Bonjhola

EP 77: What They Don't Tell You About a Digital Nomad Lifestyle

• Rebecca West

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Welcome to Bon Jola, a podcast about two women, Amy and Rebecca, who each move from the United States to Europe to become expats. Amy to Spain and Rebecca to France. We're here to share the highs, the lows, and the logistics of this adventure. Encourage you to follow your own, move abroad dreams, and remind you that you're not alone when the going gets tough. Enjoy.

audioAimee11292886823:

Rebecca, I am really curious because we did a lot of hopping around and a lot of traveling this summer, but you do a lot of like really kind of nomadic living where you are moving from location to location to location. Often, like how many you told me in a conversation a while ago, like, how many times you have moved this year or No, since you've been in Paris. What's the, what's the grand tally thus far?

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Off the top of my mind, I think we've moved properly, moved 10 times, and then if you count like um, overnights or short stays that we did in a move like 18, it's been an enormous amount of moves and stays in just under two years.

audioAimee11292886823:

And it's the beginning of September. So you have been in Paris for about 18 months, right.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

That feels true. It's a blur.

audioAimee11292886823:

Yeah. With all

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

we moved here in March of last year, so, yes. Mm-hmm.

audioAimee11292886823:

Okay. Alright. So roughly you are doing some form of moving big or small at least once a month.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

When you put pencil that out. Yes. Yeah. We've had some very long stays, some extremely short stays, but it's to the point now where when I wake up in the morning, I am not sure what side of the bed I'm on, what room I'm in, where the bathroom is relative to the room I'm in. It really is, um, it's very disorienting at this point.

audioAimee11292886823:

How many, how many times did you change residences this summer?

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

This summer. Uh, let's, let's do a quick count. We had the south of France, we had with you and Gerona. We had the north of Spain, we had Portugal, we had Porto in Portugal, which was separate. Then we had Bayone on the way to Lil, of course, Lil Amsterdam back to Lil, we won't count. Now we've just moved back to Paris. Was that nine? I think it was. I can't even count anymore.

audioAimee11292886823:

No wonder you're so confused.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Yeah. And Murray has made every single one of those moves except for the Porto one, where we left him back home in the condo in Portugal for our two night overnight.

audioAimee11292886823:

Good God, that poor cat.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Yeah. You know, he is a trooper when we're traveling that much. He definitely has this look of resignation on his face. He's not miserable. He is not freaked out. He's actually really calm. We're lucky, but when we got back to the Paris apartment here yesterday, he was every bit like me, kind of just relaxed, calm, going, oh, I know where. I belong.

audioAimee11292886823:

Hmm.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

You could see that in his body language, so I'm glad that we're gonna be staying put for a little while for him too. 14 little old.

audioAimee11292886823:

I know, I know it. It's, uh, it's a lot for anybody that age in cat years.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Exactly, but he's loved, he's actually found his place in almost all the places we've been. There's a couple of stay where he feels unsettled and I'm never sure if it's, you know, old other pet smells'cause we're staying in places that allow for pets. So you'll get layers, um, or something else about the apartments. But the main thing is that we have to be very careful when we first land in a new apartment.'cause while some cats like to jump, he likes Heidi holes. When we very first got to Paris in our very first apartment. He disappeared within about 30 seconds. We could not find him and he was in this tiny construction hole under the shower. So we've learned first not to freak out, you know, he's somewhere and second to look in the holes.'cause you know, he's a 13 pound cat, but he can get very small. Yeah. But we're back. We're back in Paris now. And it does feel, it feels so good.

audioAimee11292886823:

I imagine there are some people when they think of being a digital nomad. They envision the kind of life that you and Damien are living, where you're moving locations every couple of months. Sometimes you are staying for a couple of days. Sometimes you're settling in for a few months, but having this sense of always being on the go. So I'm really curious, especially after being in Seattle and. One city for decades. What are some of the things that you have picked up and learned to make the process of physically moving so frequently, both emotionally sustainable and like literally efficient?

