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Your exposure to poverty, diverse areas in your host country...
I have just been reading a great deal about the Tottenham riots and noted that the area is economically deprived. Every one out of two children is living in poverty and the unemployment rate is one of the highest in London. The area is also home to a high Afro-Caribbean migrant community.
I have been there, for work, and I have to say I did notice the economic deprivation when I arrived. We were early and got off at the wrong stop. There was no starbucks or even McDonalds off the high street to stop and get a cup of coffee and honestly, I wouldn't have wanted to venture into their shops. The whole area made me a little unease.
So this leads me to my question. As expats, and by our very nature, we typically are of a higher education level that is needed to become expats (sans the marriage route to remain in our host country due to work and visa requirements) and therefore, often have a certain level of economic means. How exposed are you to the areas of your host country that are both ethically and economically diverse? Do you think you are sheltered as an expat or not at all?
I'm really just interested in everyone's own take based off of what I've been reading and conservations I had yesterday with DH and some friends.
Re: Your exposure to poverty, diverse areas in your host country...
This is an interesting question. Tottenham is the first area I'd ever stayed in London because my gf from the States was doing a 6-month internship as a social worker there and it was the only 1 bedroom apartment she could find that was affordable for her to pay in dollars while she was working unpaid. I must have been completely ignorant because I didn't feel unsafe there at all. Though it was my first time in London so I'd thought maybe it was just that diverse everywhere.
For my situation, one of the hardest transitions situations for me to handle has been not having the benefits of an expat, but also not having the benefits of a local. I'm married to a Dutchie so my visa was the family visa route.
While the Netherlands is a great place for expats, with the tax benefits, stable economy, relatively high quality of living, and vacation time; I've found it harder for me to be "kind of" in the category of the locals. If you're Dutch, and don't know any different, then it's fine; but taxes are very high and salaries are quite low here.
This is also an incredibly hard place for starters because our housing market is regulated and the private rental market is almost completely unaffordable but the public market has an income limit that is very unrealistic (and long waiting lists to boot).
If we were to want to rent in Amsterdam VIA the public sector, the woningbouw, then a 3 bedroom place for our family would have approximately a 120-130 month waiting list. TEN freaking years! Obtaining a mortgage is also very difficult here, hence the reason we've elected to stay with my IL's the past year. H's student loan counts against us as debt because he studied in the US so unless my FIL applies for the mortgage then it's virtually impossible for us to buy right now.
Going back to the original question, no I don't feel like I've experienced a ton of diversity or poverty where I'm living. If anything, I feel like I've had a front-row seat to the show called, "A lot of Dutch people hate foreigners." I've really heard some disgusting comments about the foreigners that do not come out of western countries since I've moved here. I do live in a predominately white, upper-middle/upper-class village though, so my experience has been incredibly different from people live in other parts of Holland.
I dont think that being an expat means that you are sheltered. Or that expat = rich. I live in a ethically and economically diverse neighborhood. I feel quite safe here. The streets are always full of people even at night and there is not a lot of violent crime in Spain. Maybe, if you are with someone from your host country, you might have more contact with a wider range of people because of their family, friends etc.
I don't think expat equals rich, but in many cases being an expat means you either have a good paying job (company transfer, etc) or you have the skills and education to obtain a visa which often means you will be able to find a good paying job.
I live in a neighborhood that is mixed. We live in a brand new highrise,yet when you look out the window you see mostly old homes that look awfully small and dingy. I would not call this poverty, but just the labor class. Hard working people that collect trash, sell trinkets, clean streets etc. And a sizable portion of them are elderly. And we live right by the subway, so there are few panhandlers as well.
The contrast that I have seen has been among the expats. Small little apartments for the English teachers. These are nice: looks like a studio in Manhattan. Or expansive, spralling 3 bedroom flat with a huge living room and kitchen with an amazing view. For those who were sent here for their husbands job.
In Norway, there really isn't poverty to speak of. I don't really see any, but I don't think that's because I'm an ex-pat. I do miss out on some of the social issues because I don't speak the language, but I do know a bit about the asylum seekers since a huge part of the language training and immigrant culture is focused towards them (and affects me as a fellow immigrant).
There is a bit of socio-economic diversity, but very little thanks to the flat pay structure. My ex-pat contract does give me a huge boost, because otherwise everyone doing this kind of work just makes roughly the same salary. But it's not enough to make me financially sheltered, considering I have to save more for my retirement and travel much farther to see my old friends/family.
