Rabu, 22 Februari 2012
First off, I apologize for this brief post today. I have been suffering from severe Internet constipation all day. My normally speedy dongles have let me down, offering up some of the strangest error messages. There is no time to be wasted, so let me get on with the subject to be discussed today.The twin Austral nations of Australia and New Zealand consistently be at the top of the lists of the best places to live, the friendliest places, and the greatest places on earth to be an expat!That is true, if you already are an expat there, because if not, migrating to either of these countries as a retiring and even well off individual is not easy at all. Both of these lovely nations have a sizeable trans-Tasman migratory population, ready to go east or west to take advantage of economic opportunities. We are talking about young, hard workers who are years away from retirement and able to offer their services to their chosen economy for years while raising families, paying taxes, and contributing to the greater good.When applying for residency while you are in your 60’s and self sustaining, you must have a better reason than “because I like it” when asked why they should grant you an immigrant visa. In fact, I really can’t think of any good reasons why baby boomers would get any type of preference, although it was their parents who fought the Japanese in WWII so that the youth of ANZ could forget all about history and enjoy their 2012 lifestyle. In my extensive travels in the region, I was never verbally or physically assaulted for being a “Yank,” (I am Swiss born and raised). I had nothing but great experiences down under and fairly recently had one of the adventures of my lifetime, crossing the Australian continent from the Pacific Ocean to the Indian Ocean by means of the Indian-Pacific train. Wherever I went, the people were as friendly as could be and treated me like best of friends after brief meetings.That said, one must face the facts that both nations have very substantial tax rates, border on socialism, are very big brotherly with their police forces, and have strict gun laws. And the cost of living in either nation is substantially higher than one would expect. But then on the other hand, New Zealand offers spectacular beauty, from its gorgeous northern beaches to the Southern Alps, with their stunning glaciers that, disturbingly, are melting at a record pace. Most unfortunately, my favorite city in this nation, Christchurch, has been inundated with a swarm of earthquakes, giving all the inhabitants the jitters. Every time they think that a sufficient time has passed between aftershocks, there comes a new batch. That is very unnerving indeed.Australia is considered to be the original leftover building block of the aboriginal earth, Pangaea and later Gondwanaland, and as such has settled down quite a bit, in spite of its proximity to the infamous ring of fire. The entire continent is surrounded by water, much of it in the form of lovely beaches, while the interior is virtually uninhabitable due to lack of water and excessive temperatures.The time for migrating to Australia was primarily in the 1950’s, when large numbers of citizens of the UK and Southern Europe moved to the promised land to do all the hard physical labor that was necessary to build a nation. That time is now mostly passed. They are still looking for miners and hard working physical laborers, but the country has grown up. If you think that because you are a whiz kid IT pro, think again. They have top level engineers, programmers and technicians because they did not have someone like Ronald Reagan and Howard Jarvis dismantle the world’s greatest educational system.There, I made it! Over 600 words, without a single crash. That sets a record for the day.In the other Austral part of the World.[image: beach near Esperance, south coast of Western Australia]I encourage you to write to me, jamie@expatdailynews.com with any questions or suggestions you may have, and if necessary, we can establish a voice communication via Skype. Disclaimer: I am not in any travel related business. My advice is based on my own experiences, and is free of charge. (Donations accepted). It is always my pleasure to act as a beneficial counselor to those who are seekers of the next adventure.Jamie Douglas is an Adventurer, Writer and Photographer with an amazing array of Nikon equipment, and a lifetime of experience traveling and documenting. To contact him for assignments, email: jamie.douglas [at] yahoo.comSee more expat articles by Jamie at
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Yes it really is a nation all of its own! Charming, historic, and in spite of its name, it is still considered a Western European nation with Eastern European traditions and customs dating back thousands of years. It is located at the uppermost reaches of the Adriatic Sea, bordering Italy, Croatia, Hungary, and Austria.This small republic is a member of the European Union as well as the Euro currency zone, which of course also makes it a member of the Schengen accord, which limits your stay to 90 days during any 180 day period, but residency is available, best obtained through an attorney knowledgeable in the language and the necessary bureaucratic hurdles you will have to jump through.
