Expat Focus: For anyone moving or living abroad

Finding your tribe, family, community, whatever you like to call it, is so important when you move to a new place. Expats Angelina and Bonny know this first hand, having moved to the UK from Poland and France. They started their business, International School of Life, to connect expat women globally, helping them to boost their confidence, unlock their talent and grow their network so they can thrive.

ISL Co-founder Angelina Piechowska joins me in this episode to chat about her own challenging experience moving abroad, her work as a psychologist and solution-focused brief therapist, and why she's so passionate about helping fellow expat women realise their full potential.

Following Brexit and amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, is living and working in the United Kingdom as attractive as it used to be?

In the past two years, we've seen a mass exodus of many expats from the countries they were calling home. The number of visas granted to Aussies to live and work in the UK reportedly dropped 74% in 2020. That same year, the UK issued 48% fewer youth mobility and temporary worker visas to Kiwis. But are New Zealanders and Australians beginning to come back to the UK? And what opportunities are they finding when they arrive?

Clint Heine is the Manager and Director of Kiwis in London, a very popular Facebook Group set up to help New Zealanders – and Australians – to find jobs, places to live and socialise. He's joining me in this episode to share his thoughts.

If you live in the UK or in the EU, you've no doubt noticed an unwelcome trend in added fees and charges when receiving parcels from online shopping. Even parcels sent from family and friends abroad are turning up with added fees to pay.

There's a lot of confusion about what these fees are for, when they should be applied, and why they've even come into play. And if you're an expat business owner, you might be wondering what you can do to try to minimise the pain of these fees for your customers so that they keep coming back and ordering from you.

My guest today is Matt Harrison, a Sales Director at tax compliance firm, Avalara. He's going to explain where these fees and charges have come from, when we have to pay them and why, if customs forms are filled out correctly, it should still be ok to send parcels to your friends and family overseas for Christmas.

Do you know if there's a pension agreement between your home country, and the one you're living in now? Do you know what you'll be entitled to come retirement age, if you decide to stay living abroad? The lack of an agreement and what that means is what I'm discussing today with fellow Aussies Judy and Peter, a writer and a lawyer behind the group Australian Pensions in France.

Australia has 31 international social security agreements with other countries, and France has 42, but they don't have one with each other. For eligible Aussies living in France, and vice versa, it's a pretty big problem that's not easy for all to overcome.

My guest today is Alex, a language coach with a YouTube channel called 'French In Plain Sight'.

Now, as the name suggests, he coaches French learners, and I'm one of those, but a lot about his approach is relevant to learning pretty much any language. What I find unique about Alex is that he's not native, and his coaching method is really derived from his own experiences of learning French.

We're going to be talking about finding confidence when learning a foreign language, how important those grammar rules really are, and if he thinks you're wasting your time on language apps like Duolingo.

Today's guest is sharing her experience of applying for Dutch citizenship. For Akanksha Pathania, it was a big decision, not least because becoming a citizen of the Netherlands required her to renounce her Indian citizenship. Find out what the process entailed, how you can best prepare for the exams, and why for Akanksha, becoming Dutch has been worth it.

This past year has really put our health and wellbeing in the spotlight – whether it's been dealing with a Covid-19 diagnosis ourselves, supporting loved ones, or dealing with the mental and physical health impacts of long-term lockdown and significant lifestyle change.

Health service providers have played a key role during the pandemic, and my guest for this episode is from one of our health partners here at Expat Focus - Cigna Europe.

Doctor Peter Mills is going to talk through the ways in which they've evolved as an organisation to support the needs of their customers and what types of services have been in demand during the crisis, and he's going to answer some listener questions.

We are chatting to one of our regular columnists today, Ben Zabulis, who I've interviewed in the past about his decision to retire to Hong Kong. Now, lots has been happening in the world since our last chat, so I'm really keen to check in with him and hear his perspective, and also find out how he and his partner keep themselves well and healthy as retirees abroad.

I hope you enjoy this conversation, and if you are looking for expat health and wellness resources yourself, head over to our website, expatfocus.com.

So many workplaces have had to make drastic changes over the past year, which has affected how we do our jobs and, in some cases, if we even still have one. Whether you're already abroad or looking to move internationally for work, it's a daunting time to be searching for that next opportunity.

How has the pandemic affected your industry? Are there fewer jobs around? Have employer expectations changed? And what does the remote working trend mean for the traditional expat job posting? Will it even exist in the future? My guest, Gillian Cramb, an HR consultant based in the South of France, is joining me in this episode to share her insights and give you some job application tips.

Expat entrepreneurs Mayank Marthur and Octavian Pop are the founders of Avasa AI. They met when Mayank was searching for a property to rent in London, and they realised there was a gap in the market for a complete home search solution that really works for the tenant – so, they created it.