British expat names the one thing he cannot understand about the Dutch – ‘clearly crazy’
Boris Johnson 'needs to step up for British expats' says expert
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Relocating to another country can be a life changing choice, but for one British expat, it happened by accident. Still living at his parents’ and looking for a job after college, Stuart “came across a rather cryptic job advertisement” which changed his life.
Landing a job in another country is a dream for many, but Stuart, from London, wasn’t planning on leaving the UK.
He applied for a job and was offered a position in the Netherlands.
The move was far from smooth, with Stuart planning on being an expat only for a short amount of time.
He said: “When I first arrived I had no idea what I was doing.
“I managed to give myself food poisoning in the first week for example.
“There were times when I thought I wanted to give up and go home.
“I’d even say I got to the point where I hated living in the country for a while.
“I was frustrated. I could not speak the language, everything was weird and at times I had no clue what was going on.”
It got better for the British expat. He has lived in the country for years now and started a family with a local.
After breaking his ankle and having to deal with a new country “while hobbling around on one foot and a pair of crutches”, he figured out he “could damn well deal with it normally”.
He explained: “I started to change my opinion and the way I dealt with things and realised that much of the frustration was of my own creation.
“I love living in Holland now. Moving to this country is the best decision I never made.”
While Stuart now loved his life in Holland, he still could not get his head around one “crazy” thing the Dutch love.
He said one of the negatives of being an expat in the Netherlands were “Dutch circle parties”.
He continued: “Anyone who thinks a ‘party’ is off the hook when it involves sitting in a circle, drinking tea and eating cake with the grandparents in attendance is clearly crazy.”
The Dutch circle party’s name is no euphemism and people really just eat cake and drink tea in a circle.
Expats may find the social event strange, but it is part of life in the Netherlands.
Stuart found more things to love about his new life than to hate.
He said: “I like being able to cycle around the city.
“You would never be able to do that in London without ending up under a truck.
“Before I moved to the Netherlands I had not been on a bike since I was 13.
“Now it is a part of my everyday life.”
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