• When we left Canada and moved closer to my husband's family in the UK, I pictured a fun adventure.
• Our move caused a lot of financial strain, and living near family didn't go the way I expected.
• After seven months, we returned to Canada. Looking back, I should've been more realistic.

I pulled down the extendable ladder covered in cobwebs and dust and watched dead woodlice roll down the steps onto the new carpet in our bedroom.

With a deep breath, I willed myself to go up into the attic — a place I hated to go — to retrieve our family's suitcases and duffel bags. We were heading back to Canada, and it was time to start packing.

When we had moved to England seven months earlier, I never imagined returning so soon.

At first, moving to the UK felt like it could be a grand adventure

Packing up a life in Canada and starting a new one in England had been a herculean endeavor, but I had been excited to do it.

For two years leading up to our move to the UK, my husband, two kids (ages 7 and 10), and I had been settled in Alberta, Canada.

As much as we enjoyed it, I ached for a new adventure; something different. I didn't feel particularly connected to our community, and our day-to-day lives had felt monotonous for a while.

Some of our only reprieves as busy young parents were monthlong summer holidays spent with my husband's family in the bucolic British countryside.

We enjoyed these trips so much and looked forward to them for weeks, from planning excursions to castles and museums to researching the best local restaurants and pubs.

When we arrived, we loved taking day trips to nearby locales and eating fish and chips by the seaside. I started wondering if living in England would be just as enjoyable and exciting as these monthlong stints. Maybe it'd also satisfy our longing for adventure.

Although moving meant leaving my extended family in Canada behind, the idea of our kids spending the rest of their childhoods with my husband's family nearby felt like the right next step.

My in-laws also seemed excited about the arrangement, as they offered to help pay for my visa application to live in England permanently.

My (more skeptical) husband decided he'd continue running his business in Canada after we moved, occasionally commuting back every few weeks while working remotely from the UK in between.

After six months of figuring out some logistics and filling out paperwork, we boarded our flights.

Not long after the move, reality began to sink in

We arrived in the UK in September 2025, lugging heavy duffel bags, suitcases, and backpacks, feeling exhausted, sweaty, and weary from a much-delayed flight.

We were ready to be in our new home. Home, however, did not yet exist.

For the first week, we stayed at my husband's grandparents' place, which was vacant while they were on holiday. We spent it navigating sleepless nights, trying to get over jet lag, and dealing with horrible colds.

From there, we bumped around to three different Airbnbs and holiday accommodations. My husband returned to Canada for a three-week work stint while I earnestly tried to find us a place to live.

Securing a rental was more challenging than anticipated, and it felt unlikely that a landlord would approve our application. My husband was still earning Canadian income, we had no local credit history, and we had two kids — yet we were trying to rent a smaller (read: more affordable) home.

After six weeks and more than 20 different applications, we finally had a landlord agree to rent us a beautiful, newly renovated historic cottage that couldn't be more picturesque.

It was, however, at the very top of our budget. We knew we were heading into a precarious situation, but we could no longer afford to keep staying in vacation rentals.

We signed a six-month lease with the help of my in-laws, who loaned us the deposit and acted as guarantors, and moved.

We faced more and more challenges as we settled into our new home

Our new rent ate up so much of my husband's pay that we couldn't live the way we had hoped.

There wasn't room in our budget for the fun things we'd dreamed about doing when we moved here, like overnight stays in nearby towns and small trips to other parts of Europe.

And as a Canadian living in the British countryside, I increasingly felt like an outsider who would never fully be accepted.

My accent betrayed me every time I spoke, prompting locals to assume I was on holiday despite my residential status. Giving the full explanation of why I left Canada to live in the UK felt so exhausting that I started to just let them believe I was on vacation.

When I'd imagined my life here, I pictured being surrounded by a close-knit community of friends and family. Instead, I mostly felt alone in a new place while my husband, who understood the local culture, spent weeks at a time working in the country we'd left behind.

On top of that, we realized how challenging it can be to go from seeing loved ones a few times a year to living close by and having more frequent interactions.

Being near my husband's family didn't go as well as I'd hoped; instead, it seemed to lead to a series of disagreements and misunderstandings.

