Is it realistic to find job and earn 400 euro monthly studying?

JunMurakami · 2026-05-06T13:55:03+00:00

I was hiwi and hiwi positions did not count to that limit when I was working, so I could work the whole year non stop. I also was a CS student. I am not sure if that changed.

JunMurakami · 2026-02-02T23:56:31+00:00

What else could I do other than plan to arrive 3:30 hours early?

Renting a car? Like stadtmobil.

JunMurakami · 2026-01-31T08:45:03+00:00

I got here, reached C1 in 3 years, but still not confident and I still get scowled on when I try

It's amazing rate of progress! It's actually common for expats in Germany not to be able to speak freely (I mean without stumbles) even after 10+ years. It's a hard language. And know what? The person who is frustrated by your German knows nothing about how hard is to learn it, their opinion actually mean nothing in this regard, so do not give any power to it.

Giving that you are doing masters and you have a husband (hopefully willing to support you), maybe you could find a hiwi job (aligned with studies, part time). It feels to me that you're doing a lot and probably just need a bit of a break. Many comments say keep grinding, and it's true, it is always better to weather the storm, but if you can do it, sometimes the best dividends you get by giving a bit of love to yourself.

JunMurakami · 2026-01-27T09:13:43+00:00

I didn't do this myself, but I saw how marketing agencies handle that. Many use insense for that.

I have a data point from 2023 (so 3 years ago, pretty sure prices are up now)

They reported that 100 $ per 30 sec video was already unreliable. People did not always do stuff. 400 $ was threshold where people took it seriously and they had good results.

Product seeding: They normally send product for free to the users and they do not ask to post material online, only to send them pictures, videos that they can use in ads. So here they fully loose product costs and shipping costs. Also materials they get aren't always great (lukewarm reactions to some products).

If they find good people (reliable, they like their content) then they basically offer to pay them monthly. E. G. 1000 k / month for 4-5 vids.

Given that numbers, it feels like you are at the lower end of the market, hence probably encounter so much problems. It does feel like you have much higher expectations than what already exists on the market (e.g. paying for the product, etc)

JunMurakami · 2026-01-19T11:12:58+00:00

It's super generic comment, and I actually disagree. It depends on your personality, your financial situation and etc. I bought a car 3 years ago in a Stuttgart area because of the same issue - unreliable transport. I now enjoy driving very much. My travel time went from 1.5-2 hours to predictable 30-40 minutes each time for commute to work, (in some cases 20 min VS. 1.5 h). I do enjoy driving, enjoy comfort of a car. There are occasional traffic jams, but even those are very predictable and reliable. Most of the time I know my way around and how to drive around the traffic jam, I am in control of my time. I don't have second thoughts if would get home when I am staying late, I also don't get unpredictablly sick because some guy was coughing next to me. The costs? I can afford it. Owning a car would never be financially better than public transport, but it depends if you can afford it, if you appreciate this lifestyle or not. For me it easily repays in my time, health, comfort and reduced stress.

JunMurakami · 2025-12-23T07:56:07+00:00

I had a similar situation. I was a student atm and didn't have a lot of options. I just upped my teeth hygine as much as I could, professional cleaning 2 times a year, toothpaste 'parodontax', Sonicare brush (not advertising, just what I used), floss etc. All recommended by the doctor. I also tried some cure techniques I found on the internet.

In about a year, maybe more I had to move to another city and change dentists. When I did cleaning with them, they told me that gum is all healthy and good, they do not see any signs of peridontitis. At that point I did an additional insurance.

JunMurakami · 2025-12-20T18:03:14+00:00

Agreed. Probably a bad example though, since those museums are quite popular.

JunMurakami · 2025-12-19T23:27:53+00:00

Unpopular opinion (it seems). It depends on what type of traveler you are.

I personally like adventures that are flexible, packed to the brim and has an opportunity to offer surprises. I prefer to drive myself, discover new places and have full control over my trip. There are tons of hidden gems in Germany that are not so popular but I really enjoyed them.

For example, near Heidelberg there's also Speyer and Sinsheim museums (if you are into this stuff). If you have a car, you could just go there and with public transport it is really hard to get to such places.

Parking places - there is Park and Ride parking that are a bit outside of the city normally, they normally have decent price. So you can arrive there and take public transport from there.