China, however... Oh yes, being an ex-pat often means being sheltered. You live in a gated complex with a guard whose sole purpose is to keep "locals" out (to the point where the food delivery guy in his "Italian Restaurant" uniform still needs your explicit permission to get through the gate. In the big cities, you don't see as much of the true poverty, but you definitely see lower incomes. There are the people who sweep the streets and make as much in a month as you probably spend on taxi fare. There are the migrant construction workers who live hundreds of miles from their families because they'll make a little more in the city than they would at home. And even among the more middle-class people, you learn shocking things like the fact that your "cheap" $1 beer is five times what they would consider paying, and they'll spend two hours on a bus to save 25? over a 30-minute subway ride.
And that's just in the city. People often commented on the poverty if you travel outside of Beijing (e.g. on the way to the airport), but that's nothing. When you get into the rural areas in the country's interior, there are people living in mud shacks (or worse), who live off so little that it's hard to even comprehend.
This is a tough question, at least up where we are. There seem to be three distinct groups up here. Aboriginals, Asian Immigrants, and everyone else.
The Aboriginal Communities are pretty much off limits to anyone who isn't a member. For example the largest community we have takes about an hour to drive to, but only 15 minutes by boat. H's company might get a contract to ferry the doctors, school teachers etc over, BUT they have to have a tribal elder on board in order to land at the community piers. So, no, I don't have any exposure there.
Public housing is hard to find and there is something like a 10 year waiting list. They are thinking about/trying to build 20 units blocks in two of the beach communities and there is a huge uproar that the gov't is buying beach property for public housing. As for Low-Income housing, it's all interwoven into existing neighborhoods. The gov't encourages private investors to buy houses and rent them out at 20% below market value and you get some pretty sweet mega tax breaks/refunds. I could buy the house next door and turn it into low-income housing. So again, it's hard to say what my exposure really is.
The country/rural culture up here with people parking on their front lawns, the clothes lines/W&D's, 2nd fridges under the raised houses, couches on the front porch etc, all make it seem just a step above the trailer park stereo-type. If one was to leave the tourist area, you would think you were driving in an economically depressed area, but then again, we do have the highest unemployment rate in all of Australia.
I think this is a very interesting question. Due to my job, I see areas of London that I would not otherwise have had a reason to go to and they are certainly more economically and ethnically diverse than the area I live in. I had this conversation with my husband too because he is not exposed to these things like I am as he is more sheltered due to his job.
I spend time going into people's flats on council estates and see a large number of schools. It is definitely eye opening. I also spend a lot of time walking through these areas and traveling by bus through them too. I think this gives me a better view of London as a whole and let's me see a bigger picture than if I didn't work or had a different job.
We live in a diverse area i would say maybe 10% of the people who live in our neighborhood are Swiss and then a few Germans. Most of the people living in the complex are eastern European or North African. Not everyone is well off there are cases of 6 people living in a 2 bedroom apartment. Even though we live further from the city center the rent is outrageous. We pay 1,300 Swiss francs a month for a 1 bedroom.
There is a lot of racism. Right know there are posters all over the city that say stop mass immigration with shadow figures walking. These posters are put up by one of the political parties. Last Monday was national day and the elected official got all excited and raised his voice about how great Switzerland is and how open they are. But then in the next part contradicted himself and said how the immigrants are taking over and the Germans are taking advantage. A large part of the workforce in Switzerland is German because there are not enough Swiss people to fill the jobs.
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Eindhoven has the highest crime rate in the Netherlands and is really diverse. I don't see tons of poverty, mostly due to the reasons Ashley described above, but I have seen some homeless people out in the morning during my run.
Being on an expat assignment, for us, is very fortunate. There's no way we could have afforded to live in Europe without it.
We don't have any special situation here - we just work at normal Edinburgh jobs and make normal salaries. Edinburgh is a funny city - it's so filled with tourists and universities that it can feel kind of like a fantasy city instead of a real place. There isn't a single area in the city where I wouldn't be completely safe walking around by myself at any time of night. It's pretty surreal. Our building doesn't even have a lock on the front door so anyone can just walk into our buildling at any time. And it's not a problem!
After so long here, both of us are losing a lot of our 'street smarts' - we forget that we can't just do whatever we want when we're back in the states or travelling around. It's still pretty strange for us, we are so very sheltered here but that's just how the city is, it's bizarre.
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I know that we am definitely sheltered because we need translators to do everything for us and are living in much better conditions than most people in the country. The average salary here is 500 dollars a month per family (usually only the husband works), so obviously we are making more than that. When we were apartment hunting we saw much worse places to live than the place we are at, and I know that even those were not so bad compared to what some people have. However, they are making lots of improvements so I think that progress is being made here.