In less than a year, living permanently in the UK no longer felt worth it

Although I hated the idea of "giving up" after all of the time and effort we had put into the move, building our dream life here no longer felt possible, and we returned to Canada after less than a year.

Looking back, I realize excitement clouded my judgment about how viable this arrangement really was, but I pushed forward, believing that moving was the solution to my loneliness, restlessness, and lack of community. It was not.

We hadn't properly prepared for what life in a new country might bring, and we didn't achieve our goal of blending international families.

I realize now that our move was a misguided attempt to feel free and unburdened. Now, we're trying to repair the financial damage from it while figuring out what's next.

• Kylie Genter graduated from college with no career plan.
• At 22, she moved to South Korea to teach English and became fascinated by female freedivers who harvest seafood.
• Now, 37 and married, she spends around five days a week diving with women in their 70s and 80s.

This-as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Kylie Genter, 36, a Haenyeo diver on Jeju Island, South Korea. It's been edited for length and clarity.

I'd been teaching English in South Korea for four years when I learned about the Haenyeo — female freedivers who harvest seafood without using modern equipment. I was interested. So, in the summer of 2018, I completed diving lessons with the hopes that maybe I could work with them one day.

A few years later, my Korean husband, a scuba diver, read on a diving group chat that a small village on the southwestern side of Jeju Island was recruiting new divers. Their youngest diver was 68 — I wanted to give it a try.

At first, I was rejected, but I got invited back a month later. I don't know what changed in that one month, but I guess they suddenly became open to it, and I went in for an interview.

In January 2024, I started as a diving intern, and after two years of training, I received my Haenyeo license in April.

Finding my footing in South Korea

I was born in upstate New York, the middle of three kids. I went to SUNY Oswego and graduated with a degree in communications.

After graduating in 2012, I didn't know what I wanted to do. I applied to a few graduate schools and jobs, but nothing worked out. I was stressed out and wanted to leave. I thought about going to Japan to teach English, as I'd studied Japanese for a year while in university.

Instead, I settled for South Korea, where some schools offered housing. I didn't know much about Korea at that time — I wasn't really a big K-pop fan before I came.

So, just four months after graduating, I moved to Jinju, a three-and-a-half-hour high-speed train ride from Seoul, to work as an English teacher. In the mornings, I'd do 20-minute lessons with kids. In the afternoon, I'd have speaking classes.

I continued teaching until August 2020. That same year, I got married and started a pension business with my husband, while still teaching English on the side.

Building my life as a diver

To get my license, I had to dive 50 days within a year, sell 1.2 million South Korean won, or $884, worth of catch, and get a unanimous vote from the divers in the collective. It took me two years.

Language was an issue; despite having spent years in the country, I still couldn't always understand what was happening. My biggest strength is that I'm physically fitter than some of the divers — they are mostly in their 70s and 80s. So, I help out, like when they need someone to carry their nets full of catches or wash the dishes.

A lot of the work is physically demanding. If you don't feel good, you can't just push through. I can't dive if I have a cold or my sinuses are blocked because I can't equalize underwater. It's important to keep my body physically strong and healthy through working out.

Committing to an unconventional job

I enjoy my life. Every day is different, and I do a lot of things besides diving. I run a pet hotel with my husband; sometimes I still tutor and give lectures. I work more hours, but I also have a lot more flexibility to pursue other things. I don't need permission for a break or a day off.

On normal days, I wake up and take the dogs for a walk. Then, I go diving depending on the weather. If it's not great, I only dive for two or three hours. A normal day of diving may take four or five. After that, I take the dogs for another walk.

In our village, we typically dive five days a week. We'll take our catch and accumulate it after one cycle. After that, we'll sell it to the regional fishing co-operative. They'll pay our president, and she then distributes the money.

Being a diver isn't a full-time job. A lot of what we earn depends on the catch. I make around $2,000 a year. Teaching is much more financially stable. But I love learning from women who have been carrying on this work for generations.

When I'm diving, nothing else matters. I just have to focus on diving and catching seafood. Nobody can call me. I don't have to look at my phone and waste time doomscrolling.

When I'm deep underwater, it can be meditative, especially on days when the ocean is calm, and there's plenty to catch. I see myself wedded to this village for the rest of my life.

