Be warned, you’re in for some price shocks. Cost of living in NZ is nuts atm. Best of luck tho, it’s a solid place.
Did you get a job before moving? Just curious about the logistics of a visa
It hadn’t really occurred to me to seriously ask where an American could leave to and become a citizen. I’ve got a degree in Information Systems and I work I.T., which I would think would be relatively valuable somewhere.
“IT” as in operations, networks, security, support, or? I mean a suitable background in networks and you’d make 130k USD plus pension as a networking consultant in Denmark. IDK about citizenship though. As with all the rest of Europe, we’ve seen a rise in right wing populism and are now suffering from its resulting inane immigration laws.
But if you’re in for the adventure, then you could look outside the list of English speaking countries. There’s The Netherlands, Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, we all speak English and we all have healthcare… But don’t go to Sweden, they suck :-)
There are a shit ton of companies in my area that are looking for IT people here in Germany, and I think thats the case all over Europe.
I looked into moving to Germany a few years ago, I also work in IT. The part I had an issue with was figuring out how much I need to get paid to have a similar life style there. Taxes and cost of living is was different, especially if you want to live near a city.
The other issue is my wife works in health care but her job seems to be covered by nursing with a specialty in respiratory therapy. Here in the states we have people that are only respiratory therapists, couldn’t figure out how that would move over.
Nice, NZ will welcome you here.
So I’ve been seriously thinking about NZ for a while now, was filling out the application and figuring out banking and such until they changed their immigration policies about a year ago. When did you start your process? How long did it take? Is it a work visa? If so how did you find an employer willing to sponsor?
skilled migrant route. got a residence class visa before getting on the plane. My partner and I are STEM and medical so SMV seemed a good route.
That’s great, I’m STEM too and had been looking at the same thing but seemed like you had to get a job before you could get the VISA and trying to line that up seemed like a chicken and egg situation with employers wanting people who were already work authorized?
Good luck man!
As someone that left the US a decade and a half ago, here’s some things to go ahead and start getting answers to so you don’t have to figure it out when the time comes:
- Figure out how to get a bank account (hopefully you’ve already worked this one out before arriving)
- Where to buy toiletries and medicine. Specifically deodorant. The UK is mostly spray deodorant where as I’m a stick deodorant person. At one point I was just bringing 4 sticks of deodorant back with me after every trip home. I’m not sure which way NZ leans but it was definitely something I hadn’t considered before
- Where to buy socks and underwear you’re comfortable with
- Figure out how the health service/insurance works. Go ahead and book dentist and doctors appointments 6 months in advance if possible so you get in the habit.
- Figure out how paying taxes works
- If you’re a US citizen, remember you’re still required to file taxes with the IRS every year.
- Learn how to make friends. I still haven’t figured this one out. Let me know if you do.
- Call or go to a Kiwibank, ANZ, ASB, BNZ, Westpac bank branch in any mall in which ever city you land at (probably Auckland but could be Christchurch)
- Supermarket for toiletries. Pharmacy for medicine. Some larger supermarkets have pharmacies in them. Supermarkets are Pac’n’Save, New World, Woolworths, Freash Choice, 4Square. Pharmacies are Unichem, Chemist’s Warehouse, Random mum and pop one off pharmacy
- Both types of deoderant (stick or spray) are readily available. Lynx is typically known as Axe in other parts of the world.
- The Warehouse or Kmart for cheap socks and undies. Farmers for midrange stuff. Boutique stores for high range
- Public health care for emergancy and accute need. GPs are roughly $35 to $70 for a checkup or general appointment
- get an IRD number from the IRD, work out your tax code (its probably ‘M’) then tax is mostly automatically deducted and paid by your employeer
- really!? Sounds like a double tax whamy… Ouch
- join clubs, hiking club, cricket club, soccer club, rugby club. Pubs and drinking are popular too. Most pubs run a quiz once a week ask the announcer about joining a random team
Excellent list, I hope OP see’s it!
