Couple of things come to mind about the whole Turkish deal...

First off, I've heard there is quite a bit of animosity between the union pilots at Turkish and the non union expats coming to fly their aircraft. Just what I've heard, don't shoot the messenger.

Secondly, about 2-3 years ago Turkish hired a number of expats as Triple captains there only to turn around the let them go within about a year of what was supposed to be a longer contract period. Left some pretty bad blood from what I know. Same thing that Jet Airways did about the same time period.

So, use extreme caution when dealing with either Turkish or Jet Airways.

Just sayin'.....

Kap

Heard the same thing, apparently life on the 73 there is more pleasant, but the 777 has a few issues, there is a lot of growth proyected and for what I hear not a lot of local experience to cover it, basically the same issue than here in Japan, lots of retirements with not enough right seat wealth to draw from.

How much in Ireland? In the UK, price for an initial class 1 is up to 348GBP which is about $550 at today's exchange rate. In Spain, an initial class 1 is about €400, so about the same. At least renewals and revalidations are reasonable at €150 more or less.

The company paid for it but as I remember it was around 680 euro. I really miss flying in Europe but with all the citizenship requirements in the world I think I'll be in the States for a while. Japan temps me but I don't know if I could tolerate that commute for the duration of a five year contract.

Being doing it for 6+ years now and believe me when I say that it is nothing like the experience of commuting while working in the states.
Depends on what commuting option you take of course but if you choose to take your confirmed business class ticket every month, it is actually a very pleasant experience, your first sector is on ANA either to Chicago, Seattle, San Francisco, New York, fully lay flat seats with the service of an airline that was just named ATW (airline transport world) 2013 airline of the year and SKYTRAX just awarded a 5 star rating. All while accumulating miles on their award program, so very quickly you earn a Diamond status, that brings many more perks like checking in their ANA suite check in counters, exclusive lines through security in Narita and Haneda, automatic upgrades to first class on your second sector inside the states, checking more bags for free when you travel on vacation (great for when you travel on vacation with the family) access to all the lounges within the star alliance and so forth. Commuting is not an issue at all really, but the stupid freighter trips once you get here, that is another story:mad:

Thank you for the insight. My biggest concern with the commute is simply the number of time zones my 54 year old body would be adjusting to. I wonder how many of those 10 days with my wife would be spent in a state of semi-sleep? Still, I really enjoyed the lifestyle and cultural experiences that came with living and working in Europe. I will never be able to duplicate that in the States and therefore continue to look at contract flying. Since they do not seem to be hiring Captains at the present time I don't have to sweat the decision. Yet.

If you cant handle the commute then I wonder how you would go through the JCAB conversion process lasting upward of 6 months.

There are not many time zones to contend with when you stay in one place for six months.

Well yes, jetlag is part of it all, we all have our different system to adjust, I do OK going westbound but coming home, I usually start adjusting my sleeping patterns two days before my trip home (provided my roster allows it) if I have freight for the last few days before I go home then it is not much of a problem since I'm working at the hours of daylight back home.

Sorry all for the thread drift!

Thank you for the information. And yes, sorry for wandering off subject.
Cheers