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Well that's, it's a great question and it's a huge question, and I. It. When we talk about being a digital nomad or an expat, there are so many versions of that. You know, the classic one is that somebody gets a a big job opportunity and then the spouse and family go with them. And it's really just a relocation. And that comes with all of the stuff you and I have been talking about forever. How do I navigate the language and the visas and the social norms and the health coverage, right? This lifestyle that Damien and I have chosen has all of that, and then it takes it to a whole nother emotional toll level. Because for example, if Damien and I don't consider our French visa after his schooling is done, we're kind of without country. So what does that mean about our health insurance? What does it mean if we get properly sick? It's, It's, all fun and games to pick up and move every couple of months. But when life hits, it makes it that much more complicated.

audioAimee11292886823:

Mm-hmm.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

And that goes back to something you and I have talked about a lot, which is the cost of this adventure. There are certain things that you spend on what you have to make a choice about spending on. So a really good example is in the apartment, in the l. There was no shower organizer and it's, not even a three foot by three foot shower. It's one of those tiny little showers where you have to do a squat to pick the shampoo up off the ground. There's no bending. And we were staying in that apartment for a full month, not counting the week. We went off to Amsterdam. That's too long to be really frustrated and banging your head on the shower wall. And it's not the kind of thing that an Airbnb host is gonna be like, yeah, I'll just drop off a shower organizer for you. Right. So we bought a shower organizer, we, which was 20 euros. We, and you know, again, going back to the details we had when we were standing at the grocery store, looking at the options. There was one that had one hook and there was one that had two hooks. And this particular shower system is one of those where that you have a hot water pipe and a cold water pipe coming out of the wall. If I'd chosen a single hook, it wouldn't have been as stable. It would've been cheaper by five euros, then it wouldn't have been as stable. And again, I'm wanting to live what feels like an adult life despite all of this jumping around. So we bought the shower organizer. We bought a couple of over the door hooks because there was no place to hang our towels or robes without them falling into the litter box because that's another thing you have to think about is where are you gonna put the litter box And the bathroom configurations are all over the place here.

audioAimee11292886823:

Right.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Um, and frequently the space where a litter box will live somehow ends up underneath where the towel bar is. Um, and the towel bars here are usually the heated towel systems. So you're kind of hooking it. It's not a, it's not secure. Right. You get the

audioAimee11292886823:

Yeah, exactly. Yeah.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Um, so we bought Rob Hooks over the door. Robe hooks. We bought the organizer. We, uh, that, not in that one, but for our apartment. Oh no, that's the same apartment. We bought a fan because they had no fan in this apartment.

audioAimee11292886823:

Oh wow.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

That's one that I really think that they should actually include in the apartment. Um, but these are the kinds of choices that we're making at every single step based on how long we're gonna stay there. There were places, there are places that we've stayed for three days or a week where we've got the same kind of inconveniences, but they're just an inconvenience'cause the stay is so short.

audioAimee11292886823:

Right.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

And then of course. The other thing that happens with this lifestyle is not just the purchasing of those items, but then the accumulation of those items. Do we now walk away from this 90 Euro fan or this 20 Euro shower organizer? We chose to, and the stepladder that we also bought, like see, there's so many things. We chose to bring the stepladder and the fan back to the Paris apartment. We chose to leave the shower organizer there because it obviously went with that system. And it wasn't very expensive. So your question was how do we manage it? Um, that's part of it is you're constantly assessing where are you gonna set up your workstation? Relative to the lighting for your Zoom meetings and good wifi and noise isolation. This is a really big deal for us traveling as a couple, as me a digital nomad. He's not working, but he is studying for school and I have to take meetings and record podcasts and things like that. How do we accommodate that in a new space over and over again with both of our needs being met? The answer to that changes with every single apartment that we're in,

audioAimee11292886823:

Right, right.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

and there aren't even always proper desks. I have worked from, um, everything. I, I mean, I, I'm sorry, I'm looking at the list in my brains. I've used ironing boards as desks. I've taken the lid off of the Tupperware that we travel with Murray's stuff in and put it over a pillow on my lap, on the bed to create a desk table, which actually works really, really well. Um, the heat of the computer can't really just work in the sun. You see all these digital, no nomads working from the beach. Um, No, heat and sand are bad for electronics

audioAimee11292886823:

and you can't really see your screen when you're sitting outside in the sun

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

and that's all. Assuming that you had access to wifi.

audioAimee11292886823:

Right.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

So, you know, so much of what they're selling about this lifestyle, it's not that it's. Impossible, but it's incredibly inaccurate once you deal with the realities of this lifestyle. So you accumulate all these things, do you leave them behind and And also what do you bring with you? So we rented a car for this adventure, which comes with security issues. Right? You can't just walk away from your stuff. So we, we loaded up, sorry, let me back that up. We did leave one storage unit's worth of stuff. In Paris, there is shore guard here. I assume it's the same company. It's a very nice storage unit that we got very clean. Everything's very tidy. But because they're carving out spaces from an old world city, you can, you drive into it with, um, an app. Doors are automated, that's pretty cool. And then you can drive down to. A bay and then you can grab a cart, but the cart won't even go all the way to our unit because the ceiling heights keep getting shorter and shorter and shorter. So there's about a 50 foot stretch where we have to bring while crouched over, like a little old lady are belongings to the cart, and then we roll them from the cart to the bay where the car made it to, and then we can drive out of the bay.

