The first year in a new country is always the hardest.

Evan did what I did, he took to writing a blog to sort out the think through what he was seeing, experiencing and feeling. In this conversation we revisit an early blog post of his from when he first arrived in China. We chat about dogs, language and so many more nuanced aspects of Chinese (and American) culture.

🤸🏽Music from
Damon Castillo (earlier episodes): https://www.damoncastillo.com/
and
Key Frame Audio (more recent eps) :https://keyframeaudio.com/

🔥Need help with your podcast: https://www.coffeelikemedia.com/

Top 3 services that have help me while living in different countries (mostly for Americans): Affiliate links so I'll get a small commission.

🔥 Traveling Mailbox: scan/forward postal service for Americans. It's saved me time, money and headaches.
https://travelingmailbox.com/geopats/?ref=3422

🔥Chase Sapphire Credit Card: annual fee, NO currency conversion fee. Used this in many countries globally.
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🔥 Stackry: Shop in the U.S. and have the items shipped internationally.
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Do you have a spiritual home? Xing Zhao does. He's a Chinese Writer, Translator and former international student in Edinburgh, Scotland. Xing shares with us a blog post, Kapa Zhou, that he wrote during his first year studying in Scotland. He goes on to reflect on how his memories of that time period and how they are not fully represented in the blog entry. Xing also shared a post he wrote on the Chinese language version of this blog as advice to other international students. As someone who has taught international students both in Asia and in my passport country of the U.S, this was interesting insight to get first hand indeed.

Xing’s website: https://kapazhao.com/

🤸🏽Music from
Damon Castillo (earlier episodes): https://www.damoncastillo.com/
and
Key Frame Audio (more recent eps) :https://keyframeaudio.com/

🔥Need help with your podcast: https://www.coffeelikemedia.com/

Top 3 services that have help me while living in different countries (mostly for Americans): Affiliate links so I'll get a small commission.

🔥 Traveling Mailbox: scan/forward postal service for Americans. It's saved me time, money and headaches.
https://travelingmailbox.com/geopats/?ref=3422

🔥Chase Sapphire Credit Card: annual fee, NO currency conversion fee. Used this in many countries globally.
https://www.referyourchasecard.com/19Q/MDNYO68N38

🔥 Stackry: Shop in the U.S. and have the items shipped internationally.
https://www.stackry.com/register?referral=7118738...

Have your expectations about a place ever gotten you into trouble?

American expat Evan, also known as my husband, was kind enough to be our first guest on the podcast show back in 2017. He shared a group email that he wrote to his family and friends back home with us as well as what he thinks about his culture shock now, 20 years later.

🤸🏽Music from
Damon Castillo (earlier episodes): https://www.damoncastillo.com/
and
Key Frame Audio (more recent eps) :https://keyframeaudio.com/

🔥Need help with your podcast: https://www.coffeelikemedia.com/

Top 3 services that have help me while living in different countries (mostly for Americans): Affiliate links so I'll get a small commission.

🔥 Traveling Mailbox: scan/forward postal service for Americans. It's saved me time, money and headaches.
https://travelingmailbox.com/geopats/?ref=3422

🔥Chase Sapphire Credit Card: annual fee, NO currency conversion fee. Used this in many countries globally.
https://www.referyourchasecard.com/19Q/MDNYO68N38

🔥 Stackry: Shop in the U.S. and have the items shipped internationally.
https://www.stackry.com/register?referral=7118738...

Questions about family can be triggering if the experience was not ideal. This is one of the reasons that Steph's talked about her family in tiny drips here and there but not in depth. But it felt disingenuous to ask other expats to open up about their early family life growing up with immigrant parents without diving into these experiences herself. So to help with this tabled turned interview, Melissa was kind enough to hop in and guide the conversation.

Melissa's podcast: Tired In My Twenties: https://tiredtwenties.substack.com/

🤸🏽Music from
Damon Castillo (earlier episodes): https://www.damoncastillo.com/
and
Key Frame Audio (more recent eps) :https://keyframeaudio.com/

🔥Need help with your podcast: https://www.coffeelikemedia.com/

Top 3 services that have help me while living in different countries (mostly for Americans): Affiliate links so I'll get a small commission.

🔥 Traveling Mailbox: scan/forward postal service for Americans. It's saved me time, money and headaches.
https://travelingmailbox.com/geopats/?ref=3422

🔥Chase Sapphire Credit Card: annual fee, NO currency conversion fee. Used this in many countries globally.
https://www.referyourchasecard.com/19Q/MDNYO68N38

🔥 Stackry: Shop in the U.S. and have the items shipped internationally.
https://www.stackry.com/register?referral=7118738...

