How Do Diplomats Move?

How Do Diplomats Move?

Hey Travelers! So, you may be wondering, “how do diplomats move?” If you weren’t, that’s okay. Here is a piece of random knowledge about how Foreign Service Officers move from country to country.

Travelers, in all honestly moving from country to country is stressful. For me, I never know where the heck my things are. In the video above, I talk above the movers assisting me with moving from Brazil to D.C. to El Salvador. What I didn’t mention was that I forgot to put aside my wedding shoes.

Yeah. You read that right. I didn’t separate my wedding shoes from all the other million things that was in my apartment. And bay beeee (read as baby but with a lot of expression), let me tell you, those wedding shoes were p, expensive, and I never wore them on my wedding day (sad face). The shoes got packed up and I didn’t see them again until months after the wedding, almost a year later, at my next post. Gah.

In all honestly, there are a couple of times during a diplomat’s tour that you may hear groans: EER season (what we call employee evaluations), “bidding” for another assignment within the Foreign Service, and…you got it, moving.

So, how do diplomats move?

Well, now that I’m done telling you about the sad tale of my wedding shoes, let me segue into how we bounce from country to country. And for the sake of this post, I am not going to go into technicalities or specifics. I’m going to talk really, really big picture; this is the bird’s eye view if you will.

Before the Move

Prior to the move, you have to do a pre-pack out survey. The moving company does a video call and they look at how much stuff you have. Once they figure out the amount of things in your possession, the moving company schedules a date and the movers show up and start packing.

Before the call, we usually have to separate our belongings into separate piles. I put some things into a small pile that will show up a month or so after arriving to Post. These are your essentials. In this pile, I’ll put stuff like paper towels, toilet paper, a kitchen set, bedding etc. This pile is small and it has to follow a certain weight limit.

The next “pile” is not so much a pile; it’s everything else that will be shipped to you. For this, I separate everything into different rooms of the house: the kitchen, bedroom, office, bathroom, etc. When the movers arrive they will pack accoding to the room you designate. It makes receiving your shipment so much easier because when the movers arrive at your new Post, they unpack everything and take your belongings directly to that room you designated.

The Move

One the day of, the movers arrive. It’s the first time in my life where I have movers come to my house, pack everything individually, and ship it to the next location. It’s such a luxury!!

When I got to my second post, everything was in the same condition as it was in Brazil. It was amazing!

Okay, that’s the brief rundown of how we move from country to country as diplomats.

Also, side note…I really enjoyed writing this piece. I stopped “blogging” and focused on making videos for a while. Now, I am back to updating my blog. Writing in a creative fashion, makes me feel really good. If you enjoyed this blog post and want to see other posts, let me know in the comment below!

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