audioAimee11292886823:

Oh my God.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

So not anything you would ever see in the States, but so much nicer than I actually expected to find here. Um, so we put half of our stuff in storage. We bought Tupperwares and stuff to put all that into. And then the rest of it, we had a combination of luggage and Tupperwares in the car with us. That means, and this is why you wanna pack light, but you can't pack light when you're trying to cook proper meals. You don't know what kind of equipment the airb Airbnbs are gonna have. The knives are never sharp. The non-stick pans are usually in a condition that you don't wanna eat off of. so Damien's got his cooking stuff. We've got all the cat stuff. So even though we brought very little in the way of clothing, we still had an entire carload of stuff. That carload of stuff now has to be brought in to every single place we stay. Which if, for example, you're staying with your friend Amy, who lives in the old town of Gerona,

audioAimee11292886823:

Which you cannot take your car to.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Exactly. Well, that's, that's exactly it. The, the middle of these cities where frequently you want to stay and there's the coolest Airbnbs. You cannot drive your car to that part of town, and the streets are cobblestone. So you're hoisting your Tupperwares or you're dragging your things over. Cobblestones, which 100% breaks the wheels on these things.

audioAimee11292886823:

it sucks.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Once you make it to your apartment, there may or may not be an elevator, and if there is that elevator may or may not fit your stuff. So then you're bringing it upstairs, which is. Extra fun if you're gonna go stay in an apartment in Amsterdam, the old world houses of Amsterdam are like the tall, skinny brownstones in Boston or in San Francisco.

audioAimee11292886823:

Mm-hmm.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

The stairs go straight up. They're only about seven inches deep, so they don't even hold your whole foot when you're walking forward.

audioAimee11292886823:

God.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

And in the case of the one we stayed in, the handrail was warped, so parts of it you could grab and parts were warped, so close to the wall that you could lean on the handrail, but you couldn't grasp it.

audioAimee11292886823:

Fantastic.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

It's super. And, and it's fine. You know, moving days kind of suck, but you do get into a rhythm of it. You go, okay, I know what I'm able to grab. I know how to grab it. It's sort of like, as I always, one of my favorite analogies, the first piece of furniture you put together for IKEA makes you wanna kill people. The second one seems easy. You know, the first time you do this kind of a move, you really question your life choices. As you become more methodical and you figure out what does and doesn't work, and you figure out your communication with your partner, it does get easier. And by the end of it, we were actually really, really good at moving from place to place. And by the end of it, it wasn't moving that I was hating so much. It was that disorientation I was talking about earlier where I just didn't know where anything was and, and that gets really frustrating. You're like, I just wanna know. Where did I put the tape? And you have no clue.

audioAimee11292886823:

exactly. Yeah.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Yeah. And you leave things behind. You have to be really careful. I lost all of my coloring pencils at, I

audioAimee11292886823:

Oh.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

I think it was the Laia one. It might've been menton. By the time you realize it, you're not quite sure. So yeah, that was a bummer.

audioAimee11292886823:

Yeah. I'm curious, when you get to your destination and you park wherever that is, do you do an initial reconnaissance where you go into the apartment, you kind of look at the layout, decide how you're going to bring things up, or do you just pull everything out of the vehicle and figure it out Moment to moment?

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

It, it definitely depends on the destination, but because. Two factors. Make it so that it's almost just an emergency. Get everything out of the car, get everything up. We'll think about it later. Factor number one, actually three factors. Factor number one is that Damien is extremely security conscious. Being from Jersey, he is aware and also running contractor trucks. He is aware that if somebody wants to steal from you and they see an open trunk or something, they can clear you out in five seconds. So he's very security conscious. Number two, we've got the cat. So I wanna get the cat to a place where you can use the bathroom and get comfortable as fast as I can. I can't leave him in heat, I can't leave him behind. I can't leave him. You know? So there's the cat. And then the third thing is, um, the parking. The parking. We never know what the parking situation is gonna really be. A couple of places we've been able to preplan. Really good parking garages like the Zen Park one we talked about last time. But even so, that's not necessarily where we wanna bring all the belongings from. So usually we'll ask as we're arriving, we'll ask the Airbnb host, Hey, can we park in front of the building or try to get an assessment of that before we arrive? But no matter what, it's always a big scramble. We park, we hope we're not gonna get towed. We and, and also actually I have to add to this, checking into an Airbnb is never the same from

audioAimee11292886823:

