Weather sucks as bad as I had imagined (but this year's being amazing so far)
Food was a nice surprise - way better than planned.
Cost of living is actually lower, opposite of what I thought.
People.... many are much warmer and friendlier than I was preparing for. Very nice surprise there too. Language may be harsh and many have this perma-grumpy air about them, but when they wish you a good morning you can see in their eyes that they actually mean it.
That was the experience of a lifetime: total immersion in a foreign culture while having a serious duty to accomplish, plus a complete lack of Japanese language or culture. Luckily, in my previous Tokyo stint the PSX OS team met a series of game developers from various game companies around the world - a PSX preview series of meetings, where the Sony team saw first hand some of the odd personalities (goth / 90's super geek) the game industry had. So I, being a fairly normal dude, was given a lot of latitude with my lack of Japanese manners.
Overall, the perspective I gained was a great foundation for confidence to pursue my dreams. There is so much human activity, practically anything one wants to do can be found if one is willing to leave your culture for one pursuing that dream without the American infrastructure we take for granted.
It’s incredibly rewarding but also sometimes frustrating. If I can give anyone any advice, it’d be:
1. Learn the local language.
Nobody respects an expat who doesn’t make a proper effort to learn and use the language. You might still have local friends but they will, and should, think less of you if you lean on English too much.
2. Go back home regularly.
It’s easy to lose perspective, especially if you’re often confronted with distorted opinions (positive or negative) about the place you come from. I go back to California every six months, and I recommend going at least once a year, even if home is very far from where you live.
3. Stay humble.
It’s natural to form opinions about your host country but it’s important to remember you’re a guest, and that you don’t understand everything about the locals no matter how well you speak the language or how long you live there. That doesn’t mean you never get to complain about the obstinance of the Elbonians, just keep it light. And try not to tell people how to vote. :-)
4. Manage your expectations.
If you’re from the US and in tech you will most likely be making less money and have fewer career opportunities than at home. That’s ok: you should be aware of what else you’re getting from the experience and be satisfied with that bargain. Techies live pretty well everywhere, so avoid thinking about dollar figures or Gooface interviews. Unless you’re super into Gooface, in which case go where they have offices.
My life has been greatly enriched by “going international” and I recommend it to anyone with an open mind. I could imagine living in the US again, but I can’t imagine viewing that as a permanent arrangement.
The week that I landed my sedentary life ended. I don't think it was necessarily the location (although the Seattliltes' active lifestyles are certainly inspiring) but rather an excuse to grow. This has had the expected knock-on effects, especially in terms of clarity of mind and mood. The important things just work here - I want to deal with 1st world problems (equality, rights, etc.) and not what I used to deal with ("gee there have been many violent crimes in my neighborhood lately").
The bad has been friends. School and college are the best opportunities to make friends and it's tough once you leave. I've been trying meetup.com, but it's slow progress.
If you're on the fence, I say go for it! Put yourself in the mindset of growth and make it happen when you land.
This is a very good point. When you move you have a blank slate and you get the opportunity to turn your life into what you want it to be without having to fight against your status-quo
And I'm not an "adventurer" in the normal sense at all. Just a computer dork who wanted to try different things. I actually hadn't ridden a bicycle in a decade prior to the moment I booked a guesthouse in Krakow that just happened to be right next to a bike shop and I took it to be a sign. (I'd been salivating over other people's bike touring blogs for a year or two but thinking I'm nowhere near "adventurer" enough to do something like that).
Did it change my life? No, not really. I'm back in software at US big corp and raising two ordinary kids in a house bigger than I need and griping about taxes. I'm also the oldest person I know at my level at work (age 42 at level 64 msft).
Would I rather be at a higher level at work and miss out on those experiences though? Not a chance. Do I wish I hadn't come back? Oh sometimes, but oh well. Honestly being on the road is not all rainbows and unicorns either. There are plenty of days you're sitting around wondering why you're there in some guesthouse doing nothing and not back home "changing the world through technology" or something.
