Expat Empire Podcast 9 | Moving the Family Abroad to Prague with Brittany Powell

Listen to the Podcast Now

Episode Description

Today we will be hearing from Brittany Powell. Brittany moved with her family to Prague, Czech Republic a few years ago and has been building her own design business with her husband. In this episode, you will learn:

• Advice for moving abroad with a family
• How to get over the excuses that you tell yourself that keep you from making the jump to living abroad
• How to develop your freelance business abroad and self-sponsor your visa
• Tips for avoiding scams and crooks in the Czech real estate market

And much more! You can see Brittany’s design work at brittcreativeco.com and on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/brittcreativeco/. Check out her personal Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/brittstutt. Eli Hermit edited and produced the music for this episode, please check him out at elihermit.bandcamp.com/. Learn more about Expat Empire at expatempire.com!

Episode Transcript

Intro

Welcome to the Expat Empire Podcast, the podcast where you can hear from expats around the world and learn how you can join them.

Hi everyone, thanks for joining us today for the 9th episode of the Expat Empire Podcast. Today we will be hearing from Brittany Powell. Brittany moved with her family to Prague, Czech Republic a few years ago and has been building her own design business with her husband there. In this episode, you will learn how to get over the little excuses that you tell yourself that keep you from making the jump to living abroad, advice for moving abroad with a family, how to develop your freelance business abroad and self-sponsor your visa, and much more.

Without further ado, let’s start the conversation.

Conversation

David McNeill: Hi Brittany, thanks so much for joining the Expat Empire today.

Brittany Powell: Hi, thanks for having me. I’m excited to be here.

David McNeill: Could you tell me a little bit about where you are originally from and where around the world you’ve lived so far, and even maybe where you’re living right now?

Brittany Powell: Yeah. So, I am from South Carolina, a city called Spartanburg. It’s in the Spartanburg, Greenville, upstate area and I have pretty much lived there my entire life. So, I haven’t lived anywhere else, except for where I’m living now, which is Prague, Czech Republic. We kind of just dived right in on… going from South Carolina to completely abroad.

David McNeill: Yeah, that’s amazing. I’m looking forward to hearing more about. You know, what was your life like in your hometown? What kind of work were doing, and where did that spark to move abroad come from originally?

Brittany Powell: Well, life in our hometown it was kind of pretty much comfortable. Not really you see anything really exciting. It was really boring. It’s like a small town kind of environment. A lot of people know everybody, and you just don’t really have a whole lot to do, like, even though you have a movie theater, you have a bowling alley, and that’s it. Because the downtown area even growing up was not like, somewhere you really wanted to hang out.

They’ve done tons of improvements since but like then it was just not somewhere you went, you know, you’d go to the mall. You know, living there was comfortable, we had a comfortable life, we were near our family and we had friends, so it was really nice but for us, like we really just wanted a whole lot more.

And it wasn’t that like we hated the area or anything but I’ve always just really felt like there’s so much more out there; like there’s adventure, there’s different cultures to experience, there’s a whole lot more than just what’s in this little box of Spartanburg, South Carolina. For us, you know, there’s just… I mean, it was just this longing desire to go somewhere else.

And so I was a graphic and web designer, I was already freelancing as well and I had been freelancing I think for four years all together now, and two years before I left; and I had quit my senior design position that I was working at a promotional company and it… I really just wanted more freedom, I wanted less stress, they started asking me to work later and later and work through my lunch break and it was just like, feeling like I was always working all the time, I couldn’t pick up my son from school.

So, I already knew at that point that I definitely wanted to have more freedom in my life, and my husband was also a designer but he worked for a packaging company at the time. So we are both designers but have a little bit different avenues.

David McNeill: And, you know, as you looked at that and you also started working for yourself and freelancing, did it just become clear that that was a, you know, opportunity for you to make the move abroad or how did it really come up in the discussion, especially as your husband was working for a packaging company at the time?

Brittany Powell: We knew since even before we had gotten married that we wanted to travel abroad. We both had wanted to live abroad, I wanted to live in Australia, he wanted to live in Ireland, completely different cultural experiences and here we are, you know, meeting halfway in Czech Republic. But like, it’s something that like we’ve both just really, really wanted in our lives and so in order to like get there, it was just, I felt like we had to just really make more of an effort for it.

Because we kept on living in this comfortable life, in this comfortable environment and letting life just pass us by and before we knew it, it was like we had been living in this town home that we bought, that, with the intention of renting out so that like we could have this passive income when we moved abroad. And we were still there three years later. And I was like, okay, our goal was to be here, like two years tops, what’s going on?

So, I think like we just were ready to really make a plan and stick to it and stop like making this year long out plans and like, well, we’ll eventually do this. And then all of a sudden, like, oh! Well, now I need a new car because this thing happened, or now I need to do this. And I mean, there’s always excuses and reasons for like not going at all.

