5 Stages of Becoming an Expat

It has not been a week since I started my expat life so I am still fighting with a big batch of mixed feelings. I had many ups and downs (mostly downs) this year so never would have imagined to start a whole new thing but here I am, in Amsterdam, sipping my Coconut Coffee in a nice coffee shop (not that kind of “coffeeshop”) located in De Pijp. When I look back at the past few months, there were quite some series of events that had happened to take me here. And what I went through in the meantime, can be summarized  as below:

1) Denial: I thought about my life and future a lot, A LOT while I went through quarter life crisis. I knew that I wanted to open a brand new clean page in my life, to go for something a bit unusual. That is why I decided to become a pilot and was preparing for the application process and DLR exams even. Then bamm! Another opportunity, an offer I could not refuse. Could this be real? Or just a cheeky game of Mother Nature? It was probably Mother Nature. Yeah, it is always her anyway.

2) Anger: Denial phase does not work once things start to get more realistic. Starting a new thing all by itself is challenging enough. When you are a person who likes to control things, it becomes even harder.  As things started to get out of your control… Well, that’s the moment when you start asking yourself “Why now?”, “Why it has to happen this way?”, “Why this?” and “Why that?”. There is no answer, but that does not mean you would stop asking them. You think of current status of your life, moreover anything and everything that is likely to happen, and that makes you angry, a lot.

3) Bargaining: This is the phase where you try to avoid worst to happen. As you will be programmed to see only negative side of the things, it is very important to get some support from friends or your favourite milkshake place. But getting false hopes will only make things worse, so better be realistic.

4) Depression: At this stage, well, you will basically be depressed. And you will start to question literally everything. “Why would I do the dishes, I am going away anyway.”, “What’s the point of starting a new book, I am going anyway”. You become silent as you keep having this inner conversations with yourself. If you are lucky, your friends will cuddle you unexpectedly and will make plans to come and visit you, which inevitably helps with your condition. 

5) Acceptance: You will move out from your apartment, bid farewells to your friends, and also to your favourite barista and bartender of your hood. Your life will be packed into bags and boxes, your memories will stare at you from distant shelves. And you say to yourself “I can’t fight it, I may as well prepare for it.” and start booking your flight ticket, setting up your Skype account etc… 

Eventually you will be fine, you will be just fine…