Tell me about your experience in the Foreign Service.

November 10, 2009 9:46 PM

Are you in the foreign service? Do you like it? More inside.

So, there are plenty of questions about the foreign service exam on Ask MeFi. But I'm a little more concerned about the job itself. About a year and a half ago my wife and I had the good fortune to be able to stay with a high ranking Foreign Service member during a trip abroad. We were able to talk to a lot of foreign service members and then, for a variety of reasons, we kind of forgot about it. Life changed very quickly!

We're now in Korea teaching English and we'll likely spend a few years here and then move on to somewhere else. But it's not really a career move. The Foreign Service keeps knocking around the back of my brain, but I'm not really sure what the job is. I know that a lot of the 101 stuff entails desk-job consular stuff, but what's beyond that?

Better: If you're a member of the Foreign Service, what were your other options? Are you happy to you took the job? What does your day-to-day look like?

Bonus points for details on married life in the foreign service. The member we stayed with had a wife who did teleconfrence speech therapy. Their experience was obviously not standard, he'd been with the FS for nearly 30 years.

In general, I'm just curious and staking out my options. Thanks!

posted by GilloD to Work & Money (3 answers total)

Response by poster: It's worth noting that between the two of us we've set foot on 6 continents and spent several years abroad in both Europe and Asia. Right now, neither of us has a 'career'. I worked in marketing for a bit, social media for a bit after that and we did some tandem web-design gigs. She has a Master's in Poli Sci and we're both teaching English. She likes language, I like culture. We're generally not afraid to travel and move and dive in. She's expressed an interest in being a trailing spouse, so. Details from that end would be nice, too!
posted by GilloD at 9:50 PM on November 10, 2009

A fellow English teacher in Korea? Excellent - let's mefi mail - I've been in the Seoul area since March '08. I suspect we could share information - and possibly even a book about life in the Foreign Service.
posted by chrisinseoul at 2:25 AM on November 11, 2009

Best answer: I'm what they call a Foreign Service Brat, my father was in the Foreign Service when I was a kid. You don't mention children. If you have children, or plan to have children, let me warn you that it can be really hard on them, no matter what the State Department tells you. I changed schools a dozen times, learned and forgot languages, made friends I never saw again. It was culturally enriching and alienating too. I was an alien everywhere I went. We'd come back to the States and I would find that I lacked the cultural reference points my peers had.

I know lots of Foreign Service kids who ended up really messed up.
posted by mareli at 6:54 AM on November 11, 2009 [1 favorite]