Oh my God.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

to another.

audioAimee11292886823:

So true. So true.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Yeah. Sometimes the host is gonna be late. Sometimes the key box code simply doesn't work. Those are two things that happened on this trip. Um. So many things will complicate everything else that I just said in terms of just getting the keys in the first place. Then do you have a chatty host? We, we love self check-in. We really try hard to choose places that allow for self check-in, but that's not always an option. So are they chatty? Are they now going to make us talk for half an hour about who knows what? One of my favorite ones was when we were checking into one of our Paris Airbnbs, and the conversation was all about Damien's French and how he really should get better at it.

audioAimee11292886823:

Wow. That sounds like a

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

they'll share their,

audioAimee11292886823:

have with a German,

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

oh, the French have a lot of opinions about their language.

audioAimee11292886823:

yeah. No, it's true. They are pretty. Um. There's a word and it's escaping me, and it's not a very flattering word to describe how the French are with regards to how things need to be with language and food

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

yeah,

audioAimee11292886823:

and manners.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

yeah. Oh yeah. Big time on that one. Although I actually love all of it. I'm such a manners person. So in terms of what, what makes it go well? Um, really it's about. Taking a deep breath. This, so it applies first when you're landing. You know, you pick up a rental car at the airport and it's going to be stressful. You don't know how the highways work. You don't know how the tolls work. You don't know how it, how it works to get outta the parking garage. And so pausing, get to know the systems of your car. Get your GPS system set up. Make sure your phone and your car are connected before you leave the garage. This somehow took my dear husband a very long time to learn and so we'd be pulling out of the garage'cause he is raring to go while I'm trying to set up the nav system and get the cat set up and whatever. And that always led to arguments and frustration that didn't have to be there. So pause. And the same thing works when you're coming into the next city. As soon as you can just pull over into, you know, an empty parking lot and get your bearings, make sure you put the right address in. I can't tell you how often you think you pushed the right thing on nav. It gets you all the way to the right city, but oops, you only put in lil, you didn't put in the address or whatever, you

audioAimee11292886823:

Right, right. Yes.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

So that's a big one. Um, packing your most essential essentials in a go bag. So I always had my computer bag separate from everything else so that I could get out and go pee and not have to worry about every single thing in the car. Um. Peeing before you approach a city is very, very important. In all of Europe there are fabulous rest stops. Um, in France they are labeled as air a IRE, the air to whatever town and they are. Oh my gosh. The services are endless. There's food, there's clean free restrooms, great gas station stops. In general, like they're really, really good. So when you're about 50 kilometers away from the city, which is probably the last one you're gonna see. Just stop. Use that to pee because you don't know what traffic you're gonna hit in the city. You don't know what one way streets you're gonna get into on on these cities. You're gonna try following the directions of your GPS and find out that there's a market that day on the street that you're supposed to drive on. So if you even think you're gonna need to pee before you get to a city, do it before you enter. Those are some of my tips.

audioAimee11292886823:

Nice. I love it. I'm curious, so you rented a car, one car for the entire summer? You took it all over France, you took it through Spain to Portugal. What was the, what was the cost for that?

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

I don't know yet.'cause Damien actually did that entire reservation. I wouldn't be surprised if it came out to about$1,500.

audioAimee11292886823:

Mm-hmm..

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Um, and that's not including the cost of gas.'cause we have to gas up a lot and gas is about 10 ish bucks a um, a gallon because you have to remember that the prices you see here, which are already higher than the number you would see in the states, is per liter. not per gallon.

audioAimee11292886823:

Mm-hmm.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Yeah. So that's a, that makes road tripping a lot less. Affordable in Europe. Um, and I am guessing that's a big part of why road tripping is a much smaller part of the culture in Europe, in addition to the fact that the state, the, excuse me, the countries are so much smaller and in America everything is just about big, being big and traveling big distances. It's just a total different culture for road tripping.

audioAimee11292886823:

For sure. It'd be interesting to see in the next, you know, 50 to a hundred years really, I guess in the next 20 to 50 years if the ease and access of electronic vehicles changes the culture in Europe with regards to road trips.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Yeah, and we actually saw a lot of charging stations along the journey, and we actually pulled into one air that didn't even have the gas station set up yet. It was all electric. We're like, whoa, wait a minute. This isn't what we need.

audioAimee11292886823:

That's awesome. Yeah, we always try and rent electric when we're renting here in, uh, in Spain, you know, for day trips or whatever.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Clever. Yeah, Damien, he, what he really loves is an automatic, like an old school automatic. You know, we're of an age where getting your first car was a symbol of freedom and adulthood, and so the road trips we're taking are in part because he really loves driving and he loves that feeling of freedom. And so I'm curious if an electric vehicle would satisfy his driving desires the same way.

audioAimee11292886823:

Do you mean manual transmission?