First off, a very happy and prosperous New Year to all! And let us not forget, a happy tenth birthday to the prematurely conceived €uro. For those of you who are still navigating the fiscal waters of last year’s calamities, save some energy, because you will need it now more than ever. Things are about to get interesting for expats all around the world, including those of us who have been watching the demise of the US economy, followed by the Europeans’ massive problems.The good thing of course is that with the troubles in Europe, the weakening of their common currency and general lack of faith, suddenly the US Dollar looks like an attractive venue for parking very large investment funds. The coming three months will bring an unprecedented hundreds of billions of €uro-denominated sovereign bonds come due to be refinanced. Spain’s new Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy already has publicly stated that his government’s target of a 6% budget deficit will be more like closer to 8% (in plain language that means 10%—12%). It is fully expected that Spain will re-enter the recession it never really left, and that extremely painful austerity measures will have to be put into place. "This is the beginning of the beginning," government spokeswoman Soraya Saenz de Santamaria said.
Oh the wonderful and carefree life of the retired expat, soaking up the sun, hanging around the pool, having sunset cocktails with your fellow expats at the clubhouse, and enjoying a lifestyle that you worked for and dreamt about for so many years. You finally made it! I am so glad for all of you who have achieved your dreams. We have to assume of course, that you are firmly established in your new and improved environment, your investments are safe, and you have a decent income from which you can withdraw anytime you want when you go to the National Bank of Parador. All those financial troubles going on in the world really do not affect you in the least, right?So Monday is the best day to go shopping in town, and off you go in your shiny SUV, shopping up a storm. On the car radio you hear some garbled foreign language news, where they kept mentioning the dollar, the airo, and the libra. Well since you are not that interested in archeology or astrology, you pushed in that Willie Nelson CD and ignored all that.After buying your weekly supplies of food and libations, you get to the checkout stand, and when your tally is finalized you hand the cashier your credit/debit card. She, in turn, flips that switch which calls the floor manager over. He inspects your card very carefully, and then drops the bomb on you: Sorry Mister, we can’t accept foreign credit cards anymore! You didn’t hear the news?Don’t bother being the obnoxious foreigner. It finally happened. The world’s banks are in utter chaos, and your card is now just a piece of plastic with which you can clean your teeth. Remember when, a few weeks ago, Greece, and then Italy, Spain, and Ireland had to leave the Euro currency? Well, it ended up affecting you after all, because after you left the supermarket empty handed, you thought that a quick visit to the National Bank of Parador, a few phone calls to Goldman Sachs in New York, and a few more calls to some of your good ol’ boy broker friends would straighten everything out. And it is about now when the gravity of the situation hits you: The people at Goldman Sachs have to follow the newly issued emergency decrees, which prohibit that transfer of U.S. dollars out of the country, and in any event, transactions over US$300 per person per week are not allowed. Your relatives cannot send you emergency cash via Western Union, the banking system as you knew it has gone into hibernation, taking with it your retirement cushion, and dam’it, you’ve run out of fuel for your gas hog on the way home. After a two hour walk, you finally get back to your home and try to call the embassy of the United States of America. After getting busy signals for hours and having blisters on your fingers from so much to speed dialing, you finally get through! ...It’s a recording: “Due to an unexpectedly high call volume, all operators are presently busy. Your expected wait time is 4 years!”There are millions of expats worldwide, not all of them U.S. citizens of course. But you may rest assured that the U.S. government will not have contingency plans to assist its citizens living abroad, who are paying taxes without having any representation. The folks at the embassy will politely tell you that if you are deceased, they will lend you the money to ship your remains home, but that is about all you can expect. U.S. diplomatic offices are generally not for individuals seeking assistance. They are there to help corporations do business in foreign countries and to spy on foreign leadership. Meanwhile, with the possibility of a financial disaster looming large, there is a country, also English speaking, that is putting into place comprehensive contingency plans to evacuate their million citizens from the Iberian Peninsula, should my aforementioned scenario unfold. And if I can come up with this, and the British Foreign office can come up with it, how screwed will you, as a U.S. expat be, when today’s Argentinean edicts about repatriating money go into effect? Your government is busy screwing you out of all they can! They don’t have time for silly citizen services. After all, you could have stayed home and gotten food stamps after your bank went belly up.Concerned Citizen of the WorldI encourage you to write to me, jamie@expatdailynews.com with any questions or suggestions you may have, and if necessary, we can establish a voice communication via Skype. Disclaimer: I am not in any travel related business. My advice is based on my own experiences, and is free of charge. (Donations accepted). It is always my pleasure to act as a beneficial counselor to those who are seekers of the next adventure.Jamie Douglas is an Adventurer, Writer and Photographer with an amazing array of Nikon equipment, and a lifetime of experience traveling and documenting. To contact him for assignments, email: jamie.douglas [at] yahoo.com
