AZ to Brazil Salome blog

Friday, August 10, 2012

Motivating yourself and others

I decided I needed to do something with my life. I have always had the feeling that I am still supposed to do something great. Like there was something out there that the universe has in store for me that I don't even know about yet. We have all heard of the people that drop everything and move to Hollywood with dreams of becoming the next George Clooney or Julia Roberts. They don't let anyone or anything discourage them from their dreams, no matter how big. Imagine if the Wright Brothers got discouraged and decided never to make the airplane just because it had never been done before. All they had was a dream, a plan and motivation and they didn't quit until they flew the first airplane. There are a million examples I could give you of things we wouldn't have if people gave up. Humans can do amazing things if they put their mind to it. The best part is the sense of accomplishment and joy that you achieved something huge. You did it yourself, although it helps when you surround yourself with positive people that lift you up and are truly happy for you! In college I took a lot of writing classes. I really like writing about anything and everything. I worked for my college newspaper and a reporter and an editor and I think it was my favorite job ever. In one of my writing classes, my first assignment was to write a persuasive paper. The first thing I considered was a paper about how toxic waste from nuclear power plants is so dangerous to the planet and how we shouldn't use it. I started doing some research (in the dinosaur age of computers) and there was so much information I couldn't get started. Suddenly, I had a lightbulb moment that just popped into my head and I sat down and instantly wrote a 5 page paper. You know that feeling where you say, that is the best idea ever! I submitted my paper (I'm not going to tell you what it was about but I will share it with you soon!) The next day my teacher came up to me and said that is was the best persuasive paper she had ever read and that I totally convinced her that what I wrote was 100% true. She asked me if she could share it with her network of teachers and mentors and even if she could publish it for me!? I ended up printing it in the newspaper also and it generated a HUGE response through letters and phone calls asking me if everything I wrote was really true. It was incredible. It is moments like this that you know you can do anything you decide to do. It is moments like these that you try to remember when you feel discouraged or defeated to help you lift yourself back up to the place you were then. You know you can be there because you have been there before. This brings me to my next point. I recently decided to learn a new business and the best part is that I get to write everyday! Oh yes, that and financial independence and helping other people do well so we can all rise to the top together! The other greatest parts is that it is a job I can do from home on my computer. We all know the internet is not going anywhere and this business is the future, heck, it is the present. I already know I am going to do so well with daily learning and daily blogging and the most important part, a strong mental attitude. I wanted to share a video with you to show you how amazing this is going to be. The best part is that anyone can do it so let me know if you want to travel to the stars with me!

Financial success

I always found it unbelievable that in high school, we had to take algebra and they never teach you how to make a budget, balance a check book, how interest works or about how to use your money wisely. In fact, most people find financial planning, taxes, interest, stocks, bonds, debt, etc., one of the most confusing parts of their lives. They find it easier to ignore their finances because it is just too complicated to figure out. I do not blame them! I have to become a financial counselor myself just to leave the complex nature of everything involving finance. Not that people don't feel that way about algebra but forgetting how to do algebra generally does not lead to foreclosure and bankruptcy! If you don't have a handle on your finances, you can literally ruin your life before it even starts. The earlier you learn a few simple things about your finances, the better your financial life will be, right? It is something everyone needs to learn and it is never too late to take charge no matter where you are in your life. There are 3 EASY things you that you want to do BEFORE you get out of high school or college to insure your financial success. 1. DO NOT SPEND $ YOU DO NOT HAVE This is the #1 way that people get in trouble that the never get out of, sometimes for their entire life. I know this is an old fashioned concept but if you want something, save your money and then buy it! This brings me to my next point. Do not sign up for pre-approved credit cards. Use a debit card only so you're not tempted to but something you can't afford. If you want something that you can't afford, learn to train yourself to work harder or find other ways to make $. Think about what you really NEED instead of what you want. One of the easiest ways is to do things for other people so the universe will do things for you. Think about everything you have and your gratitude will bring you other good things in life. Doing things for other people will make people want to help you. All these things are free and it will help you appreciate the real things in life. It will also help you not spend $ you don't have. 2. LEARN HOW INTEREST WORKS Everyone is so excited that interest rates are low. Why? Because most people are borrowing $. If you want to borrow $, it is better to have low interest rates. If everyone had $1 million in the bank, we would all want the interest rates to be high. This is why credit cards are such a bad deal. Interest rates are so high and if you don't pay it off every month, before you know it, you end up paying double for something you bought. For example, if you borrow $1000 for a car stereo or a shopping spree and you put it on a credit card at 23% and it takes you 5 years to pay it off, you would pay $691 more than the car stereo is worth and in 5 years you may not even have it or want it anymore. Do you see how this can get you into trouble because you can never catch up? And it you do this with multiple items, it can get out of control fast. If you just saved up the $1000 then you only pay that amount. You can do these calculations with multiple numbers on an AMORTIZATION SCHEDULE. If you want to buy the $1000 purchase and you saved $100/month, it would only take you 10 months and if you made 4.5% you would have an extra $45 after a year, but you only needed to spend $1000 so you have $45 left over to keep earning interest instead of spending almost $700 more and paying interest. You can calculate interest earned on an INTEREST CALCULATOR and have fun saving $ instead of spending it. 3. THINK OF QUICK AND EASY WAYS TO MAKE MONEY With the economy like it is today, you need to have other ways to make money while you are waiting for your career to kick in. With tons of high school and college graduates looking for work, not to mention highly qualified people, you need to get creative and EMPOWER YOURSELVES. One of the easiest ways to make money in the 21st century is on the internet. Every company and every business out there has a website. There are so many ways to do it if you want to learn a few simple of things. For more information about making $1000 per day spending 3 hours a day, please click on this link and watch the video. www.empowernetwork.com/az2brazil

