Audrey Hodgdon East Boothbay's Audrey Hodgdon is still enjoying incredible water views, but now they are in Auckland, New Zealand. This photo was taken at Motutapo Island.

New Zealand. A diverse blend of cultures and landscape is home to an estimated 4,000,000 people - plus one.

East Boothbay native Audrey Hodgdon has been calling Auckland, New Zealand home since early September of 2007.

Hodgdon, a 2003 graduate of Boothbay Region High School and 2007 graduate of James Madison University, is currently employed as a sales and marketing assistant at High Modulus.

High Modulus is located in Albany, 15 kilometers northwest of Auckland. The company opened an office known as High Modulus Europe in the United Kingdom just outside Southampton.

"The company has three main areas of focus - engineering consultancy, composites materials supply and complete construction packages," said Hodgdon.

As a sales and marketing assistant, Hodgdon is involved with everything from market research, database management, assisting with the organization of tradeshows, and dealing with promotional materials to decorating the company Christmas tree - how's that for a diversified work day?

The market research Hodgdon has been working on involved looking into new geographical regions to see if there is a place within the market for High Modulus.

Upcoming company trade shows Hodgdon will be involved with are the Auckland International Boat Show, China International Boat Show, and the Sanctuary Cove Boat Show (in Australia) in March, April and May respectively.

The New Zealand office employs 80 to 90 people and is housed in an industrial building with manufacturing on the ground floor. Hodgdon's fellow employees are from the world over - France, Canada, Germany, South Africa, England, Ireland and the U.S.

The position is proving perfect for the young woman from East Boothbay with a long-time desire to travel.

"The visit to China with my dad (Tim Hodgdon of Hodgdon Yachts) last year was interesting, but for a long time I wanted to live outside the United States - not New Zealand in particular, but, I love it here," said Hodgdon.

Her search for a full-time job required networking. Hodgdon began her search for an internationally based marketing job by posting her resume on Monster.com and by searching the Internet for vacant positions.

Hodgdon also got in touch with some of her father's business contacts explaining her situation.

"One of these people got back to me, although he wasn't looking for anyone, but that he knew someone who was. He then passed my resume on to High Modulus and it went from there!" Hodgdon said.

She notes that the "interview process" was a bit out of the ordinary.

"Because the company is in New Zealand and the marketing and communications manager is based in the U.K., I didn't have an in-person interview. The entire process was conducted on the phone and through e-mails," said Hodgdon.

Learning is what Hodgdon enjoys most about her job.

"Though I feel like my college courses prepared me well, I have found that there is a lot I didn't know, and still don't know," Hodgdon said. "If you do a poor job on something at school, you just get a bad grade; but, if you do a poor job on something in the real world, it reflects on the entire company."

Adjusting to a new job and a new country proved both challenging and exciting - including the down time, the get out and explore time.

Hodgdon cites a trip to the Coromandel region as one of her most memorable to date.

"I went to this beach called Hot Water Beach where all the people were digging holes in the sand and then sitting in them. There are natural hot springs beneath them, but you had to be careful because some places will bring up boiling hot water and others will bring cold!"

When she doesn't feel like traveling very far, driving on the opposite side of the road, in less than an hour she can visit a white sandy beach on the east coast or a black sand beach on the west coast.

"Wanting to travel really motivated me to find an international job after college. My bank account looked like any other 22-year-olds' after college and I knew I needed to find a job. Working in a different country provides the opportunity to combine the best of both worlds."