spoke about it, and until the end of the year, if I get the job, we would visit each other each weekend, some times in Frankfurt, some times here in Hamburg.

The job offer is very interesting and the company is very interesting as well. And last week I sent an email to the other company where I had an interview to ask if there had been any progress, and they told me that (leider - unfortunately) the are no news yet, and that I still need to wait a little bit more. Both jobs are very interesting, but both are not here in Hamburg. Is strange that, so far, there is nothing for me here.

And that's it. Well, in the trip back to Hamburg, I went into the train really fast and managed to get a seat. The train later was packed. Old ladies standing in the aisle, and as usual, nobody got up to offer them a seat. Younger people than me did not get up, I did not either. I slept for around an hour and arrived in Hamburg around 19:30. It was raining a lot, but we decided to go to an Spanish restaurant (Catalonian in fact), in Altona called (how else!) "Barcelona Tapas", and had some "Pan con tomate", "Pimientos de Padron", etc. For the old times. Not so old. Just last year.

Next week I will get some feedback about the interviews. I'll let you know then if this is the beginning of several trips to Frankfurt or not.

Forgot to mention, both interviews were in english.