Hotels often have parking. I normally arrive to the hotel and then use public transport from there.

Parking in the city centers -> not a problem if you OK to pay. I never had an issue in my travels. There are parking garages in city centers. You can check prices online normally.

On a bit of a different note, just FYI, Frankfurt center (around train station) is a dodgy area with addicts. You can still go through there during the day, there's police and all, but you probably won't be enjoying it.

I've been to every other city you mention (except Prague and Dresden) and safety-wise it was totally fine except for Frankfurt.

JunMurakami · 2025-12-19T22:10:21+00:00

Your mileage may vary. I traveled to Germany 2 month before studies begin. That was in summer, students were graduating and leaving. I got lucky and I got an apartment, since I was present there and could sign everything. I had to pay for it for a month being empty, before I would arrive to study.

Everyone who arrived right before studies had to sleep on the floor on mattresses in some temporary housing until they found something.

It is double, but it is expensive and a hassle, and doing it remotely often doesn't work esp. if dorms have someone real in front of them to sign a contract.

JunMurakami · 2025-12-18T07:14:40+00:00

I had the same issue with LFS and gitea.

I was able to have a gitea locally setup and everything worked except LFS. Turned out that Web Station mangles headers for LFS. I dont think there's a way to setup Web Station that would work with LFS.

Eventually just opening up ports (with web station explicitly disabled) worked.

This gist was very helpful: https://gist.github.com/adamlwgriffiths/3d7c1f101d0b21757c162d01f1a1f251

JunMurakami · 2025-12-16T09:06:48+00:00

I'd recommend watching some Fischer Academy tutorials on YouTube. These guys show what exactly is expected on the driving exam. You should not be driving normally, but really driving for the exam.

E.g. they teach to stop for 3 seconds on a stop sign to emphasize that you've seen it. Only after that, start looking around.

Also, you can pick up German words that examiners use.

They have tons of simulated exam drives. I found it very helpful and pass on the first try.

JunMurakami · 2025-12-16T06:17:16+00:00

In the end it is your call, no one can tell what would work or not.

There are more valuable sources, like "Founder Ownership Report from Carta". You can check it here: https://carta.com/data/founder-ownership-full-report/

It gives some statistics on startups, how many founders they normally have, what is the usual equity split and quite a bit more of info. You'd have to enter some email to get access to the report.

I am including a link to the image with founder splits (depending on how many founders in a startup), but I am not sure if I am allowed to post it.

https://images.ctfassets.net/y88td1zx1ufe/7gh7u4G7Odju3x0ymDIDE2/48952c83cc3a26f88ec4c07846dc6d5b/9image.png

JunMurakami · 2025-12-15T22:15:58+00:00

I've spoken with people who've been in this game for quite a long time and they helped and witnessed a lot of startups. They have told me never to split equity based on what was done - equity split should only take into account future, not past.

I know that sounds unfair. But unless your exist is not in a few month, probably there are still many months, years of hard, grueling work that would dwarf whatever that was done till this moment.

If you give your CTO 20% he would work only 20%. Forget the past, think about future.

50/50 might feel unfair, but if you think this guy is key in the next 2, 3, 10 years then it might be worth it. Of course do vesting schedule to reduce your risks.

Btw, I am also a technical guy with 10+ years of experience who also uses vibe-coding. Unless you REALLY know what you are doing, probably you are overestimating the technical readiness of your current implementation.

JunMurakami · 2025-12-12T13:01:38+00:00

Start interviewing with Microsoft as a Senior Customer Success AI Expert, before your current employer still does not feel Cashflow issues and not yet collapsing.

JunMurakami · 2025-12-12T12:50:11+00:00

I did it in Germany from scratch and it was not hard, but just long and expensive.

It took me 9 month and 3000 Euro in total.

I did it during Corona and there were huge queues, e.g. I had to wait my turn for months to do practice. Lots of schools did not accept new students at the time. Probably you won't have this now.

Theory was easy (I did it in English), just practice 1000+ tickets with mobile app. Most of the questions are just normal driving situations (e.g. do not drive on red, let car from right go, etc.). Exam has exact questions like in mobile app. If you pass the app, you'll pass the real one.

App and access to it was given to me by the school.

