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Ask HN: What is your story of immigrating to another country?

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Re: Ask HN: What is your story of immigrating to another country?

#161

Post by meheleventyone »

CodeGlitch wrote: post #160
meheleventyone wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As noted Iceland is part of the EEA and so follows almost all of the same rules as countries in the EU including freedom of movement. When Brexit happened it was pretty up in the air what that meant for my permanent residency but the UK and Iceland signed an agreement before the UK left. Right now my wife and children can freely travel in the EU and I can’t or won’t be able to shortly. So getting citizenship here in…

I see yes it makes sense for Iceland with such a low population to still be part of the EEA. Hope it works out for you.

I live in hope that at some stage the UK rejoins as well.

Re: Ask HN: What is your story of immigrating to another country?

#162

Post by olalonde »

lapaz17 wrote: post #152
olalonde wrote: post #39

I'm from Canada and have been a full time expat since I'm 19 (32 now). I've lived in Hong Kong, China, USA, Dominican Republic and now Turkey. I never really planned anything, I just visited places and eventually decided to stay longer than expected. I'm lucky that I can work from home and made some lucky investments. For me, the most difficult is dealing with bureaucracy like getting visas and bank accounts. Another…

Hi olalonde, how did you land in Turkey?

I initially went to a friend's wedding and now I am staying longer to help start a business. I love Turkey so far :)

Re: Ask HN: What is your story of immigrating to another country?

#163

Post by FooBarBizBazz »

legolas2412 wrote: post #60
ardit33 wrote: post #11

I am from Albania, I came in the US as an exchange student for my last year of high school where I lived with an american family in Virginia (they were awesome). I got a full scholarship for college at Radford, VA, and stayed here. Then I had to deal with the whole visa saga, form J1 to F1, to F1 OPT, to H1B to finally a Greencard (after 17 years in the US). The whole journey to get the Green Card was not easy at all…

> I feel this country makes it a bit too hard for legal residents to come with work visa, meanwhile I know people that got it much faster via 'fictive' marriages So true. I have been on a student visa for 8 years, and hence I am a non immigrant. I have the luxury of getting a working visa by a random lottery, with no regards to my skills as a PhD. And when I have that, I have the luxury of entering the 100 year long…

Immigration should be on a reciprocal basis. Americans should give Indians the right to live, work, and own property in the United States, in exchange for India giving Americans the right to live, work, and own property in India, both on an unrestricted basis.

Re: Ask HN: What is your story of immigrating to another country?

#164

Post by erdo »

BrandiATMuhkuh wrote: post #153
erdo wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is referred to as the Surinder Singh principle, here's more about it: https://www.freemovement.org.uk/surinder-singh-immigration-r...

Thank you. Good to know. For me most interesting about this situation is, that most people I know, think they are EU citizens just because they live in an EU country. But that's not really true, until they executed their EU rights first.

I agree, it was certainly very surprising to me when I find out

Re: Ask HN: What is your story of immigrating to another country?

#165

Post by mbrodersen »

4ad wrote: post #146
mbrodersen wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow. I have lived, worked and paid taxes in Europe, the US and Australia. And the US ranks 3rd on my list of places where I would choose to live. I turned down a highly paid job in California and instead moved to Australia. They wanted to pay for my relocation, green card, everything. But I still said no. Best decision ever. Also, a friend of mine recently regretted moving to the US and happily returned to Australia.…

Because getting a work visa for the US take a tremendous amount of effort. I would move tomorrow if I could.

So you have never actually lived in the US? Or any other country outside of your birth country? Believe me when I say that reality doesn’t match your expectations.

Re: Ask HN: What is your story of immigrating to another country?

#166

Post by 4ad »

mbrodersen wrote: post #165
4ad wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because getting a work visa for the US take a tremendous amount of effort. I would move tomorrow if I could.

So you have never actually lived in the US? Or any other country outside of your birth country? Believe me when I say that reality doesn’t match your expectations.

I have lived in the US for about 8 years of my life in total. I have lived in Austria (not my birth country) for 11 years.

Re: Ask HN: What is your story of immigrating to another country?

#167

Post by seoulmetro »

Shorel wrote: post #116
alangibson wrote: post #3

I married an Austrian while living with her in Texas. I made exactly zero plans before moving. She had the better degree by far so it only made sense to move to Austria. Getting a job was easy by local standards due to a tight local market for programmers. Getting through German classes to earn the permanent residency was the toughest part. I would never consider moving back to the USA. I was always a sceptic of the…

By definition, not a 3d world country. But it is a rich country full of poor people.

The '3rd world country' definition is outdated for modern usage anyway.

The US is definitely not on the same tier of standard of living as the rest of the world, that's for sure. It fell well down from the first place a while ago. Shame really.

Re: Ask HN: What is your story of immigrating to another country?

#168

Post by cassianoleal »

erdo wrote: post #134
CodeGlitch wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> with the ability to work and live in the EU country of their choice, I have to ask what is stopping someone in the UK from doing that post-Brexit? I imagine there's more paper-work, but that doesn't sound like a hardship? Feels extreme to move your whole family just to reduce the minor frictions. Glad it worked out for you though.

It's not really a matter of paper work, you simply don't have the right to move to another country just because you feel like it. Whereas it's a key pillar of EU membership. As a non EU citizen, immigrating depends on that specific country's requirements, but typically it would be a time limited arrangement, you'd need to pass a language test, find a company willing to sponsor the effort (so your residency is tied to…

Also as a non-EU citizen, if you want to move to a different EU country you'll need to reapply there. Rights of work and residence in one EU country doesn't give you the same rights in the others.

Re: Ask HN: What is your story of immigrating to another country?

#169

Post by rudyrigot »

Moved from France to the US in 2013, mostly because opportunities in tech don’t compare, and also because for all the great things French culture has, the gloomy/whiny tone of the culture was always difficult for me.

It was hard for a while on precarious immigration visas, but then we got our self-sponsored Green Card in 2015, and it’s been smooth-sailing since. The Green Card path I chose took many years to prepare, starting far before we immigrated; and tons of continuous hard work to prepare. It’s hands down the hardest thing I’ve ever done.

It’s worked out pretty fantastically for me and my family, so I regret nothing. We became naturalized citizens last year.

Every culture is different and there is none that is for everyone. That’s why it doesn’t make much sense to me that people would want to spend their whole life where they happened to be born, without trying anything else. I think everyone should live abroad a little while, no matter where.

Re: Ask HN: What is your story of immigrating to another country?

#170

Post by cutthegrass2 »

Nux wrote: post #22
searchableguy wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Wages are lower in absolute terms but not qualitatively and we probably couldn’t afford to move back to the uk and have any semblance of same standard of living. We are now trapped in a utopia and happy about it. Can you give some example of improvements that you would need to pay for in the UK? I'm interested.

Childcare is a joke in UK (London). Super expensive. To send your kid to nursery 5 days a week you are looking at £1500-2000/m.

I second this.

I pay ~£1700pcm for a nanny to look after my 2 pre-school age kids 5 days a week.

This is (obviously) paid out of post tax income. At current UK income tax rates this equates to earning ~£2100 gross.

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