VANAARLE

Expats forums are not whining.
Everyone who wants to move has an idea about how romantic it will be. However, when it comes to reality those same persons realize that there is some hard work involved in that move.
The romantic ideas the OP has. is one example.
Another example. An American, who wants to live in France, finds the realtors to be useless before he moves is the reality. Personally I feel he is expecting things to be like at home. That is the hard work part.
https://britishexpats.com/forum/fran...seless-947230/

Life is not reflected in the shows like House Hunters International.

Traveler_Nick

Oh yes they are. Or at least they often are.

Why can't Italians learn how to make pizza.

Why does the cheese taste worse than Kraft's

Why do I need to pass a drivers test when everybody else is the problem?

Why do I need a license to start a business?

The list could go on and on.

Besalu

Hi! I live in Girona and I'm passionate about the Balkan area. Macedonia (North Macedonia/FYROM), Bulgaria (most of the people who travel to Bulgaria just visit Sofia and Rila), Serbia and northern mainland Greece are beautiful countries without much international tourism. I prefer to visit countries where you can observe the authentic life of that place. I don't need everything to be precious and artificial. And perhaps this is why I love visiting the Balkans. The cultural heritage is very rich (with surprising remains from the Roman period), the prices are very affordable and allow you to enjoy day to day and there is a great diversity of landscapes. If you go to Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, etc. everything is beautiful but it hurts every time you want to have a beer or similar. Instead, in these countries you can live like a local and visit as much as you want. The only problem may be the alphabet but I love learning new languages.

bvlenci

I didn't resent having to take a drivers test, but I was kind of resentful about having to take all the classes along with the 17-year-olds before I could take the test. But I didn't whine, I just took the class. I was kind of proud that I was the first in a large group to complete the written test, with only one mistake.

The written test is now much more difficult than it was 20 years ago. The wording of the questions is convoluted and some very unusual words and sentence constructions are used. I spent some time helping an immigrant to prepare. He failed it the first time, and ended up having to practically memorize the questions and answers in the (long) test booklet.

​​​​​​​I know of other immigrants who speak Italian reasonably well and have failed the test three or more times. I imagine that lots of Italian kids are having trouble too.

Jean

U.S. citizens from some states might be surprised (and probably disappointed) to learn they have to take the written drivers test in Italian. A large majority of states (40-45) offer their test in several languages.

ekscrunchy

I'm liking this thread, but notice that the OP has not returned!!

I did get engrossed on some of those expat sites with the whining....amusing, for me to read, but kind of pathetic.
I have to read that Sarge thread...give me another excuse to put off writing some kind of trip report.

Is it my imagination or are there less regular posters here than a few years ago? And fewer trip reports? Did some of the helpful regulars leave us for health reasons? Or is this a result of COVID? There just does not seem to be as much life on this forum as there was when I was more active myself way back when...

HappyTrvlr

I agree ekscrunchy that this forum is less active than we first joined it. But the posters here now are also helpful. I hope you find the perfect homes for your longer stays.

shelemm

In every country in Europe there are beautiful, glorious places not overrun by tourists. I am most familiar with France, and I can tell you that Auvergne is a both a worthy travel region as well as an affordable place to live. If I had to say which area is the most affordable in terms of housing, it might be the bourbonnais, centered around Saint Pourcain sur Sioule.

janisj

Actually I think the forum is a little busier than it was in the before times. It got really dead (to be expected) in '20, '21, early '22 but it has definitely picked up. Even before covid there were seldom more than 20 active threads on any one day (new threads or threads with with new posts). But now there are usually 25+. Right now as I type this there are 36 threads with posts dated March 25. And most of those have multiple posts/extensive discussion. First thing I do most mornings after reading my e-mail and a quick breakfast, is take a peek at the Europe board - and most mornings I'm having to go to page 2 to see all the new posts since maybe 10:30 PM the night before.

cafegoddess

I think sarge56 had to come back for family reason. I hope she is doing great.

geetika

Like janisj says I also feel the Europe forum is a little more active nowadays than it was earlier, though some of the regulars from pre Covid aren’t to be seen. The France forum is less active, with a huge increase in Portugal, while Italy remains ever popular. IMO

crellston

I think many of the regulars have migrated to the Fauxdors Facebook group which is very active. The Europe forum seems the busiest of of all the fora. Asia is pretty dead and the South America forum is on life support. A shame, but nothing ever stays the same!

bvlenci

Ekscrunchy, I just remembered that I never replied to your question about people who have emigrated to Italy but later returned home.

My statements were made based on personal experience, not on anything I read. When I arrived in Italy, I enrolled in a adult-school Italian course geared to immigrants. In the class there were a Russian woman and a Peruvian who had married Italians. (That was my situation also.) All three of us are still here. Then there were five German couples and a single German woman. All except one couple have returned to Germany. One couple couldn't take the hard work and low profits of maintaining a vineyard. One couple returned because they weren't satisfied with the medical care here. One returned for family reasons. The wife in the fourth couple died; the last time I saw him he was dating an Italian woman. I haven't seen him in over five years, so I assume he returned to Germany, but I'm not sure. I don't know what happened to the German woman.

The couple who is still here understood very well how to integrate into the local community. They took other adult school classes, including one about Italian art and culture, and went on all our art appreciation trips. They got involved in other local activities. The wife became almost fluent in Italian, although the husband struggles with the language.

All five of the couples had language problems, because they spoke German at home and didn't have regular employment here. You can take all the language courses you can find, but if you speak a different language at home and aren't forced to speak your new language with co-workers, it will be very difficult to learn the language at a conversational level. Of eleven people, one achieved a decent level of fluency.

