CARLA, 27 YEARS

To my dear future Host Family, Good day! I am Carla Micah de Guzman, 24 years old and I am currently living independently in the capital of the Philippines – Manila. I have already experienced being an au pair in Denmark a couple of years ago, after that I decided to return to my home country to gain more experience before going back to the field. I am now providing for myself through my small business where I sell some clothing items and other stuff online. I have a small family of 4 which consists of my father, mother, my older sister and me. My mother, Carmelita de Guzman, sadly died when I was just 6 years old, so my mom’s sister, my aunt, Bernadette Francisco, took me and my sister in when my mom died. She is 48 years old and she became my second mom from then on. She does not have her own kids, so she raised me like her own and helped me with all my needs until I turned 18. My father, Rogelio de Guzman is living in the province with his new family. He is 52 years old and has been working as a driver for a Chinese company for more than 10 years now. I still visit both my aunt and my dad from time to time. My only sister, Carol de Guzman-Christiansen is 31 years old and she is now married and living in Copenhagen, Denmark together with her 2 kids and her husband. She has been living there for more than 5 years now and she is currently working as a programmer for a big infrastructure company. My brother in law’s name is Lasse Christiansen and he works as an IT support for an insurance company. He is 33 years old and he is a Danish citizen. I have stayed with them during my days in Denmark, and at that time, my niece was only 1 year old, and my nephew was 8 years old. To introduce more about myself, I would say I am more of a creative person. I like singing and I dance sometimes, but mostly I love doing DIY (Do It Yourself) things to use as home decorations. I enjoy redecorating, organizing and doing interior design for small homes. I also love watching movies especially Disney ones. As for my previous work experience, I have worked as a Customer Service Representative where my task is mainly to assist people 60 years old and above in ordering their prescriptions and to ensure that they take their medicines regularly. After that I got a job as a Customer Service for Microsoft and I have also worked as a Sales Consultant for a clinic that is specialized in Integrative Medicine. When I got the chance to work as an au pair in Denmark, I learned a lot of things. I learned about the culture of the country, how the people are, and I got adjusted on how daily living is. My previous host family had 4 kids, and I helped taking care of them. They were on the age of 10 months old, 2 years old, 8 years old and the oldest is 10 years old. I helped my host mom with a lot of things like preparing the kids to school, making their lunch food, helping them dress up the younger ones, dropping them off to school, and picking them up. I also helped with getting my host children to their after-school golf and tennis classes. Some of my tasks are also putting the baby and toddler ones to sleep in the afternoon when they are not in the day care and I even read them books and sing them songs. As for the older ones, I helped them with organizing their rooms to make sure it is neat and clean. At an early age I already learned how to do household chores. So, when I became an au pair, doing chores was not a challenge at all. I supported my host family with cleaning the house, keeping all the rooms tidy, washing the clothes, ironing them, folding them, and neatly organizing them in the wardrobes. I was a hotel management student during college, so I also know how to make beds like how they do it in hotels. I thought that was nice to finally use what I learned from school and do it at my host family’s house. I am also very good at cooking Filipino food, Chinese food, couple of American dishes and following recipes are not a problem at all. During my stay in Denmark, I also learned how to make some European dishes that I always cook every night for dinner. I used Google Translate to understand the recipes they have in Danish language. During parties and events, I also assisted my host family with organizing with some nice artsy crafts as decorations. All in all, I can assure you that chores and other stuffs are not an issue at all. During my school days, I have also attended some volunteer programs where my teacher organized. My teacher was awarded as “CNN Hero of the Year” and “Philippines Hero of the Year” because of that program’s purpose. He helped small children in slum areas and visited families who are unfortunate by teaching them how to read and write for free. Being part of that program helped me become more compassionate with kids and made me become more adaptable with whatever type of situation in life. I would like to become your au pair in the Netherlands because I love children and enjoy spending time with them. I am prepared and I am well aware of the fact that being like a big sister for your children comes along with responsibilities for them and it will not always be just play and fun. My calm and patient personality will help me to master more difficult situations for instance when the kids are tired or don’t want to listen to me. I would also love to know more about your country if given the chance. Experiencing new culture, see the beautiful places, meet the warmest and happiest people in the world, maybe learn the language, and gain all the things your country can give. I also heard the tulips in the Netherlands are the prettiest ones, so seeing that would be a big bonus for me because they’re my favorite. I do expect that in the first couple of days I will be exhausted at times, but I am sure that I will adapt to the new tasks and daily routine quickly and become a big help for you. Living with me is really easy as I am a very flexible person. I do respect that the house is your house and that I have follow your house rules. If something works not quite as it should, I prefer to talk instead of ignoring things. You can trust me with whatever and I will do it as best as I can. Again, thank you very much for taking time to read my letter and I hope this helped you to get a bit of an idea of myself and my history. Hope I can share more of my stories in person and I am very much looking forward to meeting you all! Hope to hear from you soon and have a nice day! Best Regards, Carla