At the same time, because there aren't that many foreigners here, we are not sheltered in the sense that we live in an expat area, or can live our own parallel lives. We go to the same pool halls and restaurants that Turkmen do just because there isn't really much segmentation.
Really? I had a friend who went to Uni Edinburgh and lived above a park that was known as "Needle Park" because people used to rob people by threatening them with needles that supposedly had HIV infected blood in them. Maybe this was just a rumor, but she definitely hurried through that park at night. It was at the northern edge of town near Strathsclyde Uni, I think.
Strathclyde is in Glasgow. Glasgow is entirely different - there are definitely areas I wouldn't walk around on my own!
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Hmmm, I think it depends on where you lived in the US and what you were exposed to. Coming from the DC suburbs, I was surrounded by affluent people - all from different backgrounds as it's such a diverse city - but we were more sheltered from poverty than in England. I think it's down to how classes operate, and how they are set apart (or together), in the US vs. England.
It's really difficult to say one part of London, or one city or village in England, is bad. For every "bad" neighborhood, there seems to be a "good" one next to it. I think this is down to the move from tower blocks of lower-income people and/or people on benefits (similar to projects) to integrating them with middle-class (or even upper class - there are flats in Mayfair that are considered social housing) in the last decade. All new build communities in England have to include a percentage of homes for social housing. Their homes are identical to those that are privately owned. The idea is to avoid segregation and breeding grounds for crime.
I've been exposed to more poverty in England than I ever was in the US because of this. While places like Tottenham certainly have a rough reputation, I know that there are all classes of people living there. Do I think this is better than in the US where we are segregated? We could be here all day discussing that one!
As for the crime aspect, even with the recent news, I feel safer in all parts of London than I ever did in, say, parts of DC.
I also am married to a Brit (who is from outside London) and through him, I've seen a lot more of the "real" England so maybe that helps my perspective on things. I am not sheltered as an expat. But are some expats sheltered? Yes. I know some expats that think the rest of England is like the Cotswolds or Bath. I know expats who drive everywhere in London because they don't feel safe on the tube. I know expats who make sweeping generalizations about areas in London that they've never been to. So I think it's a choice we all have while living abroad - to break out of expat circles, to see more than just the tourist spots, to understand the culture better, etc. I'm preaching to the choir here, I know.
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OK, than maybe it was Napier or Herion-Watt. This was definitely in Edinburgh - I was visiting her from St. Andrews and I hadn't been to Glasgow until another trip in 2007. In any event this was in 2002 and even then it was old news. All I know is that back then there were parts of Edinburgh that didn't feel so safe. Maybe that's just the difference between walking through a park and on a well-lit street.
In Egypt, the gap between the rich and the poor is incredibly high. Initially we lived downtown in a straight middle class neighborhood for about nine months before moving to a nicer, upper middle class neighborhood just across the river. I loved where we lived, and especially liked that it was a little less expat-y, but the main reason we moved was to curb the harassment a bit.
Yes, there is a bit of sheltering in Egypt, because quite frankly the average expat has no business walking around in one of really poor neighborhood. You're not invited, and poverty is not a tourist attraction. I've accidentally wandered a few blocks one way or another and was super uncomfortable. In one of the two instances, it was made pretty clear that I was lucky DH was with me. (Although I'm pretty sure they thought I was a prostitute because I was with a white guy.)
However, in Cairo most expats do not come anywhere near as wealthy as most of the Egyptian students that also attend schools like American University in Cairo. Aside from having their social circles mainly set, I found that I had to limit hanging out with my wealthier Egyptian friends because I couldn't afford to do their activities all the time. It's a strange mix.
And yes, being and expat (at least in Pre-Revolution Egypt) Cairo came along with a huge amount of privileges and general legal exceptions. Sad but true, and in some ways greatly appreciated. (One example: No alcohol sold in Ramadan except to foreigners).
Now with Afghanistan, I'm expecting a whole different ballgame. Significantly more poverty, and significantly more sheltering. I think it might be difficult to adjust to not being able to go out walking when/wherever I like.
This is an interesting question. I lived in Madrid, but that probably doesn't count as a true "expat" experience because I was a student. Fast forward a few years, and I've lived in Mexico and the UK as an expat:
Mexico - DH is Mexican and his family lives there, so I was very enmeshed in Mexican culture. DH's family and friends are of the financially fortunate, so our standard of living was luxurious, even by US standards. Yes, I saw poverty, but we lived in a bubble (the most affluent suburb in the whole of Latin America). When we would leave our neighborhood, however, we'd see some sad realities.