David McNeill: Yeah, absolutely. And you have to, yeah, be vigilant about staying in front of those and making sure that they don’t derail your plans. So, I’m impressed that, you know, you were able to make it happen. How did you kind of get over that initial hurdle to actually, you know, make the move abroad? And, was it just one day you sat down and said, okay, we’re figuring this out and then two weeks later you were out of the country or how did it work?

Brittany Powell: Sort of. Like, so, yeah, we are pretty spontaneous with like, when we all of a sudden we know we want to do something, like bam, that’s it. You know, obviously it had been kind of a long time coming thing, our families knew it was. But I don’t think they really believed us, because, I mean, we were still sitting around not doing anything.

And so I think like, it just was one of those things. Like, it was every single day coming home from work or me ending work when he came home, and it was just like, the same evenings just sitting on the couch and I was like, what are we doing with our lives? You know, why are we just sitting here and not having anything to do? We don’t really feel like we’re going anywhere. And also like in this Spartanburg area, like they do not really inspire graphic designers or artists. And they don’t further their careers.

Like, if people are in these positions, they typically stay in them until they retire. The pay is not like super great because they don’t value them. And so for us, like we were also getting a dead end with our career, because we kind of felt like, okay, we’ll get like tiny raises every once in a while but it’s not really significant. It’s not really driving us. And so it was just like, okay, let’s do it.

And so I think I was listening at the time to like, to several podcasts about traveling and living abroad, which really helped inspire me to think, no, we can do this. We don’t have to save up like $20,000, which seems like such an impossible task in trying to figure it all out. And I mean, so we ended up saying, okay, well, we’re going to go to Berlin, and we’re going to leave in like six months from now.

And we ended up backing out of it a little and we were like, okay, well, we will wait until the end of the school year because my son was excited about school and I’m like, okay, we’ll just wait. Well, then, Tyler’s job, my husband, he was having some changes and they were moving a lot of people to Illinois, and into this extremely rural town in Illinois, like an hour outside of Chicago. And they did keep him on but it was like, we don’t want to live there. That’s like going even further backwards.

David McNeill: Yeah, that wasn’t the abroad that you had imagined, it was a different kind of abroad.

Brittany Powell: Exactly.

David McNeill: Yeah.

Brittany Powell: Illinois was not on the top of our list by any means. So, the… So then we were like, well, we don’t really want to look for a new job here. And although he had his job still, we didn’t feel very confident in the management that like that would stay a thing after they got done at using him for what they needed him for.

So, we were like, well, we don’t want to look for a job around here and we don’t want to… We can’t really even find a city that we are just like crazy about living in right now, except for living abroad. And we were like, why not just go? This is exactly what we have been wanting to do, what are we waiting for? So, that’s what we did. And like, in three months, we changed our mind about Berlin and we decided, okay, let’s go to Prague. And he approached me with the idea of Prague, and I was like, I don’t even know really what Prague is.

Like, I have no… I don’t know anything about Prague. And he’s like, well, you know, it’s really well connected, it’s got the… one of the best transportation systems in the world so we don’t have to worry about a car. We can just sell our cars, we don’t need to buy a new one, we can live in this really creative and beautiful city, it’s very budget friendly, so we don’t have to worry about like going over here and killing ourselves.

We can actually maybe save some money and be able to travel more and even like with it being in Central Europe, like there’s just so many train connections and plane connections that we’ll actually be able to do what we want. And I was like, okay, well let’s try it out. So, we rented an Airbnb for a month. And we just went in with the idea like, well, we’ll see if we like it when we get here and if we don’t, we’ll just head on to some other country. And we packed up our house and everything.

David McNeill: And what was your feeling when you first landed there? Did you fall in love with it or, you know, what was your first impression upon arrival?

Brittany Powell: I am not 100% sure it was like love at first sight. But because we were really tired when we arrived, and I was like feeling exhausted; we had been in New York for a week, we went to Berlin for four days, we had been bouncing around the entire month before. But when we arrived, it was snowing, it was a beautiful city and I was just like, ah! This is like a dream. This is beautiful. And so I was really excited about that. I was really excited that… To even be in a place where there was all this magical snow, you know, because snow just doesn’t happen in South Carolina. We were totally looking forward to that.

David McNeill: Do you still enjoy the snow now? Or has it kind of lost its appeal?

Brittany Powell: No, we still enjoy the snow and infact like this stop past winter, I was really disappointed because in this center of the city, like you don’t get quite as much snow as you do when you’re living, or I guess in the suburban areas or just outer Czech Republic. But like this year has been weirdly warm for Prague. And I’m like, what is happening? Like, we came to this environment to see snow and have winter. Like, I want like a winter.