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Did I say that? What did I, I don't know what I

audioAimee11292886823:

said you said automatic.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

misspoke. The man loves a stick shift.

audioAimee11292886823:

Okay. Okay. I was like, gosh, I'm gonna try real hard not to judge Damien too harshly on loving automatics, but

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Totally misspoke. Got that 100% backwards.

audioAimee11292886823:

okay.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Yeah.

audioAimee11292886823:

It's really hard to even get a true manual transmission in the US anymore.'cause they have this like bullshit hybrid thing that is not because there's no clutch and it's like faking.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Yeah. That's not an, that's not a manual.

audioAimee11292886823:

It just made me mad.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

rent them here too. They, it's a lot easier to get the automatics,

audioAimee11292886823:

Oh, that surprises me. That surprises me quite a bit.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Yeah.

audioAimee11292886823:

Hmm.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Don't know why. So, um, let's see. Oh, fun, not fun fact. Useful poten pen. Potentially useful fact for anybody finding themselves in this situation. When we were moving to the storage unit, we weren't sure how we were gonna get all of our belongings to the storage unit.'cause that was long before we were renting the car. Um, turns out TaskRabbit exists in France and so I was literally able to look up a guy who had a truck and he showed up and helped us move everything to Sure Guard. So that was really great. So TaskRabbit exists. Sure Guard exists. They did take a little bit of unearthing. But they do exist getting everything back. We, we just did it all in the same day as we came back. So we, we drove, we left little at like six in the morning. It's only about a two and a half hour drive, but maybe four depending on rush hour traffic. So we wanted to get ahead of that on a Monday, but we got here at 10, um, had a very easy check-in, and then we went back and forth from the storage unit. To get our stuff. It only took two trips, so it wasn't a ton of stuff. It was just more than we could do without a vehicle of some kind when we were first doing it. We have rented taxis and Ubers to move our stuff with every other move, but it's a little awkward when you start getting a whole house full of stuff. That's not what they're for, and so that's why we had to find a different solution this time. But on, on our move back, we used the rental car to get everything back from storage, and then we also rent it to Costco because there is a Costco in par in France. It is in Paris. It's the only one outside of Paris in the suburbs, and stocked up on cat litter and some of those things that we obviously go through. A lot of dropped off the car. Easy peasy. And now we are back to our non-car life.

audioAimee11292886823:

Amazing. Do you have any tips for navigating that communication piece with your spouse? Like what have you two learned about your communication styles, how to best communicate in these situations where you're repeating this stressor? Um, and factoring in all these unknowns with regards to how you each interpret and process that stressor so that each move is not, each move is a team task and not something that slowly erodes at your love for your spouse. Because I can, I. Shane and I work really, really well together with a lot of these kind of logistical things, but I know that's not actually, I don't know, based on the most frequent voices of life, my assumption is that is not common, you know, for you and Damien and Shane and I to have sort of the, the, Ability to kind of navigate these things and choose the tasks and master the tasks in a way that compliment each other rather than. Tripping over one another to try and accomplish what we're trying to do. So how have you, two, how did you, how were you two when you started that process versus where you are now and what are some of the things that you two have learned about each other that allows you to be successful with doing this as often as you two are doing it?

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

I'm going to bullet point a couple things that I don't miss any of these because there's two books I wanna talk about. One of which is the Four Agreements, one of which is omics. And before I go into either of those, I want to acknowledge that this has been an unfolding lesson. This has. Damien and I have a remarkably convivial marriage. We're very kind to each other. Moving or not? Not, no, it's not moving. We're actually pretty good with moving, but transitioning from one city to another has been where most of our arguments have ever happened in our marriage.

audioAimee11292886823:

Oh, interesting.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Um.

audioAimee11292886823:

So you've really set yourselves up for, uh, trial by fire here.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

