6 Things They Don’t Tell You About Moving Abroad

If you’re thinking about moving abroad, you probably know to expect some ups and downs and you know that it won’t all be fun and games. However, there are also some unexpected things that will almost certainly happen to you when you move abroad, particularly if it’s for at least a year or longer. This is my second time living abroad, and here are a few things that I’d say are pretty universal.

1. You will learn to understand your own culture. There’s no better way to gain understanding of your own culture than to see another one. No matter where you come from, some things will always be better back home. They may be small things like the way the locks work, or they may be big things like social security. And some things will be worse. You will find yourself having to explain why you do or see things differently from those around you. As a result, you will notice your own cultural background in a way you never have before, in good and bad.
2. You will get used to things you never thought you would. Learning to appreciate other cultures may seem like a given, but appreciating them is one thing and getting so used to the differences that you stop noticing them is another. This will become blatantly obvious when you get visitors from home and you listen to them marvel at things you’d forgotten also surprised you when you first arrived. And eventually, when someone asks you for stories about what’s different compared to your home country, you find yourself struggling to come up with more than a couple of standard examples.
3. You will lose some friends. “Out of sight, out of mind” is a cliché because it’s true. By far the saddest part about moving abroad is that you’ll learn just how circumstantial friendships are. While you’re gone, people back home continue their lives without you, and dynamics will change. You can expect fewer than half of the people you call friends to actually stay in touch. Sometimes you’re just as much as to blame as they are, because communication is a two-way street. And sometimes people just disappoint you.
   There will be weddings, graduations, and other major events you won’t get invitations to, even if you were originally told you would. You may not get invited to certain things even when you’re in town, because your friends set up a new chat group after you left so as not to “bother” you, and they simply forgot you’re not in it. Sometimes you may notice that the people you were only seeing every few months before you left may actually be more likely to keep in touch than some of the people you were hanging out with every week. And the longer you stay away, the fewer reasons you will have to return. But the good news is that the ones who do stay in touch will probably stick around for a long time to come.
4. You will get unexpected visitors. Most of the people who eagerly talk about visiting when you’re about to move will never lift a finger to even check flight fares. Even if you’re on the same continent, people will always have their excuses. The further away you move, the less likely any of these visits are to actually take place.
   However, you can expect to suddenly hear from people you haven’t talked to in years because they’ll soon be in your neck of the woods and they’re hoping to get either a local guide or a place to stay for free. While this may seem awkward, hospitality usually pays off. You may be able to reclaim the favour later on, and who knows, maybe you’ll even rekindle your friendship. Or then you just spend a few hours making chit-chat and remember why you fell out of touch in the first place. But you never know.
5. The way you process language changes. Improving your language skills may seem obvious, but what they don’t tell you is that as a side effect, your brain turns into a chaotic mess, and you will reach a point where you feel like you can’t speak any languages at all. You now forget simple words in two languages and mix up grammar, idioms, and vocabulary from both. If you’re lucky enough to speak more than two languages, even the ones you don’t use on a daily basis will try to get into this mix. And once you move past this phase, your native language will start to slowly deteriorate, even if you use it regularly. Now, this point, of course, doesn’t apply if you’re one of those people who move to a country where the official language is your native language. But we won’t get into that now.
6. Family holidays lose all meaning. When you live abroad, you often don’t get the chance to go home and visit your family for every holiday that comes around. If you’re far away, this will happen more often than if you’re close to your home country, but even then you might not get the time off from work, or you don’t have the money, or the holiday you’re missing out on isn’t celebrated in the country of your residence. Often the best method of survival is to ignore the holiday, because even your local friends will be off with their families leaving you to fend for yourself. And thus when you don’t have family nearby to practice traditions with, Christmas, Easter, and all others become nothing more than additional days off work.

This list could go on a lot longer, so if you have anything to add, feel free to comment.