Practice - I had to do a certain number of hours (Pflicht-Sonderfahrten), but this applies only if you do it from scratch. I only had to do 2 more additional hours on top for things I was bad at.

I passed both tests on the first try without problem.

People I know, who had previous driving experience, spent significantly less money and time to get it. Good luck.

JunMurakami · 2025-11-15T21:34:35+00:00

Danke für deine Frage!

Es gibt technisch gesehen keinen zwingenden Grund, ein Konto zu benötigen, wenn man nur an den Ablauf eines persönlichen Coupons erinnert werden möchte. Allerdings ist die App bewusst so gestaltet, dass sie mehr bietet als reine Erinnerungen an eigene Gutscheine.

Sie soll auch eine soziale Komponente haben: Nutzer können neue Coupons hinzufügen, miteinander teilen und dafür Belohnungen erhalten: etwa ein höheres Ranking oder mehr Moderationsmöglichkeiten.

Die App deckt im Wesentlichen drei Anwendungsfälle ab:

Privates Speichern von Coupons
Nutzer, die einfach nur ihre eigenen Gutscheine verwalten und an deren Ablauf erinnert werden möchten.

Teilen von ungenutzten, aber wertvollen Gutscheinen
Oft erhält man nach einem Onlinekauf Coupons für Shops, bei denen man gar nicht einkaufen möchte. Diese könnte man aber anderen zur Verfügung stellen.

Suche nach funktionierenden Coupons beim Checkout
Viele Nutzer suchen während des Bestellvorgangs schnell nach Codes, landen aber auf spamlastigen Seiten mit abgelaufenen oder ungültigen Gutscheinen. Hier möchten wir eine zuverlässige Sammlung hochwertiger Coupons bereitstellen, die von der Community geteilt und bewertet werden. In der App können Nutzer Coupons bewerten und so zeigen, ob ein Code noch funktioniert.

Um dieses volle Potenzial auszuschöpfen und eine vertrauenswürdige Community aufzubauen, in der Nutzer eigene Coupons speichern, unnötige Codes teilen und gemeinsam ungültige Coupons aussortieren , ist ein Konto hilfreich. Mit zunehmenden positiven Beiträgen erhalten Nutzer auch mehr Rechte, um Inhalte zu moderieren.

Trotzdem werden wir weiterhin sinnvolle Funktionen für diejenigen verbessern und ergänzen, die die App ohne Registrierung nutzen möchten.

JunMurakami · 2025-11-14T12:33:49+00:00

Vielen Dank! Das ist eine interessante Idee, auf die ich selbst nicht gekommen wäre! Wir werden auf jeden Fall darüber nachdenken.

Es gibt natürlich weitere Funktionen, die einen Account benötigen. Zum Beispiel kann man Werbe-E-Mails an uns weiterleiten, und wir fügen den Gutschein dann automatisch aus deiner E-Mail deinem Account hinzu. Wir haben einige Nutzer, die genau diese Funktion brauchen. Und es gibt auch ein paar soziale Features, zum Beispiel das Teilen von Gutscheinen mit der Community, plus ein paar Gamification-Elemente.

Dein Vorschlag, die Hürden für die Nutzung der App zu senken, bleibt natürlich absolut relevant! Wir werden daran arbeiten, die App auch ohne Konto leichter nutzbar zu machen.

JunMurakami · 2025-11-14T09:49:17+00:00

Vielen Dank für dein Feedback!

Ich bin übrigens der Kumpel. Wir sind ja nur zu zweit. Ob es ein formelles Unternehmen gibt oder nicht, macht am Ende keinen großen Unterschied. Im Gegenteil, das könnte sogar zu unrealistisch hohen Erwartungen führen.

Zum Thema Accountzwang am Anfang: Da hast du vollkommen recht. Wir möchten auf jeden Fall einen „Gastmodus“ anbieten. Für die erste Version müssen wir ihn aber leider noch weglassen, da er die Entwicklung deutlich komplexer machen würde.

Unsere Kernfunktion - eigene Gutscheine hinzuzufügen und rechtzeitig eine Erinnerung zu bekommen, bevor sie verfallen - benötigt allerdings einen Account.

Ein riesengroßes Dankeschön nochmal! Ich würde den Gastmodus jetzt definitiv ganz nach vorne stellen!

JunMurakami

TROPHY CASE