I mean, it's a privilege. You're presumably above average IQ and born into a wealthy country to less than horrible parents. It's not an opportunity most have. But, we all live a few years and then die. So it's a bit of whatever. Just try to spend some time doing what you enjoy. Don't die wishing you had.
Some random person once told me when I was young, "the purpose of life is to make memories". I still haven't found anything wrong with that statement.
But I've found I can reconcile that by switching a word: "Grow them not to be ordinary, even if they are just not ordinary to themselves". And that's probably what it should be anyway. I guess....
People are just people, but you can give the kids broad or narrow experiences.
Tell them about mountains, rivers and the seas. About different animals that they can't see anymore. Tell them about how mankind came to be.
You can be their, potentially, biggest inspiration at this age (presuming they are quite young).
PS: Sigh, I'm a hopeless romantic.
I really just want to go the same thing, I also am into human languages. Even just for the idea, like you said, that you DID it. Get it out of the system and then see what comes next in life. I've met tons of people on the road while traveling before. People you could link up with for business and life ventures in the future. Never a linear path.
I'm originally from The Netherlands; I've spent the past two and a half years in Prague, Czech Republic. I moved to Canterbury in the UK two months ago because I was becoming annoyed at not speaking the local language very well, and simply needed a change of environments. I'll probably move somewhere outside of Europe in the future.
I think the destination isn't all that important - I've mainly just gone to places I found interesting, and ideally had friends near. I'd absolutely recommend the experience, but do be aware that loneliness, isolation and stress are real issues many expats encounter at some point when moving somewhere new, and it's not talked about as much as it should be. I've found it to be very much worth it though.
For me, I think of myself as fairly open to people and cultures, but after stays in many countries I realized how closed my previous attitude really was. Meeting and living in many places seems to have helped me be much more open to differences in people, personalities and cultures.
If you stay longer than a long vacation, a very common experience (especially in countries with very large language/cultural differences), is a weird phenomenon where you start to hate where you are and every tiny difference or minor inconvenience becomes meltdown inducing. And then you'll get over it and settle into your new life. This psychological wall is a make-it/break-it moment for many expats and some people simply can't get through it and give in. Don't! It's very character building and upon reflection a huge growth opportunity that most people don't get a chance to develop.
Finally, I think it's given me a much better sense of perspective about how and where my home country compares to others in various ways - favorably and unfavorably. It's impossible to convey this to people who haven't experienced living elsewhere themselves, so it can a bit frustrating to come back home and hear the same ill informed opinions. Likewise, it can be frustrating to hear about your home country being described by ill informed people in the countries you are in.
Note: "farther" is not just geographical notion, cultural distance might be a lot more overhelming. Think
https://geerthofstede.com/culture-geert-hofstede-gert-jan-ho...
https://www.hofstede-insights.com/product/compare-countries/
(Where to and from : .bg .au/3.5yr .bg/10yr .au/3m .bg/+, with few 1-3month stays in other places in asia/europe)
And beware, after staying 3-4+years elsewhere it seems difficult to move back. Some psychological frontier i guess.. YMMV.
have fun
The first year was a semi-sabbatical. I was traveling while on and off working as a freelancer for companies back home. Needless to say, you don't need many billable Swiss hours to have a good life in Colombia. So personally it was an incredible year. All the beautiful places, meeting tons of people, reading the books i didn't found time for before and most importantly not being tied to daily business matters. But professionally I was stagnant for the most part. Because I wasn't willing to commit too much time nor other things clients expect like availability or short deadlines, I was mostly working on rather trivial generic web development tasks. Code monkey work under palm trees. Also I realized being a Freelancer is not for me. It basically means you are running a business with everything that entails: Communications, marketing, legal, accounting, project management, etc. Many of those I don't have particular interest in or patience for. The year aptly did what it meant to do. Taking a year off from 9-to-5 jobs while not having to spent savings. But career wise I was pretty bored by the end of it.
