Who is this Tassie devil you see before you? Well, I’m Kristy and I grew up in Tasmania, Australia which – as I’m sure you know – is where the actual Tasmanian Devil is from. Here’s me with one and you can read about how I got this up close and personal with him here!
Fast facts
- Sign: Aries sun, Aquarius moon, Capricorn rising
- Born: Sydney, Australia
- Raised: Tasmania!
- Based: Lelystad, the Netherlands
- Fave Disney movie: The Lion King (I can’t choose just one favourite movie so I just went with fave Disney movie)
- Fave books: Red Earth and Pouring Rain by Vikram Chandra, The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath and Watership Down by Richard Adams (plus many more!)
- Fave author: Robin Hobb
- Fave food: Chocolate
- Fave city: London
- Ultimate travel destination: Svalbard – mostly because of the His Dark Materials series by Philip Pullman
- My biggest pet peeve: People calling koalas bears – they’re marsupials, not bears!
Who am I?
As I mentioned, I was born in Sydney but my family moved to Tasmania when I was two years old. I grew up partly in the Hobart suburb of Kingson and later the East Coast town of Orford.
For most of my life, I was obsessed with three things: books, animals and travel! Even when I was in primary school, I kept a journal and particularly loved to write about any family holidays we went on and one of my favourite school assignments I ever did was creating a travel itinerary for exploring Tasmania. I had no idea that would end up being part of my actual job one day! Because I always loved animals I toyed with the idea of becoming a wildlife photographer/filmographer, due to my love of TV shows such as Big Cat Diary and Meerkat Manor. But I was also always an avid reader, and so many books that I loved were set in other places, making me want to travel there to experience them for myself.
One of the best things that happened to me as a teenager was being selected as one of 100 “youth envoys” from around Australia to represent the voice of the youth during the Centenary of Federation celebrations. I got to attend events around Australia, meaning I also visited Canberra multiple times, as well as Sydney, Melbourne and Alice Springs. Since I still had family in Sydney I also regularly visited them and loved exploring the city, plus regular visits to Melbourne to visit friends in later years.
First international trip
I ended up majoring in English and Philosophy at the University of Tasmania in Hobart and then decided to do a teaching degree to become a high school English teacher. I figured that knowing how to teach English would be a good way to work and travel the world. During my teaching degree, I got the opportunity to do an extra practical teaching placement in Thailand, which was my first time travelling outside of Australia. It was a very challenging experience in some ways but once I got back the travel bug had well and truly bitten me!
Moving to Western Australia
During my teaching degree, I ended up applying for and receiving a scholarship organised by the Department of Education in Western Australia, which also guaranteed me a full-time teaching job in WA once I graduated. In Tasmania, there were more teachers than jobs, and I had never even been to WA before, so I signed up for a three-year contract.
After I graduated I was placed in a job at Carnarvon Senior High School, in the town of Carnarvon which is on the coast of Western Australia about halfway between Perth and Broome. It was also a challenge at first, but once I got into it I loved living in WA and had some great experiences in the state, including seeing the wild dolphins at Monkey Mia and swimming with whale sharks in Exmouth!
During this period I also travelled to Europe for the first time during the school holidays, getting to see London, Edinburgh, Kilkenny in Ireland, Innsbruck in Austria (where I kind of learned to snowboard), Venice and Paris. London was definitely my favourite and the one place I had always wanted to visit… or possibly move to.
After my three-year teaching contract was up I moved back to Tasmania for one year, to organise a move to London!
Back to Tassie and doing a Masters
The year I spent back in Tassie I actually moved back in with my grandparents in Orford, which was a weird experience since I was in my late-20s by then! I also ended up working part-time at my old high school and decided to do a Master of Arts degree at the same time. I got everything organised for my big move and then in 2013, I moved to London on a two-year visa!
Moving to London
Living and working in London was an amazing adventure and I loved every second of it. In between teaching in London schools, my best friend from Australia came to visit for more than a month and we travelled to the Scottish Highlands, saw the Edinburgh Tattoo and did a big trip through Europe seeing parts of France, Switzerland, Spain, Monaco and Italy.
While I was living in London I also started Tassie Devil Abroad so I could let my friends and family back home see what I was up to. The blog was originally hosted on Blogger. I also happened to meet a Dutch guy on a dating website while I was in London, who I fell in love with and ended up moving to the Netherlands to be with him before my London visa was even expired! You can read more about my decision to become a ‘love-pat’ in this post.
Moving to the Netherlands
Once I moved to the Netherlands I discovered that finding a job as a high school teacher wasn’t as easy as it was in the UK (duh!). Since I didn’t speak Dutch I could only really apply to international schools, and since we live in Lelystad, the ones in Amsterdam are the only ones close enough, but they rarely have openings.
While I was doing Dutch lessons for the integration exams I was put onto teaching English online by one of the other students, although it was mostly for young children and I prefer teaching English literature rather than just the language. Since my Dutch partner Dennis is a web developer, he helped me migrate my blog to a proper WordPress site and I began to work more seriously on that, as well as pivoting into freelance writing.
After a few years of hard work, I can now say that I am “a writer,” making an income through freelance writing and this website!
Fibromyalgia
A spanner got thrown into the works during the pandemic though, when I started to experience weird pain, tiredness and other symptoms for no real reason. After some tests over a year, I was eventually diagnosed with fibromyalgia, a chronic pain disorder. Because I am often in severe pain I don’t work full-time hours anymore, but luckily this blog and my freelance work enable me to be as flexible as I need to so that I can manage my pain condition.
I haven’t really written much about having fibromyalgia and how it affects travelling, which it does, but I am planning to write a bit more about it in the future.
What now?
If you’re interested in working together take a look at my work with me page to see the kinds of partnerships I offer.
If you think we might get along then definitely connect with me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or by emailing me at kristy (at) tassiedevilabroad.com.
