8 Things I Don't Miss About the USA After Living Abroad

Introduction: Welcome to Badass Digital Nomads, where we're pushing the boundaries of remote work and travel, all while staying grounded with a little bit of old school philosophy, self-development, and business advice from our guests.

Kristin:    00:00:23    Hello there, Kristin Wilson from Traveling with Kristin here and welcome to episode 243 of Badass Digital Nomads. The episode I wanted to share with you today, I actually recorded while I was living in England last year, but I wanted to share it with you now because it, it's kind of a reminder since I've been back in the US for the past month about why I left to begin with. You know, there's things that we all love and don't love about the United States, but it's only when you travel, or especially when you live abroad, uh, that you really get that contrast between daily life and the US and overseas. Now, if you're from the United States, you definitely know what I'm talking about. And if you're from outside of the US but you've come to visit here, then maybe you've noticed a few things. For example, Europeans are always making fun of the food in the US. You know, everyone loves to try the fast food when they come here, but also there are certain things about the food and the chain restaurants and strip malls and things that foreigners definitely notice when they come here because you don't see it as much in other countries, even though there's now McDonald's and Starbucks and Walmart's everywhere.  

Kristin:    00:01:44    So as I've downgraded from the delicious produce in Northern England to the produce from public supermarket and as I've gone from taking the train in public transportation and riding my bike to sitting in rush hour traffic on 12 lane freeways, I wanted to share this episode with you today and just, you know, get motivated to start traveling again in just a few weeks time. I'll be in Tulum, Mexico for the first two weeks of March, so if you're going to be down there, then definitely let me know and maybe we can have a meetup down there. I also have some very exciting news about something that I've been waiting for for at least two years now, maybe even more. And this is a new global health insurance for remote workers, freelancers and digital nomads. This is called Nomad Health by SafetyWing. And previously their remote health program was only available to remote employees.  

Kristin:    00:02:51    So if you are working remotely for a company, but now they have this health insurance plan for anyone, for individuals. So this is a full health insurance coverage, not travel emergency medical insurance, but actual regular health insurance that covers your medical needs around the world, including in your country of residents. And these plans start from only $125 per month and you can even get a discount if you pay annually compared to month to month. This is a great option if you've been looking for something more robust than just having an international emergency travel medical insurance plan. This is an insurance plan that can cover you in more than 175 countries. You can choose your doctor, you can get treated anywhere at an urgent care, at a hospital, at a clinic, and they've made the claims process fast and easy. You can get reimbursed online and just overall simplify the process of getting reimbursed for your healthcare abroad.  

Kristin:    00:04:06    SafetyWing also has amazing customer service that's open 24/7 with an average response time of less than one minute. So if you're overseas and you have questions, you can easily reach out to them and get answers. It's easy to sign up online, you just put in some personal information and a brief medical history to create your policy. Then you can use your coverage when you need it and get reimbursed within 7 to 15 business days. There is a caveat with the United States, of course, because of our crazy healthcare system in the US, you'll get limited coverage on trips for up to 30 days. And if the US is your full-time country of residents, then that would not be covered. That being said, it's still a good option if you are a US citizen who's going to be living abroad full-time and you plan on getting your healthcare in other countries with just short trips back to the US, you can choose between standard premium and premium plus plans with all different coverage limits, worldwide coverage from 1.5 to 2.5 million US dollars.  

Kristin:    00:05:17    The premium and premium plus plans also include dental and vision and all of the plans include screenings, vaccines, and maternity. And this is the first global health insurance of its kind designed specifically with online professionals and digital nomads and full-time travelers in mind. It's also very reasonably priced and easy to sign up and make claims. As I mentioned, remote health has already been around for a couple years now, so this is a long awaited expansion into Nomad Health and if you're interested in signing up, then you can check our link in the show notes and get all of the details there. And again, this is a different product from SafetyWing's, nomad Insurance, this is your comprehensive monthly global health insurance plan and not just emergency travel insurance. I'm really excited about this and also some more amazing programs and products that SafetyWing has in development for the future, which we can talk about on other episodes.  

Kristin:    00:06:27    But I just wanted to bring this to your attention because it's such an innovative and novel product offering that has never before been available. And you can get all of the details in our link in the show notes. Also a disclaimer that some of you know that I recently switched from SafetyWing's Nomad Insurance to World Nomads Insurance for my emergency travel medical insurance because I was personally looking for a more robust, more expensive plan with more coverage. So even though I'm not personally using Nomad Insurance anymore for my travels abroad, for my luggage, lost baggage, things like that, I really admire SafetyWing as an organization and I'm very excited about their Nomad Health product