One milestone marking the reality that we are moving home–figuring out childcare for when we get back. We’ve talked a lot about it, and decided that hiring an Italian au pair will be great for continuity with language and culture. Although I never used online dating websites, I did work for one. I became really familiar with the way that people search, combing through pictures, finding meaning in small grammatical errors or a nice turn of phrase. So, when Josh and I decided that we want to hire an au pair, we entered the magical world of online matching.
We are working with a great agency, Cultural Care Au Pair, who takes care of all state department visas, training and extensive background checking on all the girls. So, Josh and I set out some baseline criteria: Italian, under 21 (don’t want to deal with her going to bars), strong English, well-travelled and multi-lingual.
There was a surprising number of Italians on the site, so we quickly had to parse through them. One of the first things we did was rule out pics that looked like they were for online dating. Any significant cleavage shots or too-cute selfies were nixed. I mean, come on, girls. Your primary customer is a middle aged American woman—don’t use the same shot as your Tinder profile.
It was fun to see what we both focused on in the profiles. We appreciated the letter that they wrote to their potential host families. Josh liked to see the video, to see how they actually presented themselves in real time.
It was instructive though, that reading profiles and watching videos was very different than (skype) interviewing the girls. We did five “first round” interviews. The 21yr old that we thought might be a bit wild? She admitted to being a smoker (even though it said contrary on her profile). A 19yr old who looked really outgoing in her video? She was super boring on skype.
Just goes to show, not matter what impression that is made on a profile, nothing compares to a face to face meeting—even if that meeting is on video! If I was still working for that dating company, I would approach the whole process a bit differently. My advice would be to get out in the world and really meet these people. Those darn profiles can really be deceiving.
We are in the final stages of hiring our au pair. We hope to meet her in person in her hometown before we go back to the US. It is a unique chance to get to see part of her world before she comes to ours. I don’t think any of them are truly prepared to see the 405 at rush hour, but we are excited for the kids to keep up their Italian. It will be a nice through-line for them in what has been an extraordinary time in their lives. I just hope she can really make lasagna.