In what way? I know very few israelis who have a social circle that includes local. Still americans in the equation, but from the other side. The social differences are so big it is extremely hard to reconcile
As a traveler, my experience with expats has been that the more remote, the easier it is to meet them. Which makes sense. If there are only 100 of you in some non-touristy foreign town, youāre going to have a common bond.
My other experience is that with some expats it becomes obvious pretty quick that thereās a reason they left home. Travelers that you meet off the beaten path tend to almost always be pretty cool. But expats off the beaten path can sometimes be really cool, and sometimes be socially maladjusted in some way that becomes obvious after a few beers.
And of course thereās the creepy middle-aged sex tourists. Or sex-pats in this case I guess. Avoid avoid avoid.
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I havenāt ever really experienced any anti-American sentiment, and Iāve been traveling outside the USA since 2011.
From what I understand, it was pretty heavy during the GWB era, but I think now the understanding is that if youāre living abroad long-term, you likely arenāt ultra-conservative. I was in France when Trump won, and basically noone blamed me, they were all like āwhatās wrong with your your country bro?ā and Iād just make a joke or say ānow you see why I leftā. Iām also usually leading the anti-American jokes and sometimes joke that Iām from Canada, so that obviously helps.
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Yeah I agree with this. Basically every Australian I ever met who lived in London as some weird rite of passage were absolutely insipid humans who built zero friendships with anyone over there that wasnāt one of the other thousands of Australians working as baristas in London.
Interesting, since the first day Iāve lived in Japan becoming part of the expat community is something Iāve never even given a momentās thought about.
I live in this country to experience this culture, speak this language, and interact with the people who are from here. Otherwise, why even bother living here?
Living this way, the fellow foreigners I have met incidentally and jelled with are those who tend to be like-minded, and thus enhance the overall experience.
For me this approach makes for a much richer experience than hanging exclusively on the fringe of society with the typically disgruntled (at least in Japan) expat community.
I realize that people have different reasons for living in a foreign country and this isnāt a practical mindset for everyone though.
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Like Fossil, Iāve experienced very little (if any) anti-American sentiment. If anything, it may have benefitted me in some ways.
If I remember correctly, youāre married to a Japanese person right? That means you have roots there which provides a very different perspective and different social group.
I know a few people who married Czech women and have a family here and itās the same. Theyāre just in a different group and have very different experiences than foreigners who donāt have that connection.
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Maybe not in Europe, but Asia definitely has a bunch of sex-pats who are into demure, non-Westernized women and keep track of whatās going on back in the US via FoxNews type stuff. They hate feminism, they hate socialism, they hate political correctness, and they hate locals who donāt understand what Americans expect.
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Depends. Got plenty of nationalists from countries within eastern Europe who live here and are pretty conservative. Not far-right exactly but definitely conservative and religious.
Not sure what this means.
A huge majority of the israelis i know who live in the US socialize almost exclusively with other israelis expats. (of course this changes completely for the 2nd generation)
Is this true for you?
Yes. We didnt know at first if weāre gonna apply for a green card to stay here (my wife would easily get one based on academic achievements). We are going back because we never really managed to find our place here socially (and in a way culturally, mostly for my wife).
I mean thats a very shallow description of the reasonings but not gonna go that deep into it
Thatās surprising, because it seems like you would fit right in.
If iāll take a small step deeper (allow me in advance to decide when to pull back as its pretty personal), i think a lot of it has to do with my own privilege and handling a change in social status. Explaining it requires a bit too much information about Israeli culture.
Latin America too.
Thatās true this time around, but for my first stint in Japan I flew solo, and still made a point of avoiding the expat crowd, as my goal was to learn the language and experience the culture. Had zero connections when I first got here and it was a struggle to make any in the beginning, but the persistence paid off in the end.
Man they do not make this shit easy. I decided to pursue Czech citizenship via my mother having been born there. In order to do obtain it, I need to get a bunch of papers certified in the U.S. and then apply a further certification, an apostille, before it can be sent to the Czech embassy. The ones in Arizona were no problem but all the ones I sent to NYC were rejected.
The most difficult one to obtain appears to be a ācertified true copyā of my motherās naturalization papers. According to the USCIS website she needs to sit for an interview to obtain this type of copy. They wouldnāt give me any information when I called so Iāve been bothering her to call and when she finally got through to a person, they told her she just had to fill out some form on the website, which Iām 95% sure is incorrect and would result in me being in the same situation I am now.
Edit: Some good news - my Mom will be in NYC and volunteered to go to the offices herself to get things taken care of. Itās usually a little difficult to ask her things and I thought this might be a big ask but she came up with the idea herself.
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Getting citizenship is a battle. I think the US government doesnāt want its citizens obtaining other citizenships because then they have less control over them. My Irish citizenship took close to two years to get and most of that was the US government stalling on providing the required paperwork, not the Irish government.
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In Asia, telling other white guys Iām from Portland early in the conversation often saved time when it came to getting a grasp of their values. Unfortunately the misogyny/objectification of women is the norm across political worldviews among white expats over there.
Living in Cambodia, most of the younger non-permanent expats were mostly pretty liberal types, but man a lot of the older permanent ones definitely had that anti-woke anti-political correctness bent and ate up all the culture war talking points that NBZ is talking about.
It is kinda nice how easy it is to stay long term in Cambodia, but youāre not always getting the cream of the crop