Memories of IT - 2002 - DHL was fun while it lasted...

DHL Systems was located in the Bay area because it was felt that’s where the skilled systems people were. True enough, although the tech bubble had burst by now. Overall when I joined, DHL was owned by a combination of Deustche Post, Japan Airlines, and family of the original founders; then the Germans bought out JAL or something, and ended up as majority owners. (That’s why DHL vans and planes went from white with red/blue to yellow with black.) At some point someone in Deutschland decided that the Bay area was too expensive, so in December 2001, DHL Systems was ended. The operational part that ran the comm network moved to Arizona, but ATP was mostly dismantled and most of my friends end-dated. I think there was a lot of payback going on for past politics and disagreements. Somehow I, amongst a couple of other people, was offered a job elsewhere. Mine was in the London systems office I had visited. However, the salary was average, and not much was offered to help me and my family move. I also looked into what it would cost to put my sons in ‘american school’ in the UK, and that killed it. Probably for the best, as later on the London office was closed and the jobs moved to Prague. Nothing against Prague, never been there, hear its lovely, but I think it would have been too much of a culture shock.

…but, I am in the USA on an H1B sponsored by DHL. I start looking for a new job, but it’s a slim market, and no company wants to take over sponsoring me, so after some months its clear we have to move back to Canada if I was going to get work… so pack up and move, decide on Kitchener-Waterloo because we had been there before, my wife gets a job first, and then I get back into the workforce as a BA at a captive finance company, like GMAC, but it was for farm and construction equipment. So, out of the ivory tower and back into the trenches.

Afterword: I and my family certainly did like that time we spent in the Bay Area. Three out of 4 seasons was fine, although my son would go on school ski trips to Tahoe. We especially liked heading down to Monterrey and Carmel for weekends, and even just to Half-Moon Bay for the day, and drive up the coast to San Francisco. When I win the lottery, there is a little place on Monterrey Bay I may have to invest in...