Blue Card in Germany!

“It’s a beautiful thing when career and passion come together”

First day of your real job can be a memorable day for all of us. It is exciting, finally the feeling of being independent strikes, the relief of studying no more and all sorts of thoughts running your mind you prepare yourself. Especially the dialogue that we all have told all our lives as students „When I start working, I will do/buy so and so“ runs in a loop during the first month of work.

But, reality is always different from what runs in our head. And so was this day for me.

Even though I was part of the family past 12 months, this was different. It was my first official day as an employee and the day began as it was supposed to. New photo taken for the id card, followed by me asking to head directly to my desk.

My new place was two rooms away from where I have been from past a year and the first thing I noticed as I walked in was my CPU was replaced with a workstation. I was excited for obvious reasons but then something else made my day even more perfect, my phone. I was given a personal number for the internal/external communication and it was the cherry I had been waiting for.

Now some of you might wonder why this made me so happy? Well, for one simple reason. The time I send the picture of my new work space to my parents, there would be no one else in this world more happy than them. Happiness in life isn’t about a laptop or phone, but their feelings of accomplishment and seeing me start my career at such a wonderful place.

I was introduced to my team and after the warm welcome I was introduced to my mentor. I emailed my tentative graduated certificate to the HR department. All was going well. We were installing all the things required for my work one after the other and I had no clue how it would all be. I had my first lunch at the canteen with my team and all I could manage to eat was salad and a dessert.

Few minutes after lunch, I got my first call on my phone. It was from the HR department and I was explained the situation.

So the thing was this – I had just completed my masters and I did have a work permit for three months before getting my blue card but, I was no longer a student of TU Chemnitz. According to the work permit, I was allowed to work as a regular employee as long as I was a student. All the events past 48 hours had changed that and as a result – I was very politely asked to sort my visa and then continue my work.

I left the my building and went to meet the HR personally to understand the situation better. I am really privileged to be working with such a wonderful company that is Vector Informatik GmbH. Each person from my boss, to the team mates and the HR, each one were extremely supportive and caring. They knew I would be back soon.

The situation was now this in short, I had to apply for my blue card on that very day and wait for an appointment. Until then, all was stand still and I was supposed to stay at home. With no studies, no income, living (managing) in one of the expensive cities (Stuttgart) of Germany was my next challenge. Due to the immigrants coming in each day to Germany in number of thousands, I couldn’t see an appointment any time soon.

Honestly, I wasn’t sure if I should have shared this with my parents of not that day just for the fact that it was a really big day for them too. But I did (as usual) and all my dad told on phone were these words: “Charu, it’s not a big problem. It is just a work permit issue. You have been running since 6 years and now it is time you sit back and enjoy this time. Do not worry about anything, I am always here for you.” Ending my call started my tears, mixed with all the possible emotions that day and I made my way back to my room having no clue what next big thing was ahead of me.

P.S. Do leave your questions/opinions/comments in the comment section below 🙂

P.P.S. I will be continuing with the process of application for blue card in my next post J Do subscribe to the blog if you enjoy reading the posts and receive an email each time a post is published 🙂 Thank you! 🙂