What's funny is when we first started dating, we already knew each other'cause he had been my student, but we didn't know each other intimately, right? So we start dating and within a few weeks we decided to take a three week road trip together. So we actually started this quite early in our relationship and had been working on it the whole time. So the first thing that everybody can do is. Follow one of the points in the four agreements book, which is don't take things personally. When I read that book, that was the hardest one for me to even understand. I, it, it was hard for me to even comprehend that something that involves you isn't, therefore about you. I don't know what that says about me, but we'll set that aside. What I've learned, and it's very specific to moving from city to city, is. You are going to both be short tempered. You are out of your comfort zone. You are out of your element. You're gonna make decisions that suck, like taking the wrong exit or turning the wrong way on a one way street, or turning into a market and coming face to face with a cow and not being sure what to do next. These have all happened. It's going to happen, and you're both going to respond in your own emotional way. What I had to embrace was that Damien can get upset and it's not about me. He can even say unkind things and point them at me, and it's still not actually about me. So I really had to come to terms with that and I, and I have to give Damien credit for the fact that he's very good at that. He comes from a family where you get very, very mad in the moment,

audioAimee11292886823:

Yeah.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

it's over.

audioAimee11292886823:

Right.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

I come from a combination of the South and the Pacific Northwest

audioAimee11292886823:

Yeah.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

you Hold on.

audioAimee11292886823:

Oh God.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Yeah. You hold on to imagined or real injuries for the rest of your life As as weapons.

audioAimee11292886823:

Absolutely. You never know when they'll come in handy.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Exactly. But you know, I. It turns out I'm not perfect and I can say some unkind things too, and Damien just lets it roll off his back, like the proverb proverbial water off a duck's back. So I have both learned from the book and I have learned from watching my husband how to be a better partner. So that's number one. Number two is from omics, which was renamed. It's not you, it's the dishes. It is one of the best couples counseling books out there because the premise is divide your chores not based on masculine, feminine, or whatever rules were brought up in your family. Wherever you think your rules are coming from, they're all made up. So base who does what on, who's good at what.

audioAimee11292886823:

Yes, yes, yes, yes.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

is extremely good at packing a car. He can look at a pile of stuff and look at an empty hole inside of a trunk or wherever and put it together in his mind, and then just slot everything in like it was made to go together. It's remarkable. I'm also a good packer, but not as good as he is, so that's just better to let him do I get outta the way. I am more patient with humans. So when we are having trouble checking into an Airbnb or when there's a note left on your car that says, Hey, you can't park here, and we don't know why,'cause it's written in some other language,

audioAimee11292886823:

Yes.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

it really is smarter for me to step in and be calm and, and have the communication go through me. So figure out what you're good at and then get out of the way and let your spouse be good at what they're good at, and step up and do what you're good at. Okay. Those two of the things. Oh, and just the fact that we weren't always good at it. So those, those are the things that come to my mind immediately. And then the other thing is try to make choices that make moving easier. So like a good example, and this isn't really the specifically to moving, but it is the same lesson. I cannot tell you how many times we have gone to the grocery store without totes. And in Europe they do not give you bags.

audioAimee11292886823:

That's, that must be, that must be a French thing because in Spain they will, if you don't bring your own bag, they will give you a bag. They charge you, you know, like 10 cents for it. But they'll give you a bag.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

In France, even the paper bags, if they're available, which they're not actually that often easy to find, um, and are charged for, they are before you're actually checking out. Not by very far, but you would have to go get that bag. They do not have them at the cashier, uh, stand itself.

audioAimee11292886823:

that's inconvenient.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

So do you walk home with 50 things loose in your hands just because you're annoyed that you had to buy another tote? No, you buy the tote, so buy the luggage. That makes it easier to carry everything. Buy the totes that latch better. Just, you know, invest just enough that you're not creating more obstacles if you can avoid it.

audioAimee11292886823:

