Who says you can't travel with kids? Dan and I find out we can do just that as we set off with our two very young kids, first to live and work on an island far out in the Pacific, then on to the continent of Africa with a few stops in between. Armed with strollers, diapers, and too much luggage, we travel to over twenty-five countries throughout a ten year span, while working together as international overseas educators.
After surviving typhoon Yuri, almost being mauled by lions, and, being nearly shot by a presidential guard, we happily endure all of the good times and bad, while living life to the fullest. A decade's worth of experiences and lifelong memories remain with us, as we return to the U.S., now with two teenagers in tow, and begin to experience our very own version of reverse culture shock.
Reviewed by Maria Beltran for Readers Favorite
This is a true to life story of a couple, both teachers, who raised their two children, Ian and Ali, while traveling around the world. Author Jill Dobbe and her husband Dan did not let their two young children stop them from traveling around the world. From their native Wisconsin their first stop was the island of Guam, in the picturesque village of Inarajan, where they endured not only the unruly behavior of their students but also the wrath of hurricane Yuri. This was just the start of a life of travels and adventures that will take them to more than thirty countries around the world. In the process they get to meet prominent personalities, learn languages and adapt to the most bizarre of customs and traditions. Going back to Wisconsin, they found out that home has a different meaning for them.
"Here We Are & There We Go" is a memoir of a family who are traveling around the world to work and, above all, to live. Growing up in a small town in Wisconsin, Jill Dobbe dreams of exploring the world and marriage and children do not dampen her lust for travel. And with her cooperative husband, she fulfills her dream of traveling around the world, with two little children in tow. Working as teachers, they lived abroad and travelled to other places too. What comes out is a story that is filled with jet lag, diapers, and experiences that are sometimes funny, sometimes scary, but always entertaining. From the Pacific to Africa and back to the states, the author regales us with a story that not only crosses continents but also crosses cultures. I find Jill Dobbes' style charming and very conversational so that after reading the book, I feel as if I am talking to a good friend about her unforgettable adventures. Everyone with the itch to travel should read this book.
Educator Jill Dobbe, along with her husband Dan, recount their journey to live and teach and visit all over the world. Thirty countries later, Jill shares this not-quite-over memoir of life abroad.
Beginning in 1991 in Guam, Dobbe discusses the culture, tidbits tourists would miss about living among different cultures – for instance, although tourism is a major trade in Guam, the beaches are dangerous. The first ten years and four countries of working overseas, Jill taught elementary school and Dan high school science. It wasn’t easy adjusting, especially as different cultures treat education much differently. Discipline, language, lifestyle, and childcare were all issues the Dobbes had to deal with.
Jill relates several lessons about traveling and working, such as most people wait months and months for household shipments to arrive and pass through customs; by which time the items arrive, they are nearly forgotten or the Dobbes had learned to do without.
Some of the more quirky, frightening and poignant experiences of Guam, Singapore, Ghana, and Mexico include having to pinch pennies until the first payday and needing to sell off possessions and keeping or throwing out even teaching materials, a babysitter who wanted to take one child on a family visit in another country; living through natural disasters of earthquakes and hurricanes; two attempted adoptions; maps that mean nothing, uniforms in daycare, needing day and night guards, shopping, shopping, shopping, lizards, cockroaches, and touring all over the work during holidays and vacations.
The Dobbes raised their children from one-year-old Ali and two-year-old Ian for ten years overseas. When the children were old enough to be in school, life got a little easier, and Jill wrote many times about how grateful she was to raise her kids globally. From 2001-2007 the Dobbes experienced a reverse culture shock in the craziest of all lifestyles—American—while they lived and worked in Wisconsin until Ian graduated from high school. After that, they returned to work overseas in Egypt and India.
While Here We Are and There We Go is primarily a memoir, I enjoyed the universal appeal of Dobbe’s story. Wisconsinites do tend to feel as though we need nothing else to complete us, and I well understood her complaints of enduring the usual Wisconsin questions, why would you want to go there, why are you doing that, how can you take you kids so far away? We don’t deal with things like cat scratch fever and mango fly infestations too commonly in the States.
Experiencing life in many cultures isn’t for everyone, but Jill’s experiences of meeting celebrities like Jane Goodall and the Clintons, seeing humpback whales, learning different languages and adapting to the most unusual customs wherever they went is like a vicarious world tour. Throughout it all, her main lesson is: “Home is not the material place but the refuge where we spent time together.”
Readers who love to experience different lifestyles, even from an armchair, will find much to treasure in Here We Are and There We Go.
tonyfitz
Posted November 18, 2012
As someone who has uprooted my immediate family and deserted friends and family to scratch the itch of "doing something different" on more than one occasion, I couldn't wait to read this story of someone who was as mad (and some would say as irresponsible) as me! I was not disappointed.
From Guam to Ghana and Singapore to Cairo the book takes the reader along for the ride and I felt I was constantly watching in the background as Jill and her very young family uprooted from the safety of Wisconsin and headed off across the world in search of adventure and a fuller life for their children. The book, like their life, hurtles along like a runaway train and you just want to hang on for the ride and see what is round the next bend.
The story is interesting and well written and a must read for those who would love to "be brave" and have the courage to do what Jill and Dan did. And for those who would rather stay at home and dream, this is your chance to live the life at secondhand!
Tony Fitzsimmons
Author of Paradise my Ass - Living the dream on an Island in Brazil
Anonymous
Posted August 27, 2012
"Great book...so happy for you and your success as an author!"
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Overview
Who says you can't travel with kids? Dan and I find out we can do just that as we set off with our two very young kids, first to live and work on an island far out in the Pacific, then on to the continent of Africa with a few stops in between. Armed with strollers, diapers, and too much luggage, we travel to over twenty-five countries throughout a ten ...