This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Jaime Bancroft-Gennaro, a 50-year-old consultant and coach who moved from the US to the Netherlands. It has been edited for length and clarity.
I was born in Pennsylvania, grew up in San Diego and went to college in Santa Cruz. After graduating, I moved to Oregon. First I lived in Bend, then I spent fifteen years in Portland.
When my son was born in 2009, my husband and I moved to Italywhere my husband comes from. He was homesick and it felt like the right move at the time.
When the economy collapsed during the global financial crisis, we moved back to the US. We always longed to return to Europe; we just didn’t know where and when the right time would be.
Before we moved to Europe for the second time, my husband sent me to Amsterdam alone to see what I thought. I loved it and we decided to move there.
In 2017 my children went to primary school
Trump was elected for the first time. My kids came home and talked about immigration, lockdown drills, and other things that made me realize this wasn’t how I wanted them to grow up.
Around the same time my husband received a small inheritancewhich really led to the move. I thought, “We have the money to do it now. The timing seems right. When else are we going to do it?”
Amsterdam reminded me of Portland in many ways. It felt like the right place for us. We were nearing the end of our lease, gave our landlord a few months’ notice and then moved just outside Amsterdam in 2017.
We didn’t know anyone in the Netherlands
We didn’t speak Dutch and didn’t know the culture, but we felt that if we were ever going to do it, with our children aged 4 and 6, this was the right time.
I worked in advertising and there were many advertising companies in Amsterdam. My husband had a job in software and moved with that job. After arriving I found a new job. I worked through my company with a work permit and that was my sponsorship to live in Europe.
When I later lost that job during COVID-19, I was able to stay in the Netherlands through my husband. Ultimately, I became a citizen myself.
Since I moved to the Netherlands, there are things I’m happy with, things I like and things I miss.
We got rid of most of our stuff
I decided we would get rid of most of our stuff, except our kids’ stuff. I wanted to take all their stuffed animals, toys, gifts they had received and their blankets. It felt important to keep what was important to them – and the things that would make them feel most comfortable when we arrived.
I didn’t mind getting rid of my own stuff. I’m a minimalist, and as someone who has done a lot of walking, also a purger. We brought our clothes, two cool retro chairs from Portland that I loved, and my VHS tapes from college. My husband, who is a photographer, also brought a box of old slides.
I enjoyed letting things go because every time you reach a milestone in your life, or you move, you are a new person. For the items we kept, we hired a company to fill a shipping container with some of other people’s boxes. They sold us part of the container.
It wasn’t much, but it worked. I wish I had taken my bike with me because I needed it once I arrived in the Netherlands.
We have moved to a furnished house
We moved into a furnished house that we rented for the first two years, which was very helpful. We didn’t have to worry about collecting a bunch of stuff because we didn’t know if we would be staying long.
In the US we paid $1,900 a month in rent, which included three bedrooms, carpet and a cluttered kitchen with an electric stove, but excluded utilities. Our mortgage here for a four bedroom and an office is €1,500, or about $1,745. We spend €150 per week on groceries.
We have placed our children in a Dutch school
When we arrived, we immediately put our children in a Dutch school because they were still so small. We wanted a language immersion program, but not an international school, because I wanted my children to feel rooted somewhere rather than transient.
The children became fluent after six months and stayed there for two years, after which they moved to a Dutch public school. They feel like they are in it themselves, while international children are often in the suburbs. My children feel like they now speak three languages fluently: Dutch, English and Italian.
I like to take my bike everywhere
I love the cycling culture of the Netherlands. In Portland they also have a cycling culture, but it’s not like in the Netherlands. Every time you cycle, you are not on the street. There is a complete cycling infrastructure with traffic lights, stop signs and roundabouts.
My kids also bike everywhere, and they don’t need us to drive them around or take them to parties; they are completely independent.
I work from home and never drive anymore. If I ever left the Netherlands, I would miss the cycling culture.
People are always there to help each other
I like that everyone looks out for each other. If a child falls off the bike, there are immediately people around him trying to help. If an older person falls, it’s the same. No one just passes them by.
We also have a WhatsApp group in the neighborhood where an older woman often asks: “Can someone help take out my trash, or have coffee with me?” and people like to do that. There’s a sense of community where I think Americans are now becoming a little afraid of each other.
There are things I miss, including Trader Joe’s
I miss going there Trader Joe’s. Okay, I miss Trader Joe’s a lot.
I miss the small talk. I miss going to the grocery store and asking the cashier how my day is going. There’s no talk here. They use words very efficiently.
They also don’t pack your groceries here.
I also miss English
In the Netherlands people speak a lot of English, but every time I leave the house there is still a bit of anxiety. I took a few Dutch lessons when I first moved, and I now know enough to get by.
Yet my main fear is that I will misunderstand someone or say something that he or she will not understand. For example, if I find myself in a complicated situation, such as falling off my bike and taking an ambulance, this would be beyond my language skills. Or when I visit my husband’s family, they speak Italian.
Sometimes I feel like I’m not my full self, and I’d like to be. I am friendly. I like to talk and meet people. It feels embarrassing to ask someone to speak English because I live here. I have realized that I have become much quieter and more reserved than when I was in the US. I have become much more of a wallflower and that makes me homesick.
Despite the discomfort, I would do it again
When I first moved here, I didn’t feel comfortable. I had dreams about leaving, and I was ready to leave. I thought, I don’t want to do this, but I had to go through the discomfort of being somewhere new.
Over the last few years I have come to appreciate living here much more. I often think: look what we’ve done. I think It’s so cool that we moved here.
Now that I’ve lived here for 10 years, I’d like to have a plan to move somewhere else. My son is in his last year of high school and my daughter is a sophomore, but she is open to finishing high school elsewhere in Europe.
I love seeing my kids truly thrive in their communities, navigate friendships, and find their place. I feel like we’ve all found our little pocket in the world, and I really appreciate it a lot more than I think I ever have.