David McNeill: I’m glad that’s the case for you. For me it’s still, I’m still feeling like I’m getting used to the winter. It’s gotten a little bit better. But I’m glad to hear that it’s been a positive experience for you.

Brittany Powell: Yeah, I mean, which, you know, it’s not been nearly as cold and like, when we went to Berlin, we were quite scared because it was like negative six degrees, we had like three layers on. So, it was a relief when we got to Prague that it was cold, but it wasn’t like Berlin cold. And because we were like, I’ve never been that cold in my life.

David McNeill: Yeah, I’ve been pretty much in the same boat. But I was curious as to what your original interest in Berlin was, and maybe why you veered off of that original plan.

Brittany Powell: Our original interest I think is that it was such a creative city. It’s very Expat friendly. It’s very, I think like designer and freelance friendly. So, for us it was just… Oh, and it’s well connected. And I think those were like pretty much our biggest selling points on any city for that matter. Deterring away from it, I’m not really sure. I mean, there was a lot going on at the time with like the terrorist attacks and stuff like that.

So, we were a little apprehensive and, you know, from the perspective of not really being abroad, like you really aren’t really sure how to gauge the situation, like should I be concerned or not concerned? And, so there was just a lot of different things and we were just like, well, and I mean that’s why we even went to Berlin on our way to Prague, because we were like, well, I still want to see it. Just to see like, you know, if Prague doesn’t work out, I mean, we’ll just go to Berlin again.

I mean, I don’t know, we just feel really drawn to Germany and Germany lifestyle a lot. And the way that they do things is very organized. And sometimes I think that’s a little too much. But, you know, at the same time I feel like they’ve kind of got their stuff together. So, it’s pretty helpful. Yeah.

David McNeill: And you mentioned listening to some podcasts that gave you some inspiration for moving abroad, what podcasts were most interesting to you and helpful to you at the time?

Brittany Powell: Well, these errand travel podcast with Jason Moore. He, I think I listened to like almost all of his podcast episodes for a while. He was probably one of the biggest ones because I was really inspired by his stories, his interviews with everyone else who had lived abroad. And then he, when he was moving to Norway which is a country that like, we had visited before, and we absolutely loved, he was… we were moving to Prague.

So, it was kind of like, I don’t know, we were able to see like all these like different experiences from him. And then, I think there is like a nomadic family podcast as well. And they gave a lot more perspective on traveling as a family. Because, you know, not just as a single person, or somebody who can hop around from city to city every two weeks, and made it like seeing, okay, well, you can do this long term travel thing and then you can use your city as a hub and travel all these other places and stuff like that.

So, he kind of helped me to get a lot of different perspective on what to do and stuff, and then freelancer podcast as well; like being boss and stuff and how to like adjust your business for living completely independent, I think, was also a big play in that.

David McNeill: Yeah. Do you have any specific advice on that part of it? So, of course, you were freelancing before, but how you made that work as you moved into a complete different country, a different time zone, and also with your husband, I guess, becoming a freelancer I suppose as well?

Brittany Powell: Yeah. So, the time zone thing has always been like, I don’t know, something that clients are a little hesitant about. Most of our clients are still in the US, although we have grown a little bit more worldwide. But, I think it’s actually worked out a lot better, because I can have like a full six, eight hour day before they even get up in the morning.

So, if they email me with changes to a project that we’re working on by 5pm their time, or by the end of their day, that next morning, I have something new sitting in their inbox. And I feel like the workflow just really flows very easily. And for the longest time, there has been even like many clients that even had no idea that I had moved.

David McNeill: Oh, wow.

Brittany Powell: Yeah, which most of our clients are, from an online business perspective, I didn’t go out seeking clients in South Carolina, and especially not in Spartanburg. So, a lot of them were already in like, California time zone, or Mountain Time Zone, or different places already across the states, or I think I had some kind of in London or Africa. So, it wasn’t like, there was a huge thing.

So, I think that that part really adjusted really well. As far as like transitioning, like, I just kept on doing what I was doing. Now for Tyler, like he had a lot more of trying to navigate, I guess the lifestyle of becoming a freelancer because it’s very different. Then, you know, working a full nine to five kind of job and so… And you also have to, I feel like get established in your community. So, he had started doing some contract work for a local company here, I would also like kind of push projects towards him and then we will get like new projects.

And, so we’ve like really just worked together on handling the clients and growing it that way. He’s also utilized things like Upwork, which at first was kind of like, okay, this is not ever going to work. Because all these people in here, you know, want to pay nothing for it. But he’s actually done like a really phenomenal job about navigating that and getting higher paid clients, and then we end up converting them into long term clients, with other services and stuff. So, I feel like we’ve been able to utilize it as a tool to like get in the door. And that’s how I originally got started too, and being able to like retain them. So, it’s been really, more helpful than you would think.

