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U.S. Foreign Service Officer headed to Wuhan, China

The mission of a U.S. diplomat in the Foreign Service is to promote peace, support prosperity, and protect American citizens while advancing the interests of the U.S. abroad. The work that diplomats do has an impact on the world as they serve at one of any of the more than 270 embassies, consulates and other diplomatic missions in The Americas, Africa, Europe and Eurasia, East Asia and Pacific, Middle East and North Africa, and South Asia.

The duties of a Consular Officer include to provide emergency and non-emergency services to American citizens and protect our borders through the proper adjudication of visas to foreign nationals and passports to American citizens. We adjudicate immigrant and non-immigrant visas, facilitate adoptions, help evacuate Americans, combat fraud, and fight human trafficking. Consular Officers touch people’s lives in important ways, often reassuring families in crisis. They face many situations which require quick thinking under stress and develop and use a wide range of skills, from managing resources and conducting public outreach to assisting Americans in distress.

Superbowl time


It’s Superbowl Sunday Monday over here and Sean and I watched the game which started at noon at the one bar where it was playing in town. Our new “flattie” or flatmate to be, Andrew, joined us along with some of his Kiwi friends. Two Americans that we had met a few nights before also showed up late because of some morning skydiving and had to leave early as they had plans to go “river surfing.” After they left, two older American gentlemen on a tour group showed up to take their place while their wives were out shopping.

Sadly, the famous Superbowl commercials did not air abroad and I was a little disappointed about that. The commercials that ESPN showed during the Superbowl in New Zealand were only ads for upcoming rugby, cricket and soccer matches. We spent most of the game chatting with the Americans about their NZ travels thus far and answering Andrew and his friends’ questions about the rules and strategy of American football. After the game they explained how the rules of rugby and cricket work. They even asked Sean to come out and give cricket a try this week Thursday after work. We’ll see how that goes; the rules seem very complicated and the game appears to continue for ages.

Here’s some of the things that I picked up during the conversation (according to Andrew and his “mates”):

Not many Kiwis care much about American sports

Though they don’t care about American sports, most know the basic rules of sports like football and baseball and think it’s lame that most Americans have no idea how rugby and cricket work.

They think it’s ridiculous that in baseball we have a “World Series” when, in fact, only American teams play (I can’t emphasize enough how much this topic riled everyone up)

Kiwis can put down a LOT of alcohol and the more they drink the more unintelligible their accent becomes

The guys seemed genuinely concerned about the possibility of the U.S. ever taking an interest in rugby or forming a team because they think the money and talent that the U.S. could invest would surely overpower them in their national sport

Kiwis are enormously proud of their rugby team and the fact that they won the rugby world cup this year
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    Sarah Sanderson
    I am currently in Mandarin language training as a new diplomat in the U.S. Foreign Service. Sean and I depart for Wuhan, China in November 2019 for my first tour in consular affairs.
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    Grateful for my very tolerant, supportive and easygoing husband who's always game for a new adventure

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