I really love Belgium. It’s a criminally underrated country with a silly culture and a pretty fun vibe.

The bad news is that I’m Moroccan, and not just any Moroccan, a QUEER Moroccan (even more specifically, an aroace gender non-conforming Moroccan man), meaning basically everyone hates me.

I need to get the visa which takes forever to get and I have a chance of getting denied.

Right wing politicians in the country are basically super racist and really hate the immigrants so much (most of the bad apples are second generation folks that literally act like they’re having a stroke, even Moroccans hate them).

Housing is expensive basically everywhere. People in Belgium are pretty introverted (just like me), meaning they basically don’t care of my presence, but it’s much harder to make friends.

Everyone I know actively discourages moving there because they only know Brussels and… the snooze festival that is Charleroi or something, but they’ve never heard of Ghent or Hasselt or Bruges or Liège or Antwerpen (truly amazing cities) so they’re basically untrustworthy.

I’m so disconnected from the country I live in that I genuinely don’t feel Moroccan and want to get rid of my citizenship (spoiler alert: it’s quite literally impossible). But is it really easy to convince people? Actually, my family gets very mad when I say this because they’re super patriotic and shit.

I don’t even practice religion. I’ve never cared about it. I do believe in God, but I really lack that spirituality and whatnot that would make me “religious”. But unfortunately everyone would wanna kill me for apostasy.

I could go on, but we’d be here all day. Basically, I hate my country so much and I just want out so bad.

I don’t know how.

In a heartbeat if I could afford it

Yes. In fact it’s a done deal.

Yes!

My friend and I are actually planning to start taking trips to find which country we want to live in later on (we’re both single/childless). We’ve been looking around Europe and Southeast Asia.

North Americans, I’m one of you. You have to leave for a while. You gain perspective.

Back in '07, I left. I was in Australia in '09 and some Aussies asked me, ‘what’s it like living over there?’

The only thing I could come up with at the time was " causes neuroticism.’ It’s so much worse now that we have social media, smartphones, and a penchant for duelling forms of misinformation.

What I learned is that there are many ways to live. There are lots of goals people have — and can have — many of them are quite modest: a safe place to live, love, and feel part of community. There are much worse daily experiences than those we hear about in the news, or see on TV, or read about it books. There is truly grinding poverty and privation that does not translate well into a novel or an article — readership is fickle. Yet, from those ashes, there is still joy, levity, and grace.

So, we residents of the most powerful economies must see outside of our bubbles. We must see, first hand, how we are duped into believing there is only one set of goals, one North American dream, one prestige, and one centre of power. When you spend enough years away, you just might forget about homeownership, career-building, and fretting over retirement. You might find that life is about living, about doing good work, and about being with people you care to pass the time with.

At least, that’s what 12 years outside of NA taught me.

Well, I couldn’t, because we share custody of my stepson with his father for 5 more years.

After 5 more years, things might be very different, in one way or another.

If that wasn’t the case, I’d look at the happiness of various places. I think Denmark was #1? Probably be ok with the top 10 happiest countries.

I did move within the EU for studying and for work and it was generally a good experience and I would do it again. Am German and have been in Ireland for studying and lived in the Netherlands and Slovenia for work (although never longer than for one year).

Quite a few places, particularly if it was coupled with a decent job. Denmark, Norway, Finland, Iceland, Ireland, S. Korea, Japan, New Zealand, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland and mayyybe the US depending on how enticing the job was.

100% if I could afford it.

I have the choice of moving to Brazil, not Rio or São Paulo but to the north eastern part. I have too many family ties here in the US to make the move, but when I get older or if shit really goes off the rails here I will. I’ll probably just buy a small shipping container and bring my irreplaceable stuff in it and send it down on a boat. Would it be expensive? Sure, but if I sell off what I won’t be bringing it’ll more than outweigh those costs. Or maybe I’ll win the lottery, if I ever bought tickets.

I do have that option and choose not to exercise it because it would take me too far away from my kids.

I don’t know about MOVE move, but I did see some lovely little houses in Mexico that are pretty affordable. Might make nice winter homes.

I’m an American, so yes - in a heartbeat.

Broadly, I wouldnt much care where it was, just so long as it was somewhere that was not being actively transfomed into a plutocratic/christofascist autocracy.

And in fact, there’s virtually nothing that I want more at this point in time than to get the hell out while I can. I fully expect that if I don’t, I’m going to end up in prison or dead, just like so many other vocal dissidents under so many other authoritarian regimes.

SE Asian here. Currently doing my best to move myself and my family outta here to the west. Lemme know if any of you here got an IT job opening.