Getting the Hell Out of Dodge? Don't Land in Hell by Bringing it With You
You're Too Old to Spend the Rest of Your Life on the Couch: Let's Adventure!
An intrepid does more investigation on a big move, and whether it makes sense, with stories along the way
Dear Reader: This is my second trip this year to Ecuador, where I am taking a potential move very seriously. I’ll be writing multiple articles about what I’ve learned and the stories I hear, all of which are intended to assist anyone who is considering moving to another country, including Ecuador. This is NOT to be considered comprehensive advice, I will provide periodic links. Above all, do your due diligence.
I missed the flight. After taking two full days in Quito to relax, to rest, to shed my America gogogogogogo, I still got to the airport two hours late. I know how to read military time, or thought I did. Failed that test. Get a sense of humor, all right?
That cost me $85 to re-book, another taxi ride back to the same hostel. I still had the key (that worked out!) and I went right back to the same room. No drama. This happens when you’re tired, even when you think you’re not.
You can scream and yell and complain all you like. Doesn’t change the lost flight, nor does it change your re-booking fee. It was my mistake.
Everyone was extremely nice about it, I got a full night’s sleep and was welcomed with open arms by my proprietor at Casatodosantos, a house that is nearly impossible to find, but an oasis when you get there.
“There” is Cuenca, an American immigrant heaven, to read all the stories. It’s so cheap, the real estate is ridiculously inexpensive, you can get groceries for relatively nothing, you can live like a king for pennies a day…..
Blah. Blah, BLAH.
Not that some of that isn’t true. Much of it is, although the immigrants are already griping that “their” Ecuador is changing because of “them.” The Them would be more immigrants who are heading down to Cuenca and ruining it for everybody who got there first.
First? Really?
It’s the same story all over the world.
Witness the Venezuelans who were able to move to America under a specialized visa. They had money and status and thought they had special rights.
But I digress. You get it. We bring our hell, no matter where we move, if we bring our hate, racism, ignorance, superiority, and all the rest. It doesn’t travel well.
Let’s talk, shall we? I’ve lived for four years in another country as an immigrant and traveled to some 47, so not without a touch of experience, some thoughts.
First, if you move to another country, you are an immigrant, not an expat.
That’s how others see you, just as Americans brand all those folks who moved to America “immigrants.” You are a guest, even if you’ve lived there forever. Even if you get a permanent visa. You and I will never be a local.
If you come from a rich country, your arrival creates change, not always for the good. Prices skyrocket, real estate gets grabbed for rich Westerners, people can’t afford to live in their ancestral towns.
Precisely the same complaints everyone has in America about Those People who move from the big cities to their perfect sleepy little town for a better life.
Those who move who have more resources bring vast changes, and much of that change hurts the local folks.
Especially overseas, if those immigrants insist on Westernizing where they have moved because they want the comforts they left back home.
I’ve watched the Facebook pages where immigrants complain about the lack of infrastructure. It’s a developing country, so a big rainstorm is going to take out roads for days. Power goes out.
Shit happens, that’s why it’s cheaper to live there. You are going to be inconvenienced.
When rich Westerners demand more of the comforts of home, “cheap” goes away.
Prices rise, infrastructure improves, a developing country is no longer Third World and costs a lot more because…you and I have to pay for all that development. So do the locals, who simply don’t have the funds to pay for all those upgrades.
As a serious traveler I have watched this happen in every village, town, city and beautiful spot I’ve ever visited or lived. The refrain is the same.
Kindly consider, if you are genuinely interested in moving to Ecuador or Panama or Costa Rica (which is now a lost cause for a lower cost of living) or any other developing country, what you need to leave behind, and what you might want to bring with you.
Nobody told me it would be like this
The hell I referred to in the title is what so many people bring with them. Superiority complexes, that the local brown folks are ignorant or inferior, that everything in America is better (then kindly GO BACK HOME).
It rains too much, it’s too cold all the time, the power goes out….
A part of me, a very very very small part of me, has a little pity.About the size of Jeff Tiedrich ’s pity party violin. But not much.
