One of my goal in life is to go out of my home country. No, it’s not because i am not proud of becoming the citizen. it’s just an act of finding self and challenging myself to become a better version of me. The “scary” part is that wish came true at the end of 2015. I had the opportunity to continue my career in other country.
I still remember how hard i deliberate at that time. There are a lot of things to consider.I talked with lot of people and i was swayed between going and not going couple of times. For my fellows out there here are my list of 7 Things to consider before you are living abroad. with notes : you like the job & feels comfortable with your new management team.
#1 Family, Your Beloved Ones, and Your Friends
What i would suggest is to talk with your direct family. They are the one who will help you. Your first tier. Try to get their support on your movement.
As for your beloved ones, this is where things could get messy. Now, i realise that this kind of life event is the real test. It’s not about sacrificing one need/dream it’s about working it out together. Please consider it carefully and my best wishes for you. 🙂
Your friends will be there and you will be able to discover a new network. This is where i love how IT contribute on this item. Get yourself a device and get connected. By this point, i believe you could guess that i am a millenial generation.
#2 Your new income vs your current income.
The hard part of this is the currency conversion. What i did was trying to compare in one Currency. Afterwards, please see how big is the increase that you will receive. In this part, really calculate every tiny bits that you have. I might share this in another post ( please wait for it ). in summary, the main part would be :
- Basic Income : be carefull about the gross / nett.
- Taxation : Check how is the tax arrangement between your destination and home country. This part is quite a headache
- Benefit : Pension, health, transportation, and on leave days. it’s so important because you will want to go travel out and go back home at certain times.
Have you seen the increase? keep it in mind first and let’s go to the next point.
#3 Living expenses in the destination country
If you are like me in regards coming from a country that everything is relatively cheap. This will be another moment of realisation of how nice our home is. I usually calculate my necessities in breakdown of :
- Basic living : housing, food, clothing, health, transportation, communication
- Leisure : acquiring new skills, travelling, social activities
- Going back home : i can’t emphasize enough how important it is. you must put this as one component at least enough to cover once per year even if your company bear a home coming expenses. this is for your safety net.
After you make your calculation, now let’s see how much is your :
new saving : new income – new expenses
How’s the figure now? let’s go to next point.
#4 Incremental Saving
Well, this is where you have to think through. especially if you are still inexperience about moving like i was back then. It’s not about the incremental income, it’s more into the incremental saving. The destination country might come with higher price. Hence, even if you have quite a leap in terms of income, it might not be the same for your saving. If everythings looks good until this point, hey! it looks promising! congrats!
#5 Paperworks
Moving to another country will involve bunch of paperworks. Be sure that the employer or someone could help you on VISA and Working permit. Otherwise, it will be very handfull. If you dream to go, probably you could just prepare in advance these things, i notice some basics :
- CV – always have it handy and please make it simple 2 pages is enough.
- Transcript & Graduation Certificate – Get it in English
- Passport – Scan all pages and update it from time to time.
- Credit Card – Get one even if you are not thinking of using it. no one share me this.
- Photos –> well this one is easy. you could just do it later.
#6 Food & Culture
Other thing that you have to think of is about food and culture. Googled it up so that it could minimise your culture shock. Human is amazing in terms of adaptability, but if by reading the stories it’s already demotivating, you might want to skip.
#7 Transportation ( inside & out of the destination country )
You might want to run away at one point of time so it’s very important to check how good the infrastructure is. Kidding. 😛
One of the thing that i would recommend you to avoid is to focus only to commute between home & office when you are living abroad ( or anywhere you live ). You should explore your living environment, get in the public transportation even if you have car. Mingle with the local and try the local way of living will give you a taste of how does it feel like to really living in the country and will help you to adjust yourself better. Chances are you will fall in love until you want to become the citizen or you will not want to come back for long time, so ensure that you have explored the country enough.
as about how to get out of the country, it’s back to point #1. For me, people comes first, be it your family, loved ones, and friends. You are living apart from some of them or even all of them. It will be very good to know how to reach them in case of emergency. I can’t think of how heartbroken i am if i can’t go when it’s needed.
These are my list and i should stop while i can otherwise it will be very long list. Hope that this sharing could help you! 😉
Cheers,
Triana Mustika Rukmi
Wanderer 
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