"The further place is, the better it seems to us", - one of our proverbs says.
And in fact, it's really so.
Many people, who live in my country, dream to live abroad in Europe or in Canada or anywhere but not here. They think life there is much better than here. They blind and deaf to numerous stories of comeback to the Motherland of poor emigrants after long unhappy years of living abroad.
They didn't wanna hear any disadvantages and difficulties about life there, though there are lots of them!
Anywhere both + and - can be found! Especially for foreigners with different outlook and cultural code!
But despite these dreams about happy life abroad, there are more and more families of immigrants who come vice versa to Russia leaving Canada, Germany and other countries.
Now this wave is active more than ever. Strange but it's so.
For example,
this family has come to live in my country leaving Germany forever.
They plan to build a house here and stay.
When they are asked why, they say that the reason is in "changing of history that is made by Europe, and the problem of education and upbringing of kids".
We all know about german Jugendampt with the most cruel rules for families in Europe and maybe in the world.
I think it's the root of family's emigration.
one more family from Germany who has arrived and already got passports and citizenship in Russia.
They even plan to create eco-village for other Germans who plan to come here.
They meet huge support and protection from government.
it's a Canadian family with 8 kids who always come to Russia using a tourist visa and want to stay here.
They have to pass an exam for knowledge of the language, and they aren't able to do it for now cause it needs much time.
The father was afraid they will have to come back home for this period but it's very expensive for suchn a big family.
1 ticket costs 2,000$ - as he has said, and they need 10 of them!
But the officials let them stay in the country and prepare for the exam here.
We know about ability of our brain to sort info and to miss that one that contradicts with our wishes and judgements and notice only the data that proves our own beliefs.
But the reality and the truth is beyond our own beliefs, as a rule.
So what we consider to be the worst, can be the best for others.
When I was a child growing up on an island in Alaska, the troublesome bother of foraging for food, picking up kelp off the beach, scraping barnacles off the rocks, hunting, fishing, all seemed so much more trouble than the fantastic images of civilization I could find in the library, of lambent neon glare banishing the darkness of night, 4 lanes of traffic on bustling city streets, millions of people hustling, haggling, creating the vibrant society that supported theater, museums, science, and all the blessings of civilization. I dreamed of living in LA, or New York, or flying from city to city and tasting the cream of the knowledge humanity had arrived at through millennia of probing, questioning reality, leaving only what could not be disproven potentially true.
Then, after I escaped Alaska, I made my way to Austin, TX, and dipped my toes in a vibrant city culture for a time - but Texas is HOT compared to Alaska, and the Gulf Coast is all swampland where it can be 45 degrees at midnight with 130% humidity, making your ~37 degree body the coolest thing around, so the moisture forced out of the oversaturated air condenses out onto you, making sweating useless, running into your eyes, dripping off your nose, drenching your clothes. So, I headed west, to the familiar Pacific Ocean and the fabled California coast.
However, I didn't expect the insane rents that fabled beachfront property commanded, and when I reached LA and saw the grim concrete sprawl of the barrios I never even stopped, but kept driving until I found rents I could pay with the little cash I had scrimped and saved up. I ended up in Bakersfield, CA, at the edge of the Mojave Desert, paying by the week at the 'Knight's Rest' Motel for a roach-infested cell with a private bath that doubled as my kitchenette, and found a job working for a company that put up steel buildings. That was in April, and by July the temperatures rose above 45 degrees every day for weeks on end. At least it was a dry heat!
Needless to say, the fantastic visions of cosmopolitan cities had soured, I eventually headed north until I hit the Pacific Northwest Ecological Zone and the deep, dark evergreen forests I was familiar with from my youth. Sometimes, we don't realize how good we have it until we live away from it for a while. Then, there's nothing like coming back.
There's no place like home.
Thanks!
oh yeah
East or West - home is best;)
I do like your life story, thank you! so teaching and so useful.
unfortunately, people can't get experience from other's mistakes, so they need their own ones
but I really agree with you: we can feel gratitude for what we have only when we get something worse.
I see people leave my country every day to other continents to seek greener pasture
I also see people come here on tour and also keep on postponing their leave.
But you get to find out something bad happening in their country so you just conclude oh even though this country is not good, they still get their peace of mind everyday.
yeah, what is bad for you can be the best for others
the difference is only in atittude and perception
Yeah exactly