I had studied Italian for two years before marrying my husband, in an intensive course (which I audited) at Princeton University. Still when I got here, I struggled for at least a year. It helped tremendously that my husband spoke very little English, because it was the words of everyday life that I didn't know, like toilet paper and dustpan. (I also had an Italian housekeeper, who mostly spoke the local dialect, so I often mistakenly used dialect words in formal conversation.) The adult school course didn't help much, except for making friends.

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cs_adri

Unfortunately, without tourists I can't find a place. Europe is full wherever we travel. Even we ourselves, as Europeans, cannot travel in peace because everything is full all year round.
Otherwise, the places are in Italy, Austria or Slovenia, according to your criteria, although with many tourists. Or the French Riviera. But they are not cheap either.

Travel_To_Eat

This is something I have thought about even though I am a couple decades from doing it and may not even end up doing. My brother moved to France for a couple years and he did not like it (in his 20s). Spain and Portugal seem to be the most popular, from my online search, as they are affordable, have great weather and good infostructure.

bilboburgler

I continue to find lovely parts of Europe with no one in them, in the last two weeks I've been in north Wales staying in an empty valley for some nights and saw virtually no one followed by a trip to Geneva and to Morzine. The snow slopes (yes the snow was fantastic) were empty and apart from the area around the snack bar (one other couple at 2 pm) the pistes had 5 other people on them one day and we felt a bit crowded.

swandav2000

I live in a small town that's big with tourists -- Garmisch Partenkirchen in Germany. In the winter, the roads are almost impassible in the morning and afternoons, with out-of-town cars heading to & from the slopes, and the pedestrian center is full of folks on crutches .... In the summer, the road to the Eibsee is similarly impassable on the weekends, and the pedestrian zone is jammed with happy folks snapping pictures and eating ice cream and window shopping.

But just about 28 km away is the wonderful, sweet little town of Murnau, which few English-speaking tourists find. Or the town of Starnberg, 78 km from me towards Munich. Both of these have marvelous small museums dedicated to local artists, both of them sit on Alpine lakes, and they have a wonderful pedestrian zone and lots of business and life going on in town. There are tourists, but you likely won't be able to tell them apart from the locals. These towns will give you the same Bavarian life and lifestyle that Garmisch does (traditions, scenery, hiking, biking, local festivals, restaurants, shops) except that perhaps the ski slopes will be farther away.

My point is that, even in heavily touristed areas, you can find places that are overlooked as the hordes rush by. You can find them, but perhaps you need to be there for 3 or 4 months to find them. But that's easily doable. I would just find "your" spot that you love, ignore the tourists, get a residence visa, then look for those hidden gems and buy a place there.

Oh, also, I do belong to a few expat Facebook pages, and I don't see a lot of whining there. Mostly I see recipes to duplicate stuff -- Thousand-Island dressing, eggnog, etc. Or posts for help with German bureaucracy. Or help finding a specific item that is close to an American item.

I've lived here since 2008, not going anywhere.

s

ekscrunchy

Travel-to-Eat: Can you share a little about your brother's experience? Where did he move in France, how long did he stay, and what were the reasons for his return? Did he have permission for residency and for employment, or was he relaxing during his stay? I am really curious about these stories. (I am not thinking of moving anywhere, but hopefully will continue to travel and to remain in Spain or Italy for a 2/3 months or so in the US winter months: I am now trying to formulate my plan for early 2024...have part of the visit almost settled but am looking for a second or third destination to combine with Andalucia; I plan to begin a new thread on that here when I have some extra time)

I would really like to hear about your brother's experience and why it did not work as planned. And hope others might chime in..have you tried to relocate and ended up returning home, and for what reason?

crellston

EKScrunchy, Where in Andalusia do you have planned?

We spent a year housesitting in a small town 30km from Malaga a few years ago. Really enjoyed our time there even though we had no intention of settling there. We viewed it just an opportunity to develop our Spanish language skills to continue our travels in South America. It turned out to be a great location for exploring that region of Spain and sometimes bit further. The highways are great as are the trains so getting around is pretty easy. To have a base for even for a month makes a world of difference to the way you experience a place.

There was a small expat community there , mostly Germans, Dutch and a few English but apart from a language exchange programme once a week we avoided mixing in those circles instead tried to get to know the local people. as it happened that wasn't as easy as expected and our closest friends there were Argentinian and Romanian and we are still in contact with them now although , like us they have returned to there home countries.

We did look at settling in South America and spent extended periods renting places whilst looking for business opportunities and places to live in Argentina and Peru. Economic and political instability got in the way but I guess you can always find an excuse not to do something.

kimbedly

There are many places in Europe that offer good weather, friendly people, great food, good internet, affordable cost of living, and interesting history to explore. Here are a few options to consider:

1. Portugal - With its warm climate, beautiful beaches, friendly locals, and rich history, Portugal is a great option for those seeking a laid-back lifestyle. Portugal has also been ranked as one of the safest countries in the world.
   
2. Croatia - Known for its stunning coastline and charming old towns, Croatia is a hidden gem in Europe. The country offers a mild Mediterranean climate, delicious cuisine, and a rich cultural heritage.
   
3. Spain - Spain is a popular destination for tourists, but there are still many lesser-known regions that offer a more authentic experience. Areas such as Galicia, Asturias, and Andalucía are known for their beautiful landscapes, rich history, and delicious food.