8 Reasons how this world was not made for expats | Why it's sometimes tricky to live abroad

For me, slow travel also means living permanently abroad.

You would think living as an expat in Spain should be easy as an EU citizen, right?

Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't change my life as "slow traveller" to anything, but let me tell you why this world is not made for expats.

All expats are very aware of need for using VPNs and constantly figuring which language version of a website they should use.

This highlights how our digital identities are still stubbornly national.

The Issue: Geo-blocking. You pay for streaming services, subscriptions, and even banking apps that suddenly decide you're a security risk because you're in a different country.

Example: Well, this is just another silly goose issue that does not exist for a regular hometown girl, but for me, a daily issue.

For example, I occasionally still like to watch Finnish TV series that can be watched online.

Until now all has been going well with my fave programs, but suddenly they decided that the programs are only available in Finland - or if you have a paid subscription with Finnish bank card.

So I had subscribed to this service called Ruutu.fi, just to discover that even with the paid version I can't see the show aymore, because I would need to have a Finnish payment card.

I mean this is just a silly example, as I can live without my reality TV program Erikoisjoukot. :D

But the next one Matt faced was a bit bigger hurdle to tackle.

Yup, you read right. You have a loan in a country that you no longer live in; thus, you don't have an address in the country anymore.

This happened to Matt (my Dutch boyfriend) with his student loan. He needs to obviously pay it back, but he can not do it himself as it can be done only if you have a Dutch bank. And to have a Dutch bank, you need a Dutch address.

As this stupid bureaucracy really annoyed him, he wants to pay it off as slowly as possible. :D

In practice this means, his parents need to pay it, as they live in the Netherlands, and he pays in junks for them beforehand.

This gets me to even more of a nomadic lifestyle point. We started this trip to Spain as a roadtrip, traveling slowly throughout Europe, undecided if we will settle for longer or not.

The issue: Unfortunately, you can't do that for too long, as the world runs on a fixed address. For digital nomads, this is the ultimate hurdle, as you don't really want to have your address at your parents' place when you're 30.

Surprisingly many things become impossible if you do not have a registered address.

Need a phone number? Give me your address.

Need a bank account? What's your address.

Wanna start a business? Let's start with the address.

Wanna pay taxes? Give me the address.

Need healthcare? What's your permanent address to grow old and die.

And well, if you want a registered address in Spain, you need to get a certificado de empadronamiento. If you are renting, you need permission from your landlord to do that (and deal with the bureaucracy to actually get this.)

Needing an address forces you to put down roots, to simply exist within the system.

To be honest, this needing a permanent address forced us to do quite quick and big decisions in a very short time.

I had to decide to become a registered business in Spain, simply because I needed a simple way to send invoices at that time.

I knew all of it would be a lot of bureacracy, so my choices were to go all in, or drop out of all systems.

That's how I eventually, within three months had gotten my Spanish residence card, official address, started a business, found an accountant, and within the same months, gotten a mortgage and bought an apartment.

Sounds crazy (and it is) but I did not see a point to do a sh*t ton of paperwork just to maybe stay for a few months.

The apartment buying was crazy, but we just strongly followed our intuition (full story of buying our flat in Alicante, Spain here).

So I had to decided quickly what would be my home base for long-term, and I decided it will be Spain, even if I spend longer times travelling the world.

You know, can't exist without a permanent address.

So, I have lived in Spain now for 4 years at one go (and earlier for a shorter time).

As much as I have started to tolerate paella and croquetas, it doesn't make me Spanish.

I would like to say I belong here, but then I hear about friends with local boyfriends spending the weekend barbequeing with his Spanish parents, cousins and whole family.

I realise I don't have a family here, or people who would have known me from my teenage years.

So as an expat, you're kind of always in between cultures and identities.

Sure, I identify as a Finnish person, but I can't imagine myself living full-time in Finland.

So being an expat becomes an identity.

The reason why expats mostly become close friends with other expats is that they're living in the same limbo.

Expats are the people you can relate with, share the headaches of bureaucracy of not fitting into boxes and the inability to stay all life in home country.

So what's the issue?

The Issue: When you live abroad, people come and go.

Especially as a nomad, just when you got a real connection with a friend, they suddenly decide to move to another Mediterranean island or go discover Asia.

Even as an expat staying in one place, within a year, many people have moved either back to their home countries, or gone to discover Portugal or Thailand.

The good part? It forces you to live in the moment more, as you realise nothing is permanent.

When your family is simply staying at home, for you that's also a full day of travel, and a nice gap in your wallet.

As an expat, I am still way too curious to not to travel the world a lot. It's just that I also want to (and need to) visit family and travel home frequently.

It's not that I don't want it, it's just harder to join stuff spontaneously that is 4000kms away, right?