David McNeill: In terms of managing the, you know, the visa process and actually being able to legally live in Czech Republic for a long term, how were you able to do that? Did you actually utilize the freelancing sort of company that you had made in the US beforehand or how did you do it?

Brittany Powell: I was set up as a sole proprietor in the US before. So, that’s basically still what I use there. I mean, here, which I believe is also kind of the easier visa to use as well. So, we set up the visa with a freelancer and was able to, well, the whole part of funneling it from the US to here was rather quite complicated. And because like, there’s also like, limits on, you know, where you’re having the income coming in, and you need to actually make this minimum amount of income, but you don’t want to make over this amount of income either.

But there’s like all these different rules for qualifying for your visa again, but also, you know, not being really bad taxes and stuff like that. So, we eventually ended up setting up an LLC in Wyoming and, you know, like, we’ve never been there or anything but yeah, I mean, it was really cool. And because they have no income taxes then like the taxes just go straight to us when we get paid as a freelancer. And then we can still put like more back into the business as well.

I think like having that separation helps like, navigate the US side of business, and then also the European side, because with the majority of our clients being in the US, like we still have to cater to the US market and everything going on over there. Because if we went completely European on this side, I feel like it would be a little bit more difficult to navigate, even like from down to like bank accounts and stuff like that, and different types of taxes that go into play and everything. I mean, there’s just like so much stuff.

David McNeill: Yeah, definitely. It’s good to hear that you were able to make it work. Did you go through sort of a, I don’t know, lawyer, a legal advisor to be able to set that up or how would you suggest that people, you know, make all of those, all of the legal situation work and tax situation work best?

Brittany Powell: Well, to set up our LLC, we went through a law firm called Cloud Peak law firm. And they were, I mean, one thing that attracted me to them is their website, it is extremely streamlined. It’s very straightforward. They have all these articles and stuff on everything that you need to know for setting it up. And it’s like, pay $200 and we’re going to get this done for you and you’ll have your license in 24 hours.

And then after you’re done with this, these are the steps you need to take, like getting an AIN number and setting up a bank account and all that stuff. And they even will handle mail forwarding and stuff, like you get like five free pieces per month and so it’s really convenient. One of the lawyers there that I was talking to has even traveled to Prague and traveled abroad, so I feel like he has a little bit more experience with just some international business in general.

And then on the European side, we hired a visa agency, and they handle our visas and our Czech taxes and accounting matters. And up until really… Well, I’ve still handled our US taxes. So, I’ve done all that like through Turbo Tax online, and they have like a really easy software to navigate through.

David McNeill: So how long does your visa in Czech Republic currently last for? And how long did it take for you to actually get all the documentation together and get the visa so that you could comfortably, you know, reliably live over there for some period of time?

Brittany Powell: Our visa right now is lasting for two years; we’re on a two year visa. It’s considered long term residency, so we actually get like a biometric card instead of like the visa and your passport. And that one doesn’t expire until next fall, or the end of August, I believe. So, we still have like a good bit of time on it.

But we’ve applied for it back last July after our one year visa expired and we didn’t get it until like March. So, I know, it was really kind of scary, we had to get like to bridge visas in between then, because we had plans to travel other places and we wanted to be able to get back in the country. But, yeah, so we now are on a two year visa. And then I think after we’ve been here for five years, then you can apply for a permanent residence. And I think you can get a five year visa at that point.

David McNeill: And in terms of your travel, you know, you’re interested in being able to, I guess use the Czech Republic, use Prague as a hub and be able to travel from there. You know, how has that been ultimately in practice, especially with, you know, moving as a family with kids, I guess, in schools over there and also your careers and businesses as well?

Brittany Powell: It’s been a little complicated, more complicated than I feel like we had thought it was going to be. So, we started our kid out with homeschooling and, because we just didn’t really know how the situation would work, which I do not recommend for anybody working from home. Like, you all can’t be working from home. And it was kind of crazy. And then we switched them into an international school.

And the cool thing about it is, is that they have a lot of holidays, like they have a week long fall break, they have a two week Christmas break, they’ve got a one week winter break, and then they’ve got spring break, and all these other different breaks and holidays that do make it actually easier to travel throughout the year but also, you still have to stick to a school schedule.

So sometimes it’s harder to find like more budget friendly deals or different like, easier ways to like just travel when everybody is not traveling and… We’ve been able to really travel Czech Republic. So, we’ve focused a lot on traveling Czech Republic and traveling nearby countries and stuff but I feel like we still haven’t traveled it as much as we sought out to do. And a lot of that was because we needed to prioritize our business and prioritize schooling and the different things from day to day life.

David McNeill: How has your son found it in the international school? Has he enjoyed it pretty well?

