There’s something about certain expats that seems to push the wrong button at times. I’m registered with a few of these expat websites and every now and then I’ll pay them a visit and click links of other expats living either in London or Amsterdam [or elsewhere]. Just out of curiosity and in search of a bit of entertainment. This is how I met a few really nice people online who can be found in my expat list below. I started reading their blogs because there was something nice to read, a positive, friendly and non-quitter attitude.
Of course expats have a right to complain about certain things in their host country but when a person is only slagging off each and every single aspect of the host country then it causes question marks in my head. Especially if it is about the Lowlands or about the UK. I’m not patriotic, I left the Lowlands for a reason but I wouldn’t say it was that bad as some would want us to believe, same here in the UK. I feel that if you decide to move, you should adjust to the host country and try your utter best to integrate.
I read several blogs and was surprised to see how some are capable of posting one nasty complaint after another about the host country and praising their home country like it’s paradise on earth. Time for a wake-up call perhaps? I’m tempted to leave a comment asking why they don’t go back ‘home’ if they hate it that much, but I contain myself *most of the time*. Over the weekend I ended up on this website of an American family who’d moved to London, I read a post about Halloween written by the mother.
What struck me was that she was slagging off the fact that people in the UK/London, don’t celebrate Halloween, they were called mean because they had signs on their door letting people know that they won’t answer it. Question that pops up: what’s wrong with honesty…? It was then implied that Halloween was typical American; the Brits could learn a thing or two. Now this is where I start to feel the button being pushed… It was the tone in that post accompanied by a picture of the sign mentioned above.
It’s the arrogance: not everything in this world is American or about America you see… If she would’ve known the facts she should’ve said it was originally an Irish celebration, which is older than the history of the USA. *Ughh* I can’t really blame her though, Europeans tend to leave the kind of heritage information out that goes back more than two generations, that’s because we have a history that extends way beyond 1776 and we most certainly don’t feel the need to keep reminding everyone with each possible occasion.
There also seems to be an extreme gap between those expats who only need to follow hubby’s well-paid career path and entertain themselves [see example above] and those who made an independent decision to make the move, which clearly shows a divergence in attitudes and people, but perhaps that’s a different post altogether.