The last two years I have been working for a startup in Bogotá that is part of a company builder that creates businesses from scratch for the growing middle class in Latin America. While I don't have that many exciting adventurous stories about my personal life to tell at the moment, I do thoroughly enjoy living here and work wise I have never learnt as much in so little time since I started my career 10 years earlier. Exclusively communicate in foreign languages. Vastly different market and mindsets than my country. Having to re-assess things I though where "universal truths" just because I saw them over and over again in Switzerland or similar nations. Balancing tech budget for cloud services whose pricing is aimed at rich western countries. Dealing with much lower end mobile devices and low quality networks.
So the whole 3 years have been extremely valuable personally and professionally in terms of experience and knowledge gained. Money wise less so. But I'm young enough and don't have family to take care of, that this is not much of a worry for now.
But the former is probably better to start in, if one wants to live in Colombia or just work from here for a couple of months. The grey, rainy and cold capital takes a bit more time to appreciate :)
I think the most valuable aspect has simply been experiences and viewpoints that serve as counterexamples when I am thinking about how society is organized.
I lived in New York for 5,5 months (the max period allowed on one continuous stay on a B1 visa in the USA).
Cons: I wasted ~3000usd on rent
Pros: I, never having been outside former Soviet Union, flew straight to another part of the world, without any connections, without friends, alone, with some money that only appeared to be sufficient to be spent on rent and food. I managed to rent a room (never done so before in my life), I tested if I could find a job in NY (yea, guys, don't be hurt by this, this is illegal, and I never actually worked while staying in the USA, so i didn't breach visa terms, I was only testing the possibility of finding work there - and that was very easy, I found a low-paid position on the second day of looking for it). I was amazed by how much people in America respect your privacy, talked to some people, developed a daily routine - not too sophisticated but still I managed to survive some 7000 or so miles from home, and it wasn't too difficult and I came to one of the main conclusions in my life - the world is much smaller than I thought, and in order to fly anywhere and live anywhere you just need some rather humble amount of money. This 'global thinking' replaced rather depressive 'local thinking' framework I was thinking in previously and in that regard now I am happy that I have realized that.
I had two 6 months period in the US and they definitely reshaped my way of thinking and gave me a more pragmatic approach.
Now I'm living in the UK, mostly because London has a way better job market. This is giving me the opportunity to live in a truly international environment, to work on more interesting problems and with a better compensation. The Brexit debacle is also giving me more perspective on why being part of the EU is good and how having really bad politicians is not only an Italian problem.
I moved for work, and I gained a cool new project to work on and new adventures, but didn't have my family, friends, or any familiarity of the culture.
It quite accustoms you to leaving your comfort zone, which is powerful and awesome. And it forced me to really value my relationships, and I found myself deliberately making an effort to catch up and keep in touch with some friends that I really valued.
I’ve worked for a number of agencies across the country, and I’ve also freelanced quite a bit. I have a studio down by the river with some good friends of mine, where I build various apps and platforms with the various web stacks. I’ve been lucky enough to make some cool things with some cool people.
It’s pricey here. I’ve taken up work at a startup here in town to cover my costs. I have thoroughly enjoyed learning Swiss German and its various dialects – I’m told I still have an eastern accent from time to time. The river is beautiful during the summer.
I do think about Chicago often. I miss it dearly. The startup scene is burgeoning here, but it’s still Switzerland. Bern is somehow too nice to leave. Small government, applied correctly, is a lovely thing. We pay through the nose in taxes, but the system is there for you when you need it.
Still, I’m a stranger in a strange land. And simultaneously at home. A part of my own cyberpunk novella with mountains.
It is of utmost importance that you do this at least once because it will show you the things you considered constant but aren't. And after having that experience you might be more open to understanding other situations.