Brittany Powell: Oh, yeah. He loves it; his social life is like a million times better than ours, probably. He has adjusted like, so well, which I’m really so happy. And because he like has all these friends, they can even go around the city by themselves. Because it’s a really safe city, all the kids here do it. And it’s just like, really easy on the parents and really easy on the kids to be able to live this way really relaxed lifestyle and one that like, you’re not constrained to, well, my mom is not going to be home for a while so I can’t like go over to her house or whatever. So, he’s been able to really find a great community of friends and, I mean, I think he’s like really loved living abroad.

David McNeill: That’s excellent to hear. It’s… I’m not sure how it was at the beginning but it’s good to hear that at least, you know, the transition has been good. And I’m sure some kids wouldn’t be able to, you know, navigate their way through a new country, a new culture that easily. So, that’s great to hear.

Brittany Powell: Yeah, he’s definitely adjusted really well.

David McNeill: Were there any other aspects of moving abroad as a family and getting business setup that were particularly difficult, especially in the early days, or did it kind of, you know, through the advisors that you used, go relatively smoothly?

Brittany Powell: I think school is one of our hardest things to navigate. Because, like you can’t really just throw them into Czech school, Czech is like a really difficult language to learn. It’s not as easy to pick up as like Spanish or something like that. And they have, you know, a lot more stipulations plus they… Czech schools have really kind of gotten a bad rap for bullying and so, yeah, and because they’re not very open to foreigners.

And so we were pretty nervous about doing that. And then, like I said, we tried the homeschooling and, I had always swore that I would never do it and here we were doing it and then hating it. I was like, we can’t do this again. So, that was pretty hard. Also navigating like the slowness of life, like life in general was just so much slower than in America where like you can get in your car and run like even 15 errands in a day.

But like here, if you are lucky to even accomplish two errands in a day, you’re doing great. Like, because it just takes so long, like even going to the grocery store. One, it’s like almost an everyday thing, I’m pretty sure we end up at some sort of like market or grocery store every single day. And, you know, it’s just like, I don’t… it forces you to slow down and that’s such an adjustment for us. And, again like with prioritizing the time for work. At first, our schedule was all over the place.

Like, I felt like I had done a really good job of being on a consistent schedule in the US because I would just work when my husband worked. But then when you’re in Prague, there’s just like, you’re meeting people, you’re having all this stuff that you have to do to get established or all these errands you have to run and you’re trying to figure out things, so things are taking like 10 times longer than they should too.

So, it’s just like, you know, you are having to really focus hard on like, okay, when am I going to work? And like we ended up working like sometimes at midnight, or like two in the morning and it was just like a nightmare. So, we’ve had to like really, I guess, get very, very disciplined and like saying no to things and like, No, this is our work schedule. Like, my boss said no, even though like I’m the boss. I said No, you cannot go anywhere. You cannot go to your appointment today. Sorry.

David McNeill: It’s good to blame it on somebody else.

Brittany Powell: Exactly.

David McNeill: Yeah.

Brittany Powell: It was easier to blame it on even like a third person me.

David McNeill: Right. Do you intend to work from home or co-working spaces, cafes, do you have an office space that you rent there?

Brittany Powell: We don’t rent an office space. We have worked at cafes and stuff like that on occasion but for the most part, it’s really easy for us to work at home, like we both have our own desk space and our internet is blazing fast. Like, I think we get between 2 and 300 megabits per second. You know, there is no interruptions, things are very quick and easy to manage, we don’t have to worry about sitting in like an uncomfortable sit all day or ordering like 15 coffees because, you know, you’re going to get a weird stare from the waitress.

I mean, we still do it, you know, sometimes because it’s nice to get out and see the world. But we’d also really just stay working from home all the time and we do prioritize like going for a walk once a day or going out. I mean, like I said, we have to go to the grocery store every day. So, we do try and like still prioritize things to get out of the house because like on the reverse end of that, when you’re working from home, it’s like very isolating, and I don’t feel like we get as many opportunities to meet local people or people in general to connect with.

And we’ve even recently started trying to connect in more business networking things like creative mornings, and they’re only like once a month, but I feel like it’s enough to get us out, get us a little bit more connected in the community and being around other people like us and creative’s in general.

David McNeill: Yeah, I was going to ask, you know, how you initially made friends and connections in Prague and, you know, what your peer group was like? Was it mostly locals or they’re foreigners, a good mix and if you have any advice there, that’d be great?

Brittany Powell: So, I don’t feel like we have like really created a really strong friend groups. We do have friends but I feel like everybody is still so busy with their own lives that it’s harder to connect on a really regular basis and just relax. A lot of our initial ones, so I think about two months in, we went to an International Church and they had all sorts of people that we were able to connect with.