• My husband and I moved from the US to the Netherlands without seeing our new apartment in person.
• We encountered lots of surprises, like the lengthy Dutch application process.
• Although we love our apartment, we've had to get used to a few cultural differences.

After living as digital nomads for nearly two years, my husband and I decided to move from the US to the Netherlands.

We'd visited several times and fell in love with the walkability and bike culture. Plus, I have a connection to the country, since my great-grandparents were Dutch.

With the help of a real-estate agent, we found an apartment remotely from the US, signing a yearlong lease in the city of Utrecht before ever setting foot in the home.

We encountered some surprises while looking for an apartment

Since the process of finding an apartment abroad can often take months, we chose to search remotely from the US. To make things easier, we hired a Dutch real-estate agent with local connections who could view apartments for us in person.

The prep work was much more intense than I was used to. In the US, I've leased apartments in three different states, and the extent of the application typically included filling out a basic form and sometimes completing a background check.

That wasn't going to cut it in the Netherlands.

Our agent gave us a long list of materials to prepare, from 12 months of bank statements and links to our LinkedIn profiles, to a "get to know us" letter, which included our hobbies and photos of us. Then she went looking.

Rentals often get snatched up within a few hours or days, so my husband and I were regularly waking up at 4 a.m. in Colorado to read our agent's emails about the new listings each day.

When we finally found one that checked all our boxes, we asked her to schedule a walkthrough. Luckily, she recorded a video for us to review, so we didn't need to wake up early for this part of the process.

It was during the walkthrough, however, that we learned Dutch apartment listings aren't as detailed as the ones we were used to in the US. When our agent arrived, we discovered the listing had omitted several important pieces of information.

For example, there was a fully fenced-in back garden, complete with a shed, picnic table, and blackberry and rose bushes. The kitchen had a dishwasher. And there was a washing machine hidden away behind a cabinet door — and a dryer (which is not as common in Europe).

Score, right? So we jumped at the opportunity, put in our bid, and jumped for joy when our offer was accepted.

Despite a few setbacks, we fell in love with our apartment

We arrived in the Netherlands a few weeks later, traveling directly from the airport to our rental. When we unlocked the door for the first time, hoping we'd fall in love with our new home, it was … freezing.

Turns out, the heat had stopped working, and the rental company couldn't send someone to fix it until the next day. So, we spent our first night in the Netherlands at a hotel.

Thankfully, the heat was fixed the following day, and then we could start unpacking. This is when we began to notice some of the more nuanced differences of a Dutch house compared to an American one.

The first thing to get used to? The alarmingly steep stairs (a hallmark of skinny, tall Dutch houses) which made moving furniture up to our second-floor office feel like a Herculean feat.

We also learned to accept moths and gnats as houseguests, since Dutch windows don't typically have screens. However, with no air conditioning and a 100-year-old house that was built to retain heat, we definitely want to keep those windows open.

Overall, aside from a few stowaway insects and some hot days, we've been very fortunate with our rental. I particularly love the neighborhood and how we can walk to a grocery store, bakery, or park within five minutes.

The biggest lessons have come from being part of a Dutch neighborhood

Although finding our rental was a whirlwind process, I've found the most interesting parts of living here have come from the cultural differences between American and Dutch neighborhoods.

For example, shortly after arriving, our neighbor invited us to the neighborhood WhatsApp group. If you need to borrow a drill or lose your cat, you send a message to the group.

It's very active, and joining the group helped me feel like I was part of a community before knowing anyone here. Although I've heard of similar groups in the US, I've never been invited to join one.

Ordering packages is also very different. Back in the States, packages would be left by my door. In the Netherlands, however, they aren't left unattended.

Instead, the delivery driver will start ringing the neighbors' doorbells until someone is home. Then, they'll leave a digital note about which house has your package.

One place I didn't expect to feel such a contrast is the sidewalk. On sunny days, my Dutch neighbors bring out their dining room chairs, park them on the bricks outside their front door, and enjoy a cold drink. Sometimes, it'll feel like an impromptu block party — and I couldn't be happier to join in the festivities.

After leasing an apartment across the world, sight unseen, would I do it again? I sure would — especially if I could hire a real-estate agent to check out the home in person.

The quirks of our apartment and neighborhood are all part of the experience of living abroad, and although I may not have expected them, I've now grown attached to these cultural differences.