So almost a decade in total! Hard to say if it's "valuable" as honestly it just felt like life. I have dual citizenship though (US / Euro), so moving around was much easier than for some. I am really glad I took advantage, and do believe it opens you up in a unique way.
You learn how to get along with people from all over, get good at identifying accents (like making friends just because you can tell that person is from Manchester, and not just English), and hopefully pick up a language or two. My Spanish is thankfully still pretty good, but my Dutch is awful.
I'm in NYC now, and while I am enjoying it, I can definitely see myself moving again. Maybe Australia, or somewhere else in Europe? Gets harder with kids I'm sure, but I know people from oil households who moved around a lot (Nigeria, Bahrain, Norway) and are still normal, well-adjusted adults. Itchy feet? Who knows. But a big benefit of working in tech is that the job doesn't really change, regardless of where you are. It's much harder for friends of mine who are lawyers, or even doctors (building a practice is very local), to consider moving internationally.
I presume that HN being more USA-centric makes the question interesting; but I feel that if you ask people in most other regions, the answer would be "obviously yes".
There are different aspects that make the experience different, like, whether you learn the local language or not (in many places you can get away with english).
But, regardless of that, the "cultural gap" will be always there, obvious things for everybody that for you are a total mystery... and by being in such a different context, you start to realize that things that were "a fact of life" for you, or "the way things are", it was just a feature of your culture at a given time.... So yes, you learned a lot about yourself, your culture, and people.
The bad ? you will find that each culture has great things and terrible things, and then, weherever you are, there will be something missing...
It was a super valuable experience overall and in many ways I came back to the US with a newfound appreciation for this country.
If I could do it over again I'd go somewhere way more outside my comfort zone (non-English speaking). Probably Japan or Korea.
As background I’ve already traveled quite a bit with 15 countries and 45 states so I knew a little what I was getting into.
I generally have loved to travel, but this 6mo period has actually made me find some limits and has been pretty tough. I really found some things that make me very uncomfortable culturally and realized I can’t live anywhere I want like I thought I could. I’ve ad some not as good experience here due to several factors, but I’d do it again even knowing that. You really find your limits and the world opens up a lot more. One of the major things for me is even though you can make friends anywhere, if I lived abroad longer I’d have to go where I know at least a friend or 2 already to help me establish roots there. Friends really make or break wherever you are.
Many limits I ran into were personal including health conditions and it turns out humidity really makes me sweat which I never realized. Also in India for some reason eating with my hands made me so uncomfortable, whereas eating with chopsticks was fine and I learned it quickly. The language barrier wasn't too bad since Singapore is English speaking, although the accent can be really difficult sometimes so speaking slowly is sometimes needed. I knew Asian culture was more conservative as I've been to South Korea before and have a lot of friends there from research at my home university, but I really thought I could make local friends anywhere despite a quieter culture and that turned out not to be the case.
I feel like I haven't assimilated as much as I should but! to answer your question: it was/is very valuable, to see how other peoples approach life, to see subtle differences between how people handle things commonly- you pick up life tips that make being human a little easier. Simple things that are obvious in retrospect.
However, I'm not sure what the alternative would have been if I had stayed in London.. Without a frame of reference it's hard to know if it's was /more/ valuable than the alternative.
It was valuable in that I formed lifelong friendships. A few others had also done the same and being in this unique boat --- no language skills, first time in China, first job ever --- formed really tight bonds.
I also learned enough Mandarin that I can comfortably roam China on my own, even 6 years later, when I went for two weeks this January.
Oh, and this is how I got into building software as well. We built our own ERP system for manufacturing audits.
I've written a bit about it here:
https://jacquesmattheij.com/a-western-kid-living-in-communis...
Later followed by a 5 year stint in Canada that I've yet to really write about and another 2 years in Bucharest, Romania.
Original base is NL.
What's been good/bad about it could fill a book, and it changed my perspective on life in so many ways that each and every day it still surprises me.