They had like different groups for new people who were coming into Prague and trying to adjust to the lifestyle here. And, so we connected a lot with people in that aspect. Tyler was able to connect with people when he was doing contract work for a local company here because he had to do some office time. So, we were able to connect with people like that. But one thing that I feel like we haven’t really utilized as much as we should have is the Facebook groups, because there’s like a lot of Expats connecting through there. And I feel like that’s where we’ve started like, we really need to start like networking and connecting in these groups, because it’s really hard to get to know people.

David McNeill: Yeah, it is. And actually, I did have some good luck on Facebook groups here in Berlin and met some of my closest friends. Yeah, I just… I mean, one couple in particular just posted, hey, we’re new to Berlin. I don’t even know, you know, it’s just one of those things that pops up in your feed and somehow it’s just like, okay, well, I’m also looking to meet people, I’ll just message these guys and we grabbed a beer or two later that week. And then, yeah, I’ve just been close to them ever since.

Brittany Powell: Yeah, well, and that’s what I’ve thought about doing because I’ve also seen where like other people are like, hey, anybody want to go to get together and grab some beers or wine or whatever? And it’s like, you know what? We should really start doing stuff like that.

David McNeill: Yeah, I mean, I’m glad that they had the, you know, courage to post because even though I saw that and I was comfortable replying, I wasn’t sure if I really wanted to put myself out there on the internet and having, you know, just to get a bunch of messages. But at the end of the day, I mean it worked for us. So, I probably shouldn’t have been so apprehensive to post myself as well.

Brittany Powell: Yeah, it’s really scary, though. Because I mean, like you said, you’re putting yourself out there, and you really don’t know who you’re going to, I don’t know, get responding to you. And if it’s going to even be anybody that you connect with, but one thing that like I’ve really grown to love and appreciate about the Expat community is like, they’re all on the same page as you, they’re all trying to be helpful.

None of them are like weirdo’s trying to stalk you, or anything that. Like, we’re all just in it together and everybody is extremely friendly. And even like the Expat groups in Prague they are hilarious, because there is a lot of sarcasm going on. So like, people ask all these random things, and you can even just connect online with these people and really start a great community from there.

David McNeill: You mentioned before about the Czech language being quite difficult to pick up? Has it been something that you’ve, you know, studied, worked on or how have you been able to be effective and do what you need to do in English? How has that worked for you?

Brittany Powell: Originally, I think we had high hopes that we were going to learn the language and we were going to be fluent in like a year, and that did not happen. We are able to communicate what we need. Like when we go to the grocery stores or the markets and going out to restaurants and stuff like that, we are able to kind of speak a little bit of Czech. However, I’ve always felt like telling them, like now you can like ask me these questions but if you go this far and throw me like something out of left field, like I have no idea how to respond to you.

David McNeill: Yeah. Yeah. No, I’m the same here in Berlin, so I definitely can understand.

Brittany Powell: Yeah, and there are English places. I’ve heard of people who have gotten by with only speaking English and never learning any Czech, but I really don’t know how they do it. In the tourist areas, you can definitely find like a lot of English speakers, and they’re just English speaking people everywhere but it’s more of a matter like, do they want to speak English to you?

Because a lot of them, like I said before, they’re not always open to foreigners and some of them just, like, want to be a pain in the butt. And they do not want to speak English to you; they do not want to do you any favors. Every once in a while we’ll find somebody who wants to practice their English and that’s kind of nice, but I feel like it’s pretty rare. But we, I feel like we get more kudos from these people when we’re trying to speak Czech to them, even if we’re butchering the language.

A lot of Czechs really appreciate somebody just trying, because a lot of people kind of just disregard their language and don’t want to speak it or don’t want to try and learn it or anything. And I feel like, from the beginning of time when we were here, when we didn’t know the language and to now, people are so much nicer to us, they are so much more-friendly, they act like we belong, even though we clearly are not Czech. Just like the way that our interactions are with them like makes a difference, just by being able to like pronounce some words and understand a little bit.

David McNeill: Yeah, absolutely. I think it makes a big difference. And then in your first days how did you actually decide where to live around the city? And was it difficult to navigate, you know, dealing with maybe a real estate agent or landlords, especially as you hadn’t gotten some basic or intermediate level language abilities here?

Brittany Powell: We researched what the best neighborhoods were to live in. And I feel like the neighborhood that we live in now actually was not really on the top of that list, but we absolutely love our neighborhood. But we went through a real estate group; that’s really the easiest and best way I feel like in Prague, because you also have been warned on like these Expat groups that there are a lot of crooks in Prague and there are a lot of people who are going to like sell you this apartment, and not even be legally able to do that.

So, like one thing that we, a situation we ran into initially here is that there’s a lot of CO-Ops, which is where like all these owners own this building, or this one apartment. And if you get an apartment with a CO-OP, then it’s really difficult to get your visa, because for the visa process you have to have all these owners sign off on it, or there has to be like all these power of attorneys involved where only one person can. And we ran into that problem initially, even with a real estate agent.