Also, I should have added a caveat to that last bullet: learn how to make friends without becoming an alcoholic. Meetup.com is usually the answer for finding readily available like minded people interested in the same physical activity as you, but meeting a whole bunch of new people at once can be overwhelming.
The deodorant availability trauma is real and brings untold migrant suffering every year.
He’s getting out!
Quick, drag him back in!
Nah, I want to see his dash cam later.
Nicest people in the world… until they get behind the wheel and turn into violent psychopaths. But then again, I drove mostly around Auckland.
Congratulations
good luck on your journey.
Good choice
congrats.
Congratulations! Made it to the UK from the US yesterday myself. Let’s hope our new lives will be great!
Welcome to the uk did you pick up your complementary kettle on the way in? Sorry the rail network is such a mess but what can you do. Glad to have you bud o7
Honestly, other than the fact that we were really confused about where to go due to poor signage (and missed our train twice and got lost when we were supposed to change trains), we enjoyed the train ride. We did pay for first class on for the Avanti West portion, but it was worth every penny. (Or am I supposed to say worth every p now?) And since we came from the land of very few trains that all suck, the actual train rides were great. And people were super helpful with our heavy luggage.
Glad to hear you arrived safe and well. Also, for your information :
Galleons: The primary unit of currency, typically made of gold. One Galleon is worth 17 Sickles.
Sickles: The second unit of currency, made of silver. One Sickle is worth 29 Knuts.
Knuts: The smallest unit of currency, made of bronze.
P.S. : Next time for the train you should get to Platform 9 and 3/4You mean they won’t accept cowrie shells or cocoa beans? What kind of a place is this?!
😋 Today i learned about :
Cowrie shells
(from GPT) … were widely used as a form of money in many parts of the world, particularly in Africa, Asia, and the Pacific Islands. Their durability and portability made them a practical medium of exchange.
Such culture ! I’m convinced you will find a great job and i hope the best for your kid as well. Take care 😌Thanks!
That sounds a bit transphobic
It sounds like an RPG.
It’s still known as pennies here. It makes more sense for a pence to be called a penny than it does for a cent to be called a penny.
Good to have you here comrade.
Glad to be here!
You’d better have a tv license or your going to jail
Or learn the old “eat the TV before the inspector arrives”.
I guess I’m showing my age, but hopefully enough old folks get it.
“Don’t worry, lads. I always poo before I get up.”
Hopefully OP can live with trading “needing a TV license for a TV no one uses anymore” and “actual healthcare” for a “failing democracy turned Christian nationalist oligarchy”!
Oi sunny boy u got a loisense for that loisense?!
Let me see your license request license
Oi sonny Jim this isn’t a loisense request this is a loisense request request it’s a different department Oi hope you’ve got all yer paperwerk in order jimbo
Only if you have a TV. Theoretically, you need one to stream the BBC/ITV and such on a computer/phone, but the onus is not on you to prove that you didn’t. You’ll get letters asking to confirm that you don’t need a licence, and then threats of an inspection to make sure you don’t have a TV that’s on and being used to watch TV, though I’m not sure if they follow through with the latter. (In the analogue days, they had detector vans that either could detect TV tuners tuned to channels or were a bluff to get people to pay up, though they seem to have given up on that.)
The detector vans were real, and they weren’t a bluff, but the tech they used wasn’t some high tech signal detector. The secret is that they just pointed a parabolic microphone (possibly a laser microphone at a later time) at your window and listened for the audio. The operator would flip through TV channels in his van and try to match the audio from your house to the audio from a currently broadcasting TV station. That was sufficient to determine if someone was watching broadcast tv or not.
Ah interesting, here in Switzerland the rule was if you have a capable device that’s enough. They didn’t have to prove usage.
And now that they also stream online, any computer and smartphone counts. So they recently changed the rules to just charge every household.
They don’t follow up on the threats - or at least not regularly. (9 years and counting here - even if I somehow get caught and fined the max amount I’ve still saved money)
I’ve heard this joke many times, never understood it.
Does UK need licenses for everything or something?