Loaded question: Where can expats go and enjoy life, make new friends, be accepted as regular people, and feel safe?If you are white, European, North American, Australian, or New Zealander, the answer is: Almost anywhere where you will be surrounded by people who appear like you and the only difference is the way you dress and your type of English accent.If on the other hand you may be a native from the above named regions, but you are not one of the “lucky chosen” ones with Lilly-white skin and light colored eyes, then a large part of the world will be a difficult place for you to settle. Take for instance the U.S., a country that gained its self proclaimed “best country in the world” status by first conquering a huge region of the North American continent, then systematically going to war with the aboriginal owners of said lands, wiping out whoever they wanted, and finally bringing in slave labor to help make it the greatest nation in the world.Assuming you arrive, or your family originated from the “other America,” the one that goes from the U.S.-Mexican border all the way to Tierra del Fuego, and you live in the USA, you are still treated, in many instances, as an expat in your own country. Just go to Joe Arpaio’s Maricopa County, and you will see what I mean when you get stopped for driving while looking Hispanic. I have spent substantial amounts of time living in various non-white parts of the world, mixing with the natives, learning about their language and customs and making many friends in the process. One of the least pleasant experiences I ever had was when I was cursed openly on the street in Mexico by what turned out to be a Chilean illegal immigrant to Mexico for being a “rich gringo” – kind of amusing when I think about it now, but that really was the only incident ever of its kind. So all color coding aside, which are the best places to be an expat? Many people swear it is New Zealand. I don’t! The Kiwis are friendly, but if you want to live in a 1950’s England, New Zealand may suit you. Throw in lots of police and other surveillance and you will feel right at home in NZ.Australia is a kind of Super America. Bigger houses, bigger utes, much bigger taxes, and everything that the U.S. did wrong is amplified by a significant factor. After the White Australia policy finally became an embarrassment and they started to allow widespread immigration from Asian nations, they opened up a whole new slang dictionary to describe the new non-white arrivals, particularly those that don’t have churches, but instead choose to worship in mosques.So we are looking at Europe now. There are several Eastern European nations, mostly former members of the Stalinist Soviet Bloc, that are affordable, offer a nice living standard, great medical care, fabulous food, culture, and people that look at North Americans not as George W. Bush’s contemporaries, but as individuals who are respectfully seeking to share a different way of life. Many in those countries remember all too well that the USA stood for freedom while they were behind the Iron Curtain, and it was this freedom that they finally gained when the Soviet Union went morally and fiscally bankrupt, having to cut all of their former minions loose and letting them choose freedom and democracy over oppression.When it comes to which are the friendliest nations for Anglophile expats, I highly recommend those countries that still remember all too well what it was like under their former dictatorial leaderships. You will have total strangers befriend you on streets, parks, and restaurants, wanting to practice their English on you, thereby also giving you an opportunity to improve your foreign language skills.As always, I want to remind all of my readers that before you make the Big Move, go check it out, travel around a bit, get to know the customs of the country you wish to adopt as a new home, and please, don’t rush headlong into buying property. Rent instead. If after you feel comfortable after a couple of years and you find something you really like, make sure you do your homework. Find about all the legal aspects of property ownership and titles to your prospective purchase. Hire a trustworthy lawyer to check it all out, and watch out for the sharks. They are always waiting to “help” a newbie.Where it is very warm, while it is snowing in the Czech Republic![image: Astronomical Clock in Prague, Czech Republic, via Wikipedia]I encourage you to write to me, jamie@expatdailynews.com with any questions or suggestions you may have, and if necessary, we can establish a voice communication via Skype. Disclaimer: I am not in any travel related business. My advice is based on my own experiences, and is free of charge. (Donations accepted). It is always my pleasure to act as a beneficial counselor to those who are seekers of the next adventure.Jamie Douglas is an Adventurer, Writer and Photographer with an amazing array of Nikon equipment, and a lifetime of experience traveling and documenting. To contact him for assignments, email: jamie.douglas [at] yahoo.comSee more expat articles by Jamie at