So, it’s really important to find really… good real estate agent that is not going like lead you away. There is also a website that kind of connects you through to all of them, like as if you were searching for a house through like Zillow or something like that. But, I think for the most part, like you just really need to make sure there’s only one landlord, there’s nothing like… first you need to check the credentials, and like our visa lady was able to run a check on our address and say, okay, this person is who owns it, so make sure this is the person that’s actually your landlord, and is able to like legally let you live there.

It was a little tricky, but it was really way easier than we thought it was going to be. They don’t, I guess do as many checks as you think they would. You do have to have like a couple months deposits and stuff like that, which was different. Usually, you know, in the States, you only have to have like one month deposit. So, there’s just like, just little things that were different, but nothing like too crazy.

David McNeill: And how far outside of the city center, which I guess probably a lot of tourists are familiar with from visiting Prague are you guys living now?

Brittany Powell: We live in the city center. So, the actual city center is like right on the other side of the bridge, and we live next to a popular park called “Letna”. We really love our area because we can walk to Old Town Square in 15 minutes or less. So, it’s very conveniently located, we have metros, we have a metro line and two different tram lines that like are crossing each other. So we have like 10 trams running through our neighborhood. So, we’re like right in the middle of it. That was important to us when we moved to this city because we weren’t planning on getting a car, and we don’t want to walk 30 minutes to a grocery store.

David McNeill: Yeah, definitely. How long did it take for you to actually find the apartment that you ultimately took? Was it pretty quick in terms of actual searching or is it a, you know, how difficult is it to find the good spot there in Prague?

Brittany Powell: I think it’s pretty quick. So, we had searched for an apartment for maybe like a couple of weeks. I think like finding apartments that you want is a little bit more trickier. Because like, you can find all these apartments, but some of them are like, ah! I don’t know…. The apartment market here is extremely quick. And you have to decide right then in there, do you want this apartment or not when you’re looking at it. Like, you don’t really have time to think about, well, maybe another apartment that is better will come along, because we’ve called back like two hours later and the apartment would be gone. So, and that’s happened like several times.

So like if you want to have that apartment, you need to tell them right now, like how interested you are and if you’re ready for it. And, so even for like our apartment now, like there’s no dishwasher, there’s only, you know, one bathroom and the water closets not separated. So like, those are like some of the small things that we were like, okay, we’re just going to have to take it because like, we are either going to get stuck with this other apartment or we’re still going to be searching for this perfect dream apartment for like another month.

And then still maybe, you know, not get it. It’s… So it’s a little stressful and a little bit different, like look at it, because you don’t get to choose like a lot and get everything.

David McNeill: So, in general what would you say is your favorite part about living in Prague? And also on the other hand, what is the stuff that you find most challenging and most difficult to deal with, especially coming from another country?

Brittany Powell: I would say that our favorite part of living in Prague is definitely living in the city. I love being able to like walk outside of our apartment with no plan in particular and there was always something going on. You never know when you’re going to run into like an open air concert, or markets or different things going around the city and there’s always something to do.

You can even go to the beer gardens at a park or go down to the river where the locals hang out and stuff, and there’s just music and drinks and all this fun time that you can just get involved in without really having to plan doing something. That was like one of probably the biggest differences from moving to a small town in South Carolina to this bigger city. And I love being able to not have to worry about a car.

And I was really worried about that, because for me, I’ve always wanted to be the driver, because I don’t like getting stuck in places and then having to beg somebody to take me somewhere. I was really concerned about that. But like the public transportation here is just phenomenal. Like, you can just go anywhere and if we had a car, I feel like we’d be stuck somewhere because we had a car.

David McNeill: And on the sort of less attractive side? And not to point fingers or make you say something negative if you don’t want to, but just out of curiosity, what’s been particularly difficult to adjust to, maybe even still giving you some problems?

Brittany Powell: So, I would say that probably the coldness of people has been the hardest thing. I have never been… I mean, I know I come from South Carolina and everybody’s got like full-on southern hospitality going on. But that also got on my nerves too, like I don’t need to have small talk in the grocery store. Just let me buy my groceries and leave. You know, but on the other end of it, it’s like very extreme here.

Like, every time I smile at somebody, I feel like I just did something really wrong. And it’s like, it’s people like, are like, what are you doing? Why are you smiling at me? Don’t look at me like that. And, so it’s just like, I don’t know, a lot colder environment, makes it a lot harder to, I guess socially connect with people. People are not very open to just making new friends and they don’t look at friends the same way.

Like, you can’t just call anybody your friends, like you reach a whole new level if you actually become their friend. So, I feel like that was probably one of the hardest parts. The bureaucracy here is quite insane. I feel like there’s a lot going on behind the scenes, and these processes where they’re changing things and doing things that are not really on the up and up and it makes it really hard to navigate.