They have a license you’re supposed to have to watch the BBC basically a TV tax for people who actually watch it. License enforcement has always been off their rockers. Back in the day they said they had a TV detector van that they would drive around and detect if you were watching a TV without a license. They send you threatening letters if you don’t have a license. They’ll even come to your door and try to make you prove you don’t have a tv. You can just tell them to leave.
And a stabbing license
Edit: Y’all motherfuckers need to get educated https://youtu.be/g1HQ3Eyu2Jw
Stabbing? American here, never heard of it…, it’s like shooting but no range, lower body count, and not something a physically inferior person can do to anyone equally effectively, right?
Welcome! Weather’s a bit shite at the moment and monsoon season (February to May) is just around the corner, but it’ll brighten up for 2 weeks in June and for the last 2 weeks of August.
Drop me a DM if you’re heading up Manchester way and I’d happily give you a tour and you’re more than welcome to come over to my family’s place for a Sunday Roast.
You should have seen what it was like when we left the U.S. in terms of weather. This is far better. Thanks!
Would you mind sharing how you moved to the UK and what the requirements / difficulties were? Thank you!
I am happy to share, but I am afraid it won’t help many others. I am lucky because of who my father was.
https://www.gov.uk/apply-citizenship-british-parent/born-before-1983
Ah I see, well thanks anyways haha!
Damn, that’s great to hear. Welcome in Europe comrade.
Wondering why I hadn’t see you posting much recently. May and September are the two best weather months on the south of the UK.
We welcome you!!!
Thank you!
Congrats on having a backbone. Hope you enjoy the vast experiences in your new life!
Having a backbone would be to stick around and fight this shit; not flee.
Neither is easy.
That’s a bit harsh. Like my old man always said, “you gotta know when to hold 'em; know when to fold 'em; know when to walk away and know when to run.”
Your dad was Don Schlitz? Or was he Kenny Rogers?
Actually, my dad hated that song. It was my mom who was whistling it all over the house.
That song is about a gambler’s desire for selfish self-preservation, not “having a backbone”
It might be, but if you think about it, it also applies to life in general, which has a lot in common with gambling. Sometimes you have to take risks, sometimes the risks are stupid…
You’re kidding me! Now I need to go and read the lyrics.
It’s not. Granted, I 100% respect and understand someone’s decision to leave the USA at this time, but there’s very little that’s courageous about putting yourself into a better situation. It’s the next option up from rolling over and dying.
Yeah, walking away from every person you’ve ever known and every support system you’ve ever had in hopes of a better future with no real promises to fall back on if it doesn’t work out isn’t courageous at all.
I’d call courageous moving into a red state… and then everything you said above still applies. I moved from a red state to a blue state in October. Everything you said applies to me, but I can assure you that my decision was not one that was “courageous.” It’s self preservation.
Self preservation can take courage.
You’re being nitpicky for no reason. Something can be courageous without being the most courageous thing anyone has ever done.
If the US had an actual democracy and ability to fight back, you’d be right. But we don’t, so you aren’t.
You can’t expect people to take up arms and go kill cops and politicians, even if that’s what’s needed. That is a hell of a lot to ask of someone. Why aren’t you doing that right now? Are you scared?
Yeah, them and everyone else is too.
Although I personally did begin educating myself and training with a rifle about 2 years ago; it’s not the correct tool for the job at this time.
Right now is a time to come together and organize. Earlier today on a different thread I posted up the .pdf of the memo from OPM that directed federal agencies to send out that fascist email that went out yesterday/ the day before, and within it, there’s a copy of the standard format email template that’s going to be used to fire a bunch of federal employees within the next couple of days.
I moved from FL to Colorado to organize around more people like myself; I am fighting right now but it’s not with a rifle.
deleted by creator
I didn’t expect such a backlash from a dumb comment which was only intended to reference The Gambler.
People have been fighting for like 8 years now.
Its over, sometimes it best to just walk away.
Hope down under treats you better
NZ? You a billionaire?