Brazil: visit or live here in your lifetime

Christ the Redeemer with the super moon Expatriates is a funny word. To me it sounds like you just got kicked out of the country and NOT on good terms! That is what I am, here in Brazil for 3 years now. I want to share my experiences with you. There is a very small percentage of the population that gets the opportunity to move to a foreign country. It can be challenging at times but mostly rewarding. Living in Brazil has really made me appreciate another culture. It also makes me realize how lucky I am to be an American. There are 2 amazing parts of Brazil that are at the top of my list. First, the people here are the most fantastic, happy, fun people I have ever met in my life. They could live in a van down by the river and they would still have a smile on their face and a skip in their step. It has been a pleasure to live here and know how wonderful the people are. Secondly, Brazil has the most amazing nature you have ever seen. monkey island in Parati We fed bananas to monkeys on a boat ride in the Atlantic Ocean! How cool is that? I have seen more creatures here in 3 years than I ever knew existed and I am pretty up to speed on the creature trivia. I have thousands more photos of animals and breathtaking scenery. I can't wait to share them all with you. Obviously for most people, the language barrier is the most difficult. Learning Portuguese when you're 40 years old is more challenging than you can imagine. But the people here make you feel at ease and try to help you understand and are the most helpful people I have ever met. I have to laugh sometimes when Americans say, you're in America, learn English! I challenge you all to move to another country and become fluent. Call me and let me know how long that takes! If you're a kid, it takes no time at all! If you plan to visit, you must get a tourist visa if you are a US citizen. They will no let you on the plane if you do not have one. It is not difficult to get but you need to go through the Brazilian consulate and it is an extra expense. As Brazil becomes a leader in the world economy with the BRIC nations (Brazil, Russia, India and China) it is a very exciting time to live here. The 2014 World Cup will be here in Rio soon followed by the Olympics in 2016. Brazil is the largest country in South America. It borders every country in South America except 2 (can you guess which ones?) It is also home to the 5th largest city in the world, Såo Paulo, although Rio de Janeiro is more famous throughout the world.