Awesome. I have an issue that I have not yet been able to solve in my life, and actually I may be in a place like a physical location now where it's potentially solvable, but as a five foot two female, they do not make backpacks that fit my body. Children backpacks are slightly too small. All other backpacks are much too big, and I have this absolutely fantastic, um, carry-on travel backpack that I got from E bags about 10 years ago. I think I love it aside from this fact that the straps are too long and I can't shorten them anymore. In order to get the bag to fit appropriately, so the bottom of the bag rests not on the small of my back, but just just above my sacrum, and so the bag pulls on my shoulders in a way that is. Uncomfortable all of the time and painful when we're, we have very long travel days and, and the bag is full and heavy, so, and this is just something like I just put up with, but being here in Europe, it's been worse and more cumbersome for me, in part because we're doing so much more. Traveling, you know, weekend trips and whatnot. Um, and now, especially this year, I'm doing so much more traveling back and forth right across the states and back and walking for a couple of miles on fucking cobblestone. With a 20 pound rock sack, and I say that in quotes, that doesn't fit your body properly when you are middle aged is just crummy. It's just crummy. But I haven't found an appropriate solution for it, and I'm, you know, the reason why I say maybe this is the place to find that solution is because here in Spain I can go in and purchase a pair of pants and they're not too long. They actually fit because the average Spaniard is not five foot eight or whatever the average American female's height is. She's a bit smaller. So maybe it's possible that I could get a backpack here that would meet my travel needs with regards to being super duper travel friendly, but also not like bust my back every time I'm trying to get from point A to point B. Um, we recently just bought a roller carry on and I'm gonna give that a try. Um,

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

And that's, that's part about where you're going too, right? Like if you're rolling things over, cobblestones, a backpack's gonna be easier if you're gonna be on smooth surfaces. Roller bugs are the best thing ever invented.

audioAimee11292886823:

Yeah.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

thought to where you're going, but I'm curious, you said it's literally just that the straps are too long, right?

audioAimee11292886823:

Yeah.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

So. There are in the United States even, there's places that repair luggage. So I'm thinking a leather maker, even my, maybe a cobbler could actually shorten the straps. Um, so a tailor, a

audioAimee11292886823:

it isn't,

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

a cobbler?

audioAimee11292886823:

it isn't that the straps, I mean the, you know, the padded, it's not a, there's no leather on the bag. It's, it's

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

No, I mean, but the webbing straps and

audioAimee11292886823:

yeah, yeah. It's all synthetic.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

to do that work. So I'm thinking a bag repairer or a um, shoe repairer might actually be able to shorten'em for you.

audioAimee11292886823:

That might be a possibility. That's something I could also look into, and I am preemptively exhausted thinking about, how do I say that in Spanish to look it up on Google? Who do I find?

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

And this is what takes us full circle to this whole conversation. Like with my, my shower organizer, when does the inconvenience. Becomes something that is so frustrating that it's actually changing the dynamic of the relationship with yourself or with the other people in the, in the space. If it's, I mean, this is my whole book, happy Starts At Home. That's what this is about. Don't change anything if it's all working for you, but if things in your home, whether that's a mobile home for you and I, or a rooted home like I used to have, if those things are literally. Increasing the number of arguments you're having with your spouse or increasing your fatigue so that you can't then enjoy your arrival or your adventure or your tasks or whatever. That's when, sure, it sucks to spend money on something when you quote, technically already have it, but life is too short. If you have the funds, life is simply too short to walk around. Hamstringed, that'd be like walking around in in shoes that are two sizes too small. That would just be stupid and people would be like, of course your feet hurt. Of course you're tired. Of course you don't like running because your equipment doesn't work for you. And with you.

audioAimee11292886823:

Right, right.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

I wish for you a good bag. You know, Asia might be a good shopping opportunity for that too. Hop over there.

audioAimee11292886823:

yeah, for sure. Yeah. Our son is currently obsessing over getting to Tokyo and like, hold on buddy. Hold on.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Does he know Damien's going,

audioAimee11292886823:

no, no.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

do you know Damien's going?

audioAimee11292886823:

Yes. I, I'd forgotten. I, I mean, I, I, yes, I know. I had forgotten. I have not told our kid, but he is, yeah. He's like, he really wants to go to Tokyo. And I'm like, well, let's, let's close up Europe first. Let's take advantage of what is literally in our backyard,

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

I know, I feel like

audioAimee11292886823:

in a couple years.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

just begin to crack the nut that is living in Western Europe. I am one tiny step closer to actually getting on the healthcare system the idea like I am nervous that Damien's gonna come back from Tokyo with the bug to do Asia, and I'm gonna be like, I am not ready yet. I've just become an adult. Again,

audioAimee11292886823:

Right, right. Well, I want to commend you for. Becoming an adult in less than two years, because it took almost two decades to do it the first time.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

is true.

audioAimee11292886823:

I, I think that's a radical shift in like, that's radical progress.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

It is awesome having fewer days where I don't feel like a complete idiot. I shall not lie. They still are here in multitudes.

audioAimee11292886823:

Totally, totally.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

But yeah, now, now our conversations are turning to what's next because Damien's schooling will be done, um, probably midway through this year. There's some things that are unknown right now.

audioAimee11292886823:

Midway through 2026 you mean?