For one thing: in every country people take stuff for granted that elsewhere is hard to impossible to achieve or come by. Those things are simply 'normal' and nobody thinks twice of it. And elsewhere in the world people are dying or hardly able to function for lack of those 'normal' things.
Remember this whenever you turn on the light, up the heat, open a tap and clean water comes out or go out to vote on election day.
Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming "Wow! What a Ride!” ― Hunter S. Thompson
The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only one page. ― Saint Augustine
Interesting, and unusual, maybe? except if you were working in a family business. Were you?
Jokes aside, it helped me to improve my English, see other ways of living, experience different work culture, and learn that very indirect, not straightforward way British people communicate.
One example was to see different ways universities operate in respect to undergraduate students, for example the amount of socializing they are, incidentally or on purpose, forced into. The differences in prestige boils down not to the level of teaching, but to opportunities students are given, becoming a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy.
Living in another country means that sooner or later one will crash into beaurocracy and the health system, which works differently everywhere, giving appreciation to things that one might have hated before.
And finally, there's the pure "feel" of the place. Admittedly, it's possible to live in places with different "feels" without going abroad, and get most of the variation, but it's even more pronounced when the demographics, general approach to the world, weather or legislation are different.
In the very least, moving around helped me understand what is important to lead a happy life. Totally valuable.
The good IMO opinion is everything, the only downside is building a community and meeting people takes a lot of energy. But looking back I think it takes a lot no matter where you live, it is just easier if you are there all the time.
How did it change my perspective? I am a lot more confident in general as I realized I can navigate a huge swath of different cultures and challenges. Knowing you can land just about anywhere in the world and take care of yourself is a good feeling. What else? I see a lot of what other countries are doing well and doing not so well at, when I go home it helps me see what we could be doing better.
I think the most valuable lesson I brought back with me was that I sometimes speak in vague sound bites. I didn't notice before living in France because everyone around me seems to do the same thing. I'm not going to call it 'an American cultural trait' but it might be. Noticing that has inspired me to focus on clarity in my thoughts and communication.
Other useful lessons: people are pretty much the same all over; ease of travel between EU countries is so much better than when I backpacked around Europe in the 1990's; a lot of things we take for granted in the US are full of incomprehensible friction in many other countries (e.g. opening a bank account). And vice versa, to a smaller degree.
Interested in what you mean by this. Could you give an example?
However, now with wife & kids priorities change significantly. We are planning (though it is not sure we will do it due to wife's job) to bring our kids to Germany while they're in school and then retire in Spain once they have grown up. Let's see if that works out ;)
I moved because my (then gf, now wife) had been away from her home (Thailand) for ~10 years and wanted to come home for a while. I worked for a remote company at the time, so it was no problem work wise. I’ve since started my own company and work independently but still remote, so no issues there.
The low cost of living is nice, but I definitely appreciate some of the western cultural/lifestyle aspects more now that I’ve lived here.
I also appreciate things like government more now - people often claim Australia has become a “nanny state” due to regulations - Thailand is a perfect example of what can happen when government says “eh fuck it do what you want”. I realise that won’t mean much to those who haven’t lived here, but that’s the whole point of this thread, isn’t it.
Positive side effect: I now understand Trainspotting without subtitles, which did it not before :)
Every place has its nuances. In Berlin if you walk on the sidewalk and 4 people are walking abreast toward you they will not make way for you. On whatever side you are walking the person closest to you will do a half turn and it’s expected you do the same.
I met a German in Turkey once who lived in a village for 20 years. He said he will always be an outsider there. Depending on where you go you may not ever feel part of the society.
ironically it inspired me to work harder to secure some wealth for myself and go into software (because to squander the opportunity would be an insult to all of the people i met that will live out the rest of their lives growing corn).
i'm a cofounder now and there's a lot of commonality in at least the grit/resilience necessary.