Like even with our visas, like we all of a sudden had to get public health insurance, but nobody told us and then now we have to pay like a year’s worth of back fees, even though we were covered for private the entire time. It’s just like things like that, like they bureaucracy, and people just making rules like they even don’t accept money at the embassies or immigration offices anymore because of all of the like crookedness going on in there and you have to like pay with stamps.

So, you have to like go to the post office and buy these like little special stamps. So, I think those are really the hardest things to navigate and deal with.

David McNeill: What’s your plan going forward? Do you think that you’ll stay in Prague for a while or maybe move to another country somewhere in the world or in the E.U?

Brittany Powell: Well, we’re definitely planning on being in Europe for the foreseeable future. So, at least four to five years, our plan is to be here. We want our son to graduate school from here, but we’ll also love to continue living here depending on where he goes to school or where that ends up. We do love Prague, but as our friends told us the other day, like we have roaming souls and a passion to travel, so we’re also feeling that urge to go somewhere else. And, you know, our visas don’t expire until next year but we’ve been looking at a lot of different options because our son is about start High School and we kind of want that to all be geared to help him to get either, get in the Uni here and also in the schools in the US.

So, that’s pretty important to us right now and being able to be in a place that can do that. And we’ve been looking at like a lot of different destinations, kind of obsessively, I feel like. But, I mean I’ve been joining these Facebook groups for Expats in each of the cities and trying to find out as much information and stuff as possible, like, you know, how immersion in school works, and how the taxes work in all of these different countries? And what would benefit us the most, and then just trying to compare, like, you know, is it worth it to move or what, but I mean, I don’t see us living in Prague for the next five years, for sure.

David McNeill: And then as far as your son is concerned, is it definitely in consideration for him to attend, yeah, a university here in Europe where it might be, seems likely to be much cheaper. I know, some provide pretty good education. So, what’s your thinking around that longer term?

Brittany Powell: We would have loved to have him in university here. One, it is dramatically cheaper. Like the school, and at this point, like we’re selling our house and so I don’t know that will even get in-state tuition anywhere, which would mean that school would be even higher. And if we are planning on him going to the US, then we’re going to have to try and navigate like, okay, what does that look like? What do we need to do to make sure that he can get in, and it’d be the most economical for us?

But with university being so cheap and there being really good schools here, I feel like there’s a lot of good opportunity, and I would at least just like for him to have that option. Because, you know, I went to school, and it’s like, now I have all this dead, you know, and it sucks. Nobody wants that for like anybody else. And if you can go to University here for a very low price, or if we immerse into a culture like say, Germany, he learns German, I think he can go to school for free.

And maybe pay like, just, you know, for books or a place to stay, and that’s it, which would be amazing, and you can then go from there. Like, if you wanted to continue a master somewhere or if you wanted to… I just feel like there’s like a whole lot more opportunity and at that point, he’d be bilingual, maybe multilingual, the job opportunities that he would have would be amazing and then it wouldn’t matter whether he was in Europe or America or wherever. I feel like he would have like so many more job opportunities and a much-more easier life in general, you know?

David McNeill: Yeah, definitely. That sounds like a great plan and, yeah, and an interesting opportunity for him and for the rest of your family. I was wondering, you know, just generally how our listeners can find out more about you and what you’re doing.

Brittany Powell: Yeah. So, I am mostly found at brittcreativeco.com. That is our design business. We do design websites, marketing for small businesses and entrepreneurs. And so that’s where the most stem of it comes from. We also have an Instagram account that shows a little bit more behind the scenes and what we are doing on a day to day. But we also have some personal Instagram accounts, like a Great Big World is where our blog is. So, we talk about a lot of things there and I also have my own Instagram handle, which I think you can like through the Great Big World or brittcreativeco.com and go through there.

Outro

Thanks to Brittany for sharing her story with us. You can find the full transcript and links to the websites mentioned in today’s episode at expatempire.com.

If you are interested in sharing your story on Expat Empire, please consider submitting a user post about your expat experiences on expatempire.com or email us at podcast@expatempire.com and let us know more about your international background.

Music on this episode was produced by Eli Hermit, please check him out on Bandcamp and Spotify.

Keep up-to-date on new Expat Empire Podcast episodes by pressing the Subscribe button in the podcasting app of your choice. You can also visit expatempire.com and sign up for the newsletter to get notified about new podcast episodes and receive a ton of free expat and travel-related content. We are also on Facebook and Twitter at expatempire so be sure to follow us there.

Last but certainly not least, we would appreciate a 5-star review on iTunes or wherever you listen to your podcasts. It helps new listeners to find us and lets us know that we are putting out content that you appreciate.

We are going to be taking our spring break, so please check back for our next episode in four weeks! See ya then!

Originally published at expatempire.com on April 1, 2019.