Twenty Years Abroad: What Happens When “Two Years” Becomes a Life

Tomorrow marks twenty years since I left the UK.

The move wasn’t part of some grand life plan.

It started with a small frustration. I’d been passed over for a promotion, not because I couldn’t do the job, but because they couldn’t backfill the role I was already doing. At the time it felt unfair. In hindsight, it changed the direction of my life.

So I did something that now feels strangely old-fashioned.

I saw a job advert in a newspaper. Not online. In an actual paper.

I sent an application letter through the post.

A few weeks later, on Christmas Eve 2005, I had a phone call with Gary, the man who would become my manager. Somewhere during that conversation, he convinced me to come to Bermuda for what he described as the adventure of a lifetime.

The plan was simple.

Go for two years. Earn some money. See the world. Then come home.

Twenty years later, I still haven’t.

Running Toward Something

Someone once told me that people move countries for one of two reasons.

They are either running from something or running toward something.

I was firmly in the second camp. I wanted sunshine, adventure, and the feeling of starting again somewhere new.

From the outside, these decisions are easy to judge. Leaving home can look reckless, selfish, brave, or foolish depending on where you’re standing.

The truth is usually more complicated.

You rarely know what someone is carrying or what path they’ve walked to get there.

Bermuda: The First Trade-Off

Bermuda was my first real lesson in trade-offs.

Life there had a rhythm to it. I lived next to the beach and my commute was less than ten minutes on a scooter. You worked hard, but the island slowed everything down. The ocean was always nearby. Sunshine was normal. Stress wasn’t the default.

You could breathe.

But Bermuda also carried a quiet understanding.

It was never permanent.

For most people there was no real path to citizenship. No matter how long you stayed, you were still a guest. The island gave you a wonderful life, but you knew it was borrowed time.

Sydney came later.

Sydney is different.

Sydney accelerates things. Careers move faster. Opportunities are bigger.

But the cost is different as well. The pace is higher. The housing market is brutal if you didn’t grow up in it. Buying into a city like Sydney when you haven’t grown through the market feels like arriving halfway through someone else’s race.

For a long time we weren’t even sure we could stay.

Then suddenly we could.

Permanent residency arrived. Later citizenship.

And with it something Bermuda could never offer.

Roots.

Every move abroad comes with trade-offs like that.

You gain something.

But you pay for it somewhere else.

The Momentum

Living abroad creates momentum.

At first the move feels temporary. It’s amazing how common the two-year plan is. I’ll try it and see if it’s for me.

But life quietly grows around you.

A job turns into a career. Colleagues become friends. You meet someone. You build routines.

Before long, the idea of staying somewhere new feels easier than the idea of going back.

You begin to realise you probably couldn’t just slot back into your old life anyway.

You become very good at adapting to new places, but not very good at standing still.

And if you move abroad with someone else, the experience can be a pressure cooker.

Living far from family, navigating visas, rebuilding life from scratch more than once, it puts strain on relationships.

You both change and grow.

You either grow together.

Or you grow apart.

I’ve experienced both.

The Strange Edge of Belonging

Belonging becomes complicated when you live abroad.

For years, I lived in what felt like a strange kind of purgatory. One visa renewal away from stability, one policy change away from being a visitor again.

You build a life somewhere, but legally and emotionally it can still feel temporary.

Citizenship in Australia changed that to a large extent.

Before that moment, I was always slightly on the edge.

Even socially it’s complicated.

In Sydney I’ll always be the guy with the British accent.

But when I go back to Plymouth now, I’m probably the guy who sounds a bit Australian.

Too Aussie for Plymouth.

Forever British in Sydney.

Living abroad slowly creates that strange middle ground.

You don’t fully belong to one place anymore.

You belong to several.

And sometimes to none.

Finding Your Tribe

One thing that helped enormously when arriving somewhere new was rugby.

Rugby clubs are a brilliant thing.

You can land in a new city, walk into a clubhouse, and immediately find people who will welcome you in. The humour is the same. The stories are familiar. Someone will hand you a beer.

Those friendships matter more than people realise when you’re rebuilding a life somewhere new.

Expats help you land.

Locals help you belong.

The moment your friendships include locals is the moment you stop feeling like a visitor.

A Life Across Continents

Looking back, the geography of the last twenty years is slightly ridiculous.

I’ve lived for at least a few months on every continent except Antarctica.

Even my marriage tells that story.

A European gets engaged to an African in South America.

They marry in North America.

Celebrate again in Africa.

Honeymoon in Asia.

And eventually settle in Australia.

At this rate we probably owe ourselves an anniversary at the South Pole.

Twenty Things I’ve Learned in Twenty Years Abroad

Why People Leave

1. People move abroad either running from something or running toward something.
2. The two year plan almost never stays two years.
3. Living abroad creates momentum that’s surprisingly hard to stop.
4. Sunshine and a warm ocean are worth chasing.

The Reality of Starting Again

5. Moving country is exciting and lonely at the same time.
6. Visas can make life feel permanently temporary.
7. Restarting your life more than once teaches you that you can adapt.
8. Fresh starts let you leave baggage behind, but they also erase shared memories.
9. Bureaucracy becomes a strange new hobby you never asked for.

Relationships and Community

10. If you move abroad with someone, you will either grow together or grow apart.
11. Communities like sports clubs become instant families.
12. Expats help you land.
13. Locals help you belong.
14. Some people will open their arms and adopt you. Others won’t.

Money and Practical Realities

15. Buying property somewhere expensive is hard when you didn’t grow up in that market.
16. Careers can accelerate in global cities, but the pace and pressure rise with them.

Identity and Perspective

17. Living abroad expands your perspective in ways that can’t be reversed.
18. You will always feel connected to your home country.
19. But every time you visit, you will feel a little more foreign there as well.
20. Distance from family is the real cost of adventure.

Those early years abroad feel a bit like old photos stored on forgotten hard drives.

Vivid, but scattered.

I tried to find a photo from my first months in Bermuda and couldn’t. The earliest one I could dig up was from 2007, possibly one of the last times I wore a tie to work.

That was around the time I finally joined Facebook.

Before that, most of those moments weren’t stored anywhere online. If you didn’t print a photo or back it up somewhere, it just disappeared.

Staying in touch with home was different too.

No WhatsApp. No FaceTime. Skype was barely a thing.

Connection with family came through a long-distance calling plan and carefully watching the clock while you talked.

Which feels strangely appropriate.

Those early years abroad exist a bit like that too.

Vivid, but scattered.

Twenty years ago I thought I was leaving home for two years.

What I didn’t realise then is that living abroad opens something in your mind.

Once that happens, there’s no real way to close it again.

Your world gets bigger.

And you can never quite go home in the way you once imagined.