My mother is a German immigrant and my father was career military. He retired when I was three years old and bought a house where I lived until I married and moved out. I graduated high school with people I had gone to kindergarten with.
I was married to a soldier for a long time. In my twenties, one of our stints was in Germany. We were there more than 3.5 years.
I got to meet some of my German relatives and got to be exposed to my mother's culture. I had always felt I was missing something in that regard and it helped me feel whole.
I got paid better at the assignment than at home, learned a lot about how differently people think in other parts of the world; my two older kids started school there (in English) and gained excellent language skills. I'm very thankful for the opportunity.
Good: Cheaper cost of living, meeting people from all over the world, observing/learning the ways of people and cultural feedback loops.
Bad: always takes some adjusting to, esp language.
Hasn't really changed my perspective of various parts of life, even through the differences, people don't really behave imaginably different esp wrt most going along with the status quo of their local environments.
Valuable? We all have different functions for evaluation of such when it comes to anything in our lives.
My personal 2 cents is, think about your motivations. Don't do that just because of a calculation.
I'd say that doing it is more important than what your motivation is. Your motivation will last for a very short while once you are confronted with the reality of life abroad, you will need to be able to adapt and find your groove even absent whatever your motivation was or you'll be back in your home country before the week is out.
It defined my life in many ways, not least of which marrying a woman from Italy!
I can't recommend it enough - it gives you a much broader perspective on the world.
I think that living in many different countries does change you significantly. It makes you more aware of subtle cultural differences and also about human psychology at a fundamental level. I think it also probably made me a bit cynical overall. It gives you a general feeling of instability.
My wife has done the opposite and spent most of her 20s as a backpacker/work&travel. She wants to go travelling again but my job & financial situation just make it not possible to make the jump. Are there any other parents with long-term travel experience?
http://www.chicagotribune.com/lifestyles/ct-sun-0802-balanci...
First things first, I grew up in a large city that was torn by protests up until the late 90's, despite the collapse of the soviet union. Even though I was a kid in the 90's, I grew up with the idea that I'll emigrate. And So I did the moment I got the chance in the mid 2000's. I am not sure if things had changed at that time or I had but life was nothing like I would have expected. First off, coming from a poor country with no financial support is extremely difficult. Second, Eastern Europe is a pretty non-secular place so foreigners are not something you see every day. I wouldn't say the foreign kids(as few as they were) in school were bullied in any way or left out but they were almost always pushed a bit off to the side. Something I did not experience in Spain. Students, professors, random strangers on the street - everyone, no exception was very friendly and welcoming, helpful and friendly. I did my last year of school there and at the time my country was not in the EU and I was an illegal immigrant by all means. I was concerned about this when I enrolled and I asked the secretary of the school if that is a problem. Her reaction blew my mind: "We are not immigration services. We are an educational institution. What kind of animals do we have to be to say no to a kid that wants to study?". I truly had no idea what to say, I think I stood there for a good 5 minutes with my mouth wide open. For years I was trying to figure out where the catch was, but there really wasn't one. I studied software engineering and I did extremely well, graduating second in my class by a tiny fraction behind the guy that was first. When I started university I was 18 and I had been writing code since I was 10 so everything was very natural to me. Which in addition made me even more popular since I could help the others and I gladly did. I guess one of the most valuable experiences was that I used to live in the south of Spain, which besides giving me plenty of opportunity to make Spanish almost a native language to me, also made English a native language due to the large British diaspora. 2 years down the road the Spanish couldn't tell I wasn't Spanish and the English couldn't tell I wasn't English. So on that front alone it was all worth it. I suppose I was never a fan of hot weather but I could easily picture myself spending the rest of my life there. However a few life changing events happened(lost my best friend, along a very bitter experience I had with a girl over there), so I figured the best way to cope with it was to move back home and start over. Was it worth it? Totally!
There you go, hope in humanity restored.