Maid in Brazil: Drama

When my husband told me we were moving to Brazil, one of his selling points was that I could have a full time maid for very little money. Of course, anyone would think that is awesome. Someone to cook and clean for you! A dream come true. Until the dreamworld gets a reality check. I was lucky when I arrived that someone knew of a maid that needed a job so I was able to get one right away. She was awesome. She liked my kids, my dog, worked really hard and it was all good. A few months after we were happily going along, she started asking about a 13th payment. I had heard something about this. As far as I knew, the 13th payment meant that after 1 year, you pay them for an extra month. I told her she had only worked a few months so she would get a 13th payment after she worked there a year. She stopped showing up and started calling everyone I knew relentlessly. Apparently when people helped me with Portuguese she had saved everyone's phone number. She started harassing me and all my friends saying I owed her more money. She threatened to take me to the justice court. She said she was going to call the TV station and tell them her story. It was a 2 month nightmare and this was all around Xmas time when my parents had come to visit for the first time. In the end, I ended up paying an accountant to calculate how much I owed her because I couldn't take the harassment anymore. The accountant told her that I had actually over-paid her and that I owe her nothing. She even went into the accountant's office with her son to dispute this information and was told the calculation was correct. Thankfully, the phone calls finally stopped. What I didn't know at the time is that the 13th payment is supposed to be paid in 2 installments, one in November and one in December, regardless of how long they worked for you! If your maid worked for you from May to November and you pay her R$700 per month. You divide that amount by 12 ($58,33) and multiply it by the 7 months she has worked for you (R$408,33) and you pay her 1/2 of that in November and 1/2 of it at the beginning of December. My second maid was suggested by someone else's maid. She was the worst maid ever. She ruined clothes and stole them, she never got anything really clean. Every time I had a Portuguese lesson she would waste the whole class babbling at my teacher so I learned nothing. One time she took my $1200 wool turkish rug with natural dye that I actually got in Istanbul, saturated it with water and then left it folded up outside soaking wet. I have no idea why anyone would do that but it took days to dry, all the ink ran together and she basically ruined it. She constantly had excuses and I did feel sorry for her. She didn't know how to read. She has 3 small kids, her husband died and her mother had breast cancer. I only kept her a couple of months and then she stopped showing up because she was taking care of her mom and her son was having behavior problems at school and she got in trouble for leaving her kids home by themselves while she came to work out my house. For this maid I ended up keeping the accountant to do the calculations every month, calculate the taxes, etc. because of all the trouble I had with the previous maid. She ended up quitting to take care of her mom but this brings me to my next point. If the maid quits, you owe her less money than if you fire her! Even if she steals and ruins everything, you have to pay her another month. It is totally messed up, but this is the law in Brazil. Maid #3 was with me for a year and a half. She was very quiet, did her work and never said good-bye when she left. For this maid, I decided I would do my own calculations and payments. I would give her transportation every week and her monthly salary every month. At the end of the first year, you have to pay the vacation pay. I had an agreement with my maid to just pay her vacation when we traveled so I didn't owe any extra for that. Since we are foreigners, we spent several weeks a year traveling and I would pay her like we were there and she was working. The next point is, get everything in writing! If you want to pay her while you travel, have her sign something saying she is OK with it. Also, I have my maid sign a document every month with the amount I paid for her salary and for transportation so she can never come back and claim that I didn't pay her something. This maid, unfortunately, was stealing stuff from me the whole time and it all came to a conclusion when I caught her red-handed with witnesses stealing 2 garbage bags of stuff from me. This was after I confronted her about things that we missing and she acted all innocent. After this, I blocked her from coming into the condominio. I wanted to call the cops and file a police report. I wanted to tell her she was not getting a dime from me and she actually owed me $ for all the stuff she took. I wanted to scream at her about what a liar and thief she is. But I didn't. Why? I talked to a lawyer about the situation and his is advice was DO NOT make these people mad. They have been in your house. They know what kind of stuff you have. They know that you travel at certain times of the year. They know where your kids go to school. And, they probably know some real criminals. A scary thought and one I hadn't thought of. When the maid starts working for you more than 2 days a week, you must sign her workbook saying she works for you. When she no longer works for you, you sign it to say she is not employed with you anymore. I told her to leave her workbook at the portaria and I would sign it saying she no longer works for me and she could return the next day to pick up her payment, her workbook and the items she left at my house. I told the lady that runs the comdominio that she is not allowed to receive the payment until she signs the document saying she received it. Now I have my 4th maid in 3 years. She only works 3 days a week and refuses to cook. In conclusion, I will summarize in a shorter version of the information above. Hiring a maid: Have her sign a document saying she is on a 90 day trial period and you can part ways for any reason during that time. If you decide to keep her after 90 days, have her sign a document saying she works for you and she will be paid X amount for salary, X amount for transportation, X amount for vacation (mine always said she gets to take vacation when I take mine and that is the payment she will receive) and the 13th payment. Sign her workbook saying she works for you. I take a scan of all her identification cards so I have all of her information, just in case. After all, she knows everything about you, right?! One last piece of advice, I knew for the longest time that my maid was stealing and I didn't fire her because it is a pain to find a new one. I went against my instincts and now I will never see the more than 25 items that she took, most of them from my daughter. She even stole from my friends. FOLLOW YOUR INSTINCTS! If you suspect anything or feel uncomfortable in any way, please do not hesitate to get rid of her. Take it from me.