by Stephanie Olsen

If you reject the food, ignore the customs, fear the religion and avoid the people, you might better stay home.
- James Michener

When you meet someone new, one of the first questions usually asked in polite conversation is: “What do you do?” For expatriates, the top query is: “So, where’re you from?” Long-term expats cover both fields with nutshell histories at the ready, like Mark Keys at Tube TV in Florida, who takes a deep breath, then rattles off:

I grew up in Toronto and went to college there, although I’m Dutch, born in Amsterdam. Worked at Much Music for ten years as a TV director; left in ‘94; moved to LA and became executive producer for Asia’s first all-Mandarin music video channel. Then moved to Singapore: worked in Hong Kong, Singapore, Taipei, Shanghai, and India.

Once I became an executive producer for Sony Pictures Columbia Tri-Star international television, I basically did the same territories except I also moved to Madrid for a year.

In 2000 I relocated to Miami beach and launched a new music channel called “The Tube” and it looks like in the next few months I may be moving to Prague to launch yet another network.

And there you have the Reader’s Digest version!

Before the expatriate fully recovers respiratory functions, the second most popular inquiry follows: “What’s it like–living there? Do you like it?”

Writer Deanna Wolff, originally from the Beaches area of Toronto and author of “The Girl’s Guide to Traveling Solo” (http://www.deannawolff.com) says she’s living her dream on the shores of the Mediterranean. “I’m single and made the move to Italy on my own—quite scary! But…I gave up the fast lane for slow island living…in a village with 500 inhabitants—where the sheep outnumber the people 3:1 and where hardly anyone speaks any English…and I love it! I have absolutely no regrets (except for the exchange rate). It’s paradise.”

Of course, she continues, there are some things she could do without: including “…the store hours (they close daily anywhere between 1:00 and 4:30 and on Sundays at 1:00); the 17 days it takes to get a common part for my car; tractors and the 3-wheeled Apes on the SINGLE-LANE autostrada [expressway]…”

Edmontonian Stephan Drapaka, who lived in Poland for nearly two years, advises anyone thinking of going there: “…you have seriously chosen THE BEST FREEKING COUNTRY IN EUROPE TO GO TO!”

Spelling aside, Stephan acknowledges serious culture shock “can be tough at times”, and his included seeing “…graffiti everywhere and the total lack of customer service in restaurants.” On top of the difficulty of grasping the consonant-rich language, Stephan had other pet gripes:

I hate those napkins….some guy in a communist-run napkin factory sold all the good napkin materials on the black market, so all the napkins in Poland are like saranwrap…

It’s also true that [the cities] can be dark and gloomy, and that the buildings look as though they are falling apart…

On the other hand, his positive Krakow experiences have “seriously motivated [him] to travel…to learn new languages and to make new friends abroad.” Maybe Marburg, Germany, where he lived for six months “was spotless….but the Germans there were not half as friendly as the Poles.” And about those napkins? “They make up for it by arranging them in lovely flower patterns in all the Chinese restaurants and milk bars [cafeterias] around town.”

For some, the transition to life abroad comes at a higher price than others, and there are those—like Karyn, a Canadian in Germany—who admit: “I desperately miss home, and I think that I’m more suited to travel than to expat life.”
Karyn does offer insight, though, on how to ease the impact of living in a foreign country: “…my strongest advice for those moving to another country where English is not the national language is simple….make the effort to learn the new language! This seems obvious, but you would be surprised at how many people do not try. Some of them seem to manage well enough, but I guarantee that the living and working experience improves exponentially when you can communicate at least a little bit in the new language.”

From her idyllic Sardinian beach, Deanna Wolff concurs, adding:

Find out as much as you can about the place you are moving to (especially if it’s not the U.S.). Surf the net and find websites where other expats have written about their move to wherever. Buy books on your destination; join Yahoo groups for expats; get on blogs for expats. Most expats are happy to help others in any way they can, including what to expect, costs, where to go, what to avoid, etc. And in times of homesickness, they will commiserate.

Finally, she says something almost every long-term successful expatriate would agree with: “Have a sense of humour. You won’t survive without it! Culture shock is, well…shocking!”

Categories: Les Histoires Expat
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