UK - No, I haven't seen true poverty here yet, certainly not what I saw in Mexico. We live in Chelsea, which is a nice neighborhood.
My aunt and her family live in Tottenham and I've been there once. I actually didn't think of it as a poor neighborhood (maybe because they aren't). I just saw it as diverse. Many people are uncomfortable in "diverse" neighboorhoods even when it's not a poor one.
Expats in my home country tend to be sheltered and tend to live in gated communities. They typically work for oil companies and I even heard that some have separate entrances to their office building from the locals. That was a recent revelation that I couldn't believe. I'm sure they get exposed a little to poverty since there is begging on the roads so I'm sure they see that on their way to work.
Growing up in a crappy neighborhood on Chicago's south side exposed me to poverty (and different cultures) long before I moved to Seattle or Quebec City. I am happy I grew up the way I did because I have a lot of understanding when someone is struggling, even though I'm now one of "those" expats who lives in the nicest area of QC.
Here, even the "poor" area looks nice to me. It's a really safe, touristy city and I've never once been afraid of walking around even if it's in the middle of the night. I barely lock my doors - strange for me. I actually prefer the so-called "bad" town where all of my new friends (who are all immigrants trying to make it here) live than my haute neighborhood.
I'm more uncomfortable in affluent areas. Still. Even though I have money now and a semi-prestigious job. I hate having to try and be something I'm not. I grew up to resenting the rich and well-educated. I've become what I hate!
Fortunately, as an expat here, I live a very comfortable life. The gap between those who have and those who work to survive is VERY big and very distinct here in India. In Chennai, our house in located down the block from the British High Commission, and right across the street from a slum. Two very different worlds.
It's hard to see children begging on the streets while you're driving around town or people sleeping on the sidewalks. But, you can't give money to everyone that asks. You'd be giving non-stop.
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I agree with this, being married to a Brit and living in the UK I think I saw a different side of things. I had many friends who were expats and it was definitely a different lifestyle. Then again we lived in Wimbledon, which was a nice area to live in, and we lived near the Village, which was even nicer. We could walk to South Wimbledon and feel totally different, or go one train stop away to Colliers Wood and it was even more shady, for lack of a better word.
Public transportation makes a huge difference as well. I would see kids hanging out at the Wimbledon train station that I know were not from that area, but it is easy to hang out in places when you can take the train there. The same is true for where we live now in Atlanta, we are close to our train line, and we are inside the city, not in the burbs, and therefore we have more crime. We also live very close to a heavily Latino area, and while I don't think twice about it I have had people ask me if we have a lot of crime because we live close to the 'hood'. I seriously was like 'what are you talking about?' because it never occurs to me to think of it that way. Our neighborhood is most definitely not 'the hood', and I would say the average house price is $500k and up, but we are blocks away from apartments so run down they should be condemned yet people live there.
I love areas that are going through regntrification (sp?), even though I grew up in an almost exclusively white affluent suburb. In DC I lived in the U Street area well before it became what it is today, and we used to hear gun shots on a weekly basis behind our house, which was an empty lot. Now it is a Starbucks. I liked the area more before it changed.
How exposed are you to the areas of your host country that are both ethically and economically diverse? Do you think you are sheltered as an expat or not at all?
Naples is generally poor. That said, there's tremendous wealth for some in the area; sadly, the majority have ties to organized crime. Obviously, not everyone that's comfortable or, as we would say in the States-- middle class, is corrupt. For example, my landlord is an accountant and earns a normal wage and lives a "normal" (middle/upper-middle class) life. But I'd say, a solid 60% of the population lives in (by EU standards) poverty, 10% lives in crazy affluence (largely ill-gotten), and the middle 30% is, well, between the two extremes.
The (vast) majority of the population is homogenous-- Italian and Catholic. There are some immigrants, who largely (again, I'm generalizing, but it's what I've experienced) accept jobs Italians don't/won't perform. Many Eastern Europeans work as house-keepers (ours in Ukrainian, actually) and many African immigrants work in agriculture. And of course, sadly there's a fair amount of immigrants who are victims of human trafficking-- from prostitution to working in illegal factories (making hi-end knock offs).
The book Gomorrah (pun on Camora, the Neapolitan mafia) provides an excellent overview of real life in Naples.
As for us-- we're sheltered, but we're not. Property crime is everywhere. We've been lucky (and hope to continue that trend), but very likely it won't last. Many, many friends have been victimized.
Nigeria.