Have your immigrant parents ever visited you in any of your expat places? Georges' parents have and it shifted how he understood their struggles moving from Greece to Canada. We cover a lot more ground on his parents' immigrant story and how it has both positively and negatively influenced his own expat experience.

🤸🏽Music from
Damon Castillo (earlier episodes): https://www.damoncastillo.com/
and
Key Frame Audio (more recent eps) :https://keyframeaudio.com/

🔥Need help with your podcast: https://www.coffeelikemedia.com/

Top 3 services that have help me while living in different countries (mostly for Americans): Affiliate links so I'll get a small commission.

🔥 Traveling Mailbox: scan/forward postal service for Americans. It's saved me time, money and headaches.
https://travelingmailbox.com/geopats/?ref=3422

🔥Chase Sapphire Credit Card: annual fee, NO currency conversion fee. Used this in many countries globally.
https://www.referyourchasecard.com/19Q/MDNYO68N38

🔥 Stackry: Shop in the U.S. and have the items shipped internationally.
https://www.stackry.com/register?referral=7118738...

Have you ever wondered why your immigrant parent(s) didn't prepare you for being a global citizen?

Chelsea thought this when she was struggling in her first expat place. Over time she began to understand the distinct difference between her mother's immigrant experience and her expat one. In this conversation, we unpack the lasting impression that Chelsea's mom had on her expat life and which influences she kept and discarded.

🤸🏽Music from
Damon Castillo (earlier episodes): https://www.damoncastillo.com/
and
Key Frame Audio (more recent eps) :https://keyframeaudio.com/

🔥Need help with your podcast: https://www.coffeelikemedia.com/

Top 3 services that have help me while living in different countries (mostly for Americans): Affiliate links so I'll get a small commission.

🔥 Traveling Mailbox: scan/forward postal service for Americans. It's saved me time, money and headaches.
https://travelingmailbox.com/geopats/?ref=3422

🔥Chase Sapphire Credit Card: annual fee, NO currency conversion fee. Used this in many countries globally.
https://www.referyourchasecard.com/19Q/MDNYO68N38

🔥 Stackry: Shop in the U.S. and have the items shipped internationally.
https://www.stackry.com/register?referral=7118738...

How much do our immigrant parents impact our adult expat experiences? This is what we're exploring in this conversation with return guest Alison.

Alison and I dig into growing up with two unequal cultures in one household, the racial struggles she's seen in many countries during her years living outside of her passport country of the U.S. and her coming to terms with the differences between her mother's immigrant experience and her own expat life.

🤸🏽Music from
Damon Castillo (earlier episodes): https://www.damoncastillo.com/
and
Key Frame Audio (more recent eps) :https://keyframeaudio.com/

🔥Need help with your podcast: https://www.coffeelikemedia.com/

Top 3 services that have help me while living in different countries (mostly for Americans): Affiliate links so I'll get a small commission.

🔥 Traveling Mailbox: scan/forward postal service for Americans. It's saved me time, money and headaches.
https://travelingmailbox.com/geopats/?ref=3422

🔥Chase Sapphire Credit Card: annual fee, NO currency conversion fee. Used this in many countries globally.
https://www.referyourchasecard.com/19Q/MDNYO68N38

🔥 Stackry: Shop in the U.S. and have the items shipped internationally.
https://www.stackry.com/register?referral=7118738...

Language podcaster Craig is from the UK but has been podcasting in Spain for many years. Alternatively business podcaster Pilar has the opposite geographical podcasting experience being from Spain and podcasting from the UK for a long time. And yet they found each other and created a podcast about the scene in Spain some years ago. In this conversation with Craig and Pilar we dig into what they learned about podcasting in these two countries, how the space has changed since their podcast was live and how indy podcasting differs from business podcasting. These two folks are knowledgeable and are tapped into the space in a passion led way so there's a lot to learn from them. Let's get to it!

Pilar's podcast: Adventures in Podcasting

Craig's podcast: Inglespodcast

Their podcast on the Spanish podcasting space: https://enclavedepodcast.wordpress.com/

🤸🏽Music from
Damon Castillo (earlier episodes): https://www.damoncastillo.com/
and
Key Frame Audio (more recent eps) :https://keyframeaudio.com/

🔥Need help with your podcast: https://www.coffeelikemedia.com/

Top 3 services that have help me while living in different countries (mostly for Americans): Affiliate links so I'll get a small commission.

🔥 Traveling Mailbox: scan/forward postal service for Americans. It's saved me time, money and headaches.
https://travelingmailbox.com/geopats/?ref=3422

🔥Chase Sapphire Credit Card: annual fee, NO currency conversion fee. Used this in many countries globally.
https://www.referyourchasecard.com/19Q/MDNYO68N38

🔥 Stackry: Shop in the U.S. and have the items shipped internationally.
https://www.stackry.com/register?referral=7118738...