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Articles About Expat Life (Page 8)

Priorite de droite Absolue Driving in Belgium

I first wrote this post waaay back when we arrived in Belgium. I was literally terrified every time I got in the car. I’m happy to say I’m a bit calmer now but, even five years on, I’m still not driving in Belgium. Interestingly, I’ve been in many other places in Europe where I’ve felt, ‘Hey, I could drive here.’ Granted, living in Brussels, I don’t have a real need to drive and Andrew is happy to play chauffeur when necessary.

I was reminded of this post when, on a recent outing, we spotted the sign in the photo. It pretty much sums up driving in Belgium.

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Confused about language?

This second post in my Flashback series looks at the pitfalls of being an English speaker in Belgium. When I first wrote it, we were living in Flanders and struggling to learn Flemish. Five years later, I still don’t speak Flemish. In fact, since we moved to Brussels, the little bit of Dutch I had picked up has totally lapsed.

It is very easy to be lazy about language in Brussels, as so many people speak English these days; And it’s not just because of all of the expats in the city. Often, the common language among French and Flemish Belgians in English. There is more and more English popping up on signs and used in slogans. More websites are defaulting to English and English menus are more commonly available. Despite this, I still think it’s important to try and speak the local language. My French, although far from perfect is much better now that I use it frequently in Brussels. There’s still part of me that feels I should learn Dutch, even though I don’t have occasion to use it.

As I suggested when I wrote this post, I still can’t imagine how much more difficult it is to travel as a non-English speaker.

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Mobile Operators in Belgium

Looking for more recent information? Check out our newest post on Mobile Internet in Belgium from May 2012!

In my last post, I wrote about Alison’s new phone, the HTC Desire. After bringing it home and setting it up, the next question was: which mobile operator should we use?

We hadn’t researched mobile operators before, as we hadn’t any need for fancy packages. A pay-as-you-go model was fine for years.  Now however, the new phone would also need  internet access. Suddenly we needed to learn what operators were available and what they offered for data plans (aka mobile internet, 3G).  So, with my usual penchant for details, I began to dig into what operators exist in Belgium and their offers for mobile internet on your smartphone.

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Expat life can leave you feeling lost.

Recently I’ve been getting quite a few comments and emails from new expats in Belgium who are struggling with adjusting to life here. Expats in Belgium tend to be pretty transient; with terms of 2-3 years before moving on to a new posting. I wanted to find a way to answer some of these common issues and also demonstrate how we all go through rough patches in the beginning.

For that reason, I’ve decided to repost some of my older CheeseWeb posts as a Flashback series. Because there are over 500 posts on CheeseWeb now (wow! Did I really write all of that?) many of the old posts get buried and lost to the internet ether. I’ll be re-posting these with the original comments section, but adding my updated thoughts.

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Bringing the internet home

Our ‘Web Guy’ takes a look at how to choose an internet service provider in Belgium.

Most expats wouldn’t dream of living without internet access. We’re becoming more and more connected with our iPhones/smartphones, netbooks and now iPads/tablets. I’ve mentioned how important computers are to expats in my article, “Computer Shopping in Belgium,” but what use is a computer without access? For expats, high-speed (or broadband) internet access is as important as a telephone, maybe even more.

Our expat life is manageable because of the internet and even a day without access can be very disruptive. So how do you know what service provider to choose in Belgium?

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Belgium is a quirky little country. After five years of living here I’ve come to love, or at least accept, its eccentricities.

Lately I’ve noticed I now take for granted many things I found strange when I first landed here.  Maybe you’ve had a few of these experiences too. The following is a list of signs that you may be ‘going native’ in Belgium.

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Don’t leave me behind

People are always surprised when we tell them our cats are Canadian.

“You brought three cats to Belgium, all the way from Canada,” they exclaim. Well, actually it was four cats and our Saint Bernard joined us three months later, but yes. Our pets are all from Canada.

It surprises me that they are surprised. We wouldn’t dream of moving without our pets. They are an important part of our family. When we adopted them it was for life.

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Moving forward or standing still?

In another couple of weeks, it will be April, 2010. This will mark the fifth anniversary of our expat life in Europe. I can’t help but feel introspective about this milestone.

In fact, I never really intended to have a five year anniversary of life in Belgium. Our plan was always to try and move on to a new location after three years or so. Well, you know what they say about the best laid plans.

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Social Networking in Belgium

Our ‘Web Guy’, Andrew, takes a look at social networking in Belgium and uncovers a few surprises.

A couple days ago, I read in a flyer from Numericable how pervasive social networking is in Belgium. Facebook alone counts more than 2.8 million Belgian users… that’s 25% of the country! While looking at these stats, I found it interesting that the male-to-female ratio is almost 1:1. Curious, I  looked at a few other European countries and they are all within +/- 5% of a 50/50 split.

This got me wondering about the demographics of other ‘social’ sites frequented by Belgian users.

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