Things You Don’t Think About Before Moving Abroad
Moving abroad sounds like a fairy tale. Everything will be new; culture, currency, friends, language, environment. Your friends and family will be jealous because they never have had the opportunity to travel as much, or even leave the country, let alone live somewhere culturally different. You will be a pioneer.
Having been introduced to moving abroad in 2008, I never expected to move my life to new countries entirely. I have a section in my blog about my exact checklist of moving abroad. So while I ticked off the fairy tale expectations, there were many that I had never planned for.
In this blog, I will let you know what I had to learn the hard way, and provide some tips based on my question I asked on Quora moving moving abroad.
What advice would you have given yourself before moving abroad?
Be persistent when looking for a job
Landing a job in a foreign country with a different language is not easy. It will test your person, and I would tell myself to be more optimistic. For me, I am a social butterfly, and have the drive of a rhino in a stampede. So I had to get creative and provide reasons why hiring a native English speaker (in my case) will benefit any company. You must be persistent, or of course, learn the language.
Watching your parents get older from a far
This is probably the hardest thing I have had to deal with. I am very, very close with my parents, and I am probably what some consider an anomaly: I talk to them pretty much everyday. And that is what I would have told myself to do when I moved abroad; call them and fly home as much as you can. You can’t get time back, but you can make memories still.
Thanks to technology, I can make the situation a little better by using apps like iPhone’s Find My Friends, and see that my dad is chilling on the golf coarse while I am about to lay down to catch some zzz’s on the other side of the world. Or I can be in my childhood home as they put in new skylights or floors, thanks to FaceTime. Or laugh with my mom about some weird gossip she heard, or a funny culture encounter I had in my foreign country. It doesn’t beat hugging them everyday, and that is something I have had to live with, and so will you if you move abroad.
Your nieces or nephews don’t know who you are
If you were abroad when your siblings had kids, you know how it feels that they get that ‘who are you’ face every time you try and hold them during your trip home for the holidays. Not until they hit 4 or 5 years old will they start to have long-term memories. I think what has helped in my situation, is my brother showing my nieces pictures of me and repeatedly saying my name – and technology! So remember to keep in touch often.
Having one foot in your home culture, and one in the new
Keep yourself grounded with your home culture. I still celebrate 4th of July and pull my Swedish friends into the celebration so they can learn too (it’s not too hard, since 4th of July involves BBQs and beer). But you also need to have a space in your heart to learn about your foreign country’s culture! It just means I get to explore double the holidays throughout the year! My favorite Swedish holiday is Midsummer!
Since I had my own advice to myself, I wanted to heard what others around the word had to say. Here are some thoughts from top contributors in the Travel Abroad category on Quora.
Dieter Neth,
What advice to myself before heading to Mexico? That would be: Don’t be so darn naive! Do not believe those “very reasonable” proposals only because the guy you get them from is wearing a nice suit (and I only a T-Shirt) and “looks honest and competent” !
…In all these 21 years I had to learn a ton of other things! Doing my own plumbing work! Electricity? Check! Learning how to prepare and pour concrete. Done! Designing a drop irrigation system for our garden and a solar water heater? Works like Swiss clockwork. Swamp cooler maintenance and indoor painting was basic. Basic car repair up to break pads as well. But not how to change flat tires! That I already knew from thousands of miles on the desert dirt roads. In Northern Mexico, you do that also in the city quite often. Still remember the doubting look in my girl’s face when I attempted my first wheel change with her looking! “Need some help with this, maybe?” I was reading there! No one of my extensive in-law family would bet a rat’s ass on me being able to pull this whole deal of living in Mexico off!
Read Deiter’s awesome full answer found here
Vanessa Foudouli,
I moved to the UK (London) when I was 27, to do a Masters degree – but to be honest, this was just a pretext: I just wanted to live in London.
Looking back, I would have definitely preferred not to have the exam pressure.
Apart from that – I wish I had travelled more within the UK. London sucked me in, and although it’s a magnificent city, I wish I had spent more time in other parts of the UK as well.
What I saw many people do that I would never have done: hanging out only with people from their own country. I completely avoided that (though naturally I met some Greek people, there are many in London), and got to know different cultures. In retrospect, I could have been even more social!
Argus Loud
I lived in Australia in the 1980’s. The advise I wish I would have given myself is not to loan money to my flat mate. Still haven’t gotten paid back!
Today, I’d research all I can about what to go do and see. When I went I was going to the opposite side of the world with one travel book. It was the great unknown. I would have loved to have been able to plan more trips out of the city faster but had to rely on workmates to expose me to places to go and things to see. It all worked out, but if I’d been able to do the research it could have been accelerated.
Tricia LaBrie[/underline],
I have lived in Mexico, in Canada briefly and mostly in the USA all over.
Depending on your age and your current responsibility, I would pick wisely. If you have no kids or spouse, then I would go. BUT!
If you plan to work there, you will need to find out the work rules. Wherever you come from, you have to follow the labor laws of the country.
Australia is very strict as are other places. Write to their labor authorities far in advance and ask for their rules in your native language. If there is nothing in your language, you’ll need a licensed translator. That’s a huge red flag. Nothing in your native tongue means you will have trouble with communication. Be careful. In most places, you have to have a source of financial stability. If you are being hosted, they need to know who that is and the details.
If it’s a long vacation, you’ll still need credentials especially if you stay past 3 to 6 months. You’ll need a passport, drivers license if you plan to drive. Past a certain time, you may need an international driver’s license. They need to be able to validate your credentials. They check everything unless you are filthy rich.
…Be humble. It’s their back yard. Defer to them. Let them take the lead. Once they trust you, you can shine a little.
Eat their food.
Dress the way you normally dress. No need to turn yourself into a pretzel.
Follow the laws of the land.
Read Tricia’s full fun answer here
Do you have advice? Let’s talk about it in the comments!