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

20. Yes. Sorry, I lost track of where I was. We are midway through this year, so by midway through next year, his schooling should be done unless he chooses to take on another program. So we are starting to have these exact kinds of conversations. Where do we want to go next? How long do we need to be in places? This two month summer was a really good reminder of. My need for nesting, for, for knowing where the things are in my home.

audioAimee11292886823:

Yeah.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Even he was a little bit travel fatigued by the end, which is saying a lot, but it also highlighted what we need to spend in order for our homes to work for us. We already knew when we moved here that we need at least one room that has a door so that I can sound, isolate and do my work. Um, but. We are not happy on a ground floor. We tried that in lil, we do not like it. Partly'cause he's so security conscious that I can't just throw open all the doors and windows.

audioAimee11292886823:

Right.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

He's right about that. But I want everything wide open. So no ground floors. Um, if you can avoid it, no mosquitoes. Living in a space again where I can't just throw open the windows because I'm gonna be eaten alive at night. That's a killer. That was a real hard thing to navigate and still wake up on the sunny side of the bed.

audioAimee11292886823:

Yeah.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Um, so as we're, as we're now going into where do we land for these longer term stays, we have a bit more information about what really makes us happy and what isn't necessary. You know, I can handle the world's tiniest shower. While I love a good bath, it's a nice to have. Definitely not a need to have. Um, so I guess that's nice because it makes me feel like enough things are figured out that knowing that there's a big cliff in front of my life. Is a lot less scary than it was a year ago where if he'd even brought that up, it would put me in tears because I was just, I didn't have any coping mechanisms left from the adulting I was trying to do.

audioAimee11292886823:

Yeah, yeah.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

So whatever you're feeling out there, expats, that too will pass.

audioAimee11292886823:

There are waves of the ocean. They roll in, they roll out.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Yeah. Oh, one extra tip. I don't know if we've talked about this with the advent of chat, GPT. It is a great tool for expats if you aren't using it yet. Going on chat GPT and going, what are my best storage options in Paris based on the following criteria. It's a remarkable system, so use it to your advantage as you're traveling around. Don't just rely on regular Googling. It's a good tool anymore.

audioAimee11292886823:

A hundred percent. Yeah, I use both. Um. Because I still feel like even with some basic things that you never wanna trust chat GPTA hundred

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

fact check. Yeah.

audioAimee11292886823:

or you will end up going to a place that doesn't exist.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

But it's really great for planning out day trips. So, and when we were in Lil, I knew the kinds of things we wanted to find and I was able to put that in and say, what's within a three hour drive? That was very effective. And then I was even able to say, okay, put'em in order based on these priorities. So that was a huge time saver in trip planning that I am loving.

audioAimee11292886823:

Yeah, I've used it. I've used it to kind of lay out a loose plan for us in Marrakesh because we're doing a mommy son birthday trip

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

So jealous.

audioAimee11292886823:

I know. I'm so excited. And I was like, listen dude, we're taking two carry-ons each because. I might bring home a lot of stuff. I might be bringing home a lot of stuff, and if I make it to Turkey, I'm definitely, definitely gonna have checked bags because I might bring home a lot of stuff and then just leave it in the suitcase and take it to Alaska.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Um, what time of year are you guys gonna go?

audioAimee11292886823:

We'll be going the last week of September.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

That seems like a great time to go in terms of the weather and stuff

audioAimee11292886823:

Exactly.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Oh, that's exciting.

audioAimee11292886823:

Yeah.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Well, I've blathered on and I am still disoriented, so I don't even know what I've said. Is there anything useful that we can leave our listeners with?

audioAimee11292886823:

I think the whole conversation has been useful. I mean, it's part logistically navigating a very unstable living situation over and over and over again, and how to do that. And also how to be a better partner under times of stress. Like fantastic. I'm sure there's a lot of things that people can take away from, from the conversation today. Even if you have no idea what you said, you were still filled with wisdom.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

Oh, good. Well, I do know that I recommend anybody out there who's wanting a good couples book check out. It's not you, it's the Dishes. We were that early and it was. It just helped us frame conversations in ways that wasn't about you or me. It was about the task,

audioAimee11292886823:

Yeah.

audioRebeccaWest,Busi21292886823:

is a relationship saver right there.

audioAimee11292886823:

Awesome. Well, on that note, until the next time we chat Luego.

Speaker 2:

We hope you enjoyed this episode of Banla. If you did, the best thing you can do is share it with another person, brave enough to move abroad. See you next time.