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The difficult existence of the expat woman

Does she still exist? The traditional expat women, who plays tennis and has drinks with other expat women? It seems that this stereotype is disappearing. Most of the expat women want to continue their own careers when they are abroad.

However, that isn’t always simple. Only a few are busy in the social cocktail circuit or do the childcare as their daily work.

“I accompanied Matthijs and became the woman of’ is what Wieneke Vullings writes on her weblog when she tells about her expat being in Sao Paulo. She is 29 years old, does not have children and is a graduated culture scientist. The question Vullings suggests, is: How can an expat women create her own identity when you give up your job in your home country and move abroad for the job of your husband?

A lot of free time
Wieneke says that there are many myths about the expat life. “The stereotype expat woman, who is to be found at the pool or at the tennis court where she drinks coffee does still exist. Most of the girls I know, though, are applying for paid or unpaid work all the time. They are explaining again and again where they stand for,” reasons Vullings. She has a lot of ambitions too and wants to spend her time in the new country useful.

Anne van Riel is corresponding with Vullings and shares the same feeling. ‘So many people are jealous on you, you have plenty of time to read books, visit museums and read the journal totally’, writes van Riel. She prefers to spend her time abroad on a different way and she wants to do something.

Jacqueling van Haaften, director of Global Connection – an organisation that informs expats and their partners to make the assignment successful- reaffirms this trend. Since the nineties fewer women have been choosing for a life without obligations when they are establishing abroad with their partners. Having had an booming career and a good education, they want to spend their time worthwhile.

The spectre of the expat woman drinking a sherry on the edge of the pool hasn’t become a reality for her neither. She says: ‘I have fought hard. Initially I have been doing volunteer work for the United Nations, in a camp for Vietnamese refugees. Eventually I managed to get a work permit and I was able to work for a Chinese advisement consultancy agency. 

Crying or smiling
Van Haaften advises partners of expats to think about what they want. Do they want to work? And if they do, why? To earn money, to share knowledge or to develop themselves?

According to the director of Global Connection companies find it important that the partner of the expat is happy, because the expat will be functioning better if so.

There are women who wouldn’t want any different, who want a luxurious life and refuse to return to the flat in their homecountry, underlines Wieneke Vullings. She pleads for a new image of the expat woman, champion of personal branding. 

Source: Wereldomroep
Date of publication: 27 October 2009 

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