Who You Are Now is Who You'll Be in 10 Years

I also did something similar - moving to Vienna, Austria a bit more than four years ago (at the age of twenty-one).

In the first four-five months I just took German courses (I started learning it at home but not very intensely).

After that I started looking for a job, which wasn't too hard (programmers can find a job in any city above a certain minimum level of size and wealth). I simply did the same thing I'd do anywhere - searched in internet job boards and quickly enough I found one.

I'm currently in my fourth job here (yeah I know, four jobs in a bit more than four years is quite a lot) and it never took me very long to find a new job after I quit the first one.

I think that if you really want to do it and don't have anything holding you back (like a family that depends on you) you should just give it a try. The worst thing that can happen is that you'll be miserable and come back home after a couple of months.

The only thing you really need to do beforehand is to save enough money so that you aren't stressed out about finding a job right off the bat. I can move somewhere else right now, and other than in prohibitively expensive places like Manhattan or London, I can live for a year before my savings run out. And I don't really earn that much.

I've done it three times over the last ten years actually. In two cases I just left, got on the ground and started looking for work. I had a few contacts but no prospects or offers. You just need some cash to tide you over for a month or two, rent some cheap accomodation and work the phones and email all day until you get something. If you're in another country and burning through your cash, you'll find work, and once you've got the job, you can upgrade your accomodation, make some friends, and you're set.

In the other case I organised the job before I left, but that was dotcom days so jobs were plentiful.

I somehow doubt it will stay at three times for me. Once you've experience the total life reboot that doing such a thing gives you, every time you start feeling like you're in a rut, then you start looking at flight details. I met a guy in his 50's who was working overseas, with his three kids and wife in tow. They were all having a ball. Family does not have to equal ball and chain if you have the right attitude.

The thing is : nothings permanent. Buy a return ticket. If it doesn't work, come back home and go 'oh well, was worth a try'.

As I've said to a few people over the years : what's the thing you want to talk to your grandkids about? The quality of furniture you had in your house? The shiny depreciating car you bought? Or that time you flew out to country X and found a job with company Y, and traveled around seeing Z.