People who didn’t bother to do research about the weather, the rainy season, the regular showers?
The fact that folks speak Spanish down here, and as an immigrant, it might behoove you to learn at least the most basic courtesies?
People who are annoyed that there’s no postal system, and that no you can’t find work in a country where the minimum wage makes our own minimum wage look like a king’s ransom? And you were expecting American wages, no less?
Ah, me.
Most if not all of this information is easily found online. Even better, you can get onto the Facebook forums for cities, towns and villages all over the world and hear what immigrants are saying, ask for advice, get referrals to local resources and so much more.
And you can see who’s bitching all the time. Who’s leaving and why.
I gather stories, because stories teach me what to do and what not to do. One friend told me about an elderly couple who had moved to an isolated spot outside a large Ecuadorian town. About an hour out, on a good day.
They had no car. One of them is quite generous. The other, well, cranky at best. So when the local Indigenous folks visited the home carrying local food as a welcoming gift, the cranky one waved them away at the door.
Breathtakingly rude, especially since the locals are so very poor. Such an offering is a monumentally generous gesture.
When this couple needs help, and they will, they will not get it. When things break or someone breaks in, nobody will care. If their home is targeted by thieves, oh well.
That’s one way we create hell when we thought we were moving to paradise: dishonor the local culture.
I find it fascinating that many of the same Americans who have complained bitterly about immigrants in America who haven’t mastered English or who live in immigrant bubbles end up living in English-speaking immigrant bubbles and barely bother to master the language.
My horse-riding friend Kim, who moved here from Florida a number of years ago, helped rebuild the roof on a bus stop. There, locals, including many pregnant women, had been standing in the rain. It took three days and the volunteered time of the local retired veterans to create that roof.
Everyone noticed. These gringos expected nothing, and everyone from the bus drivers to the riders watched the work. That’s how you make yourself welcome.
If there’s a ditch that is dangerous to people, Kim will locate her shovel and fill it whether it’s on her property or not. People notice. There’s a gringo doing something for the community.
Those actions build trust, and they also help dispel the deeply unfortunate impressions of arrogant, self-important gringos who openly criticize the locals and create communal anger against the entire gringo community.
This is true all over the world, whether you’re in Nairobi or Cairo or Lisbon. What you and I do as Americans reflects on all Americans, especially today.
These things matter.
If you moved to Paradise only to find hell on earth, I would invite you to explore whether or not you brought it with you. We usually do.
This is a huge, life-altering move, especially in your late years. At 72 this is a massive undertaking, and I am taking it seriously. If you’re thinking about it, please do the same.
Show up in country, live here for a few weeks like a local, find the stumbling blocks and work through the Gordian knots which are inevitable. I make constant mistakes, learn a lot each time, and am far better-equipped for an eventual move, if that indeed happens.
Wherever we go, there we are, some wag once said. Nowhere is that more true than when we move to another town, village, state, country. We bring hell with us, if we’re not careful, whether it’s to a pretty mountain town in North Carolina or a coastal town in Costa Rica.
Let’s bring gratitude that we even can make such a move.
Let’s play.
With constant thanks to those who read and support my work. I hope I keep adding value to your world. Please consider
One of our former neighbors, a gentleman much older than we were at the time, did a lot of traveling with his wife. "That sounds like so much fun!" we'd say when he was describing their next planned adventure. His response, always, was, "You take your fun with you." Looks like you take your hell with you too. It literally makes my stomach hurt to read about that woman who refused her new neighbors' gift of food.
Ah, Julia. I just love you so much. Even in a country that is strongly westernized (Israel), there are still too often those who come from a variety of Anglo countries expecting to "teach those Israelis" something of their culture, which is, of course, far superior to that which the people who were born and raised here espouse. Ah, the arrogance. Ah, the ignorance. When (or if) those people finally understand that they're visitors in the country - no matter which country - and conduct themselves with respectful humility, only then will they be embraced and included. Those arrogant ass&oles who think they know and have everything better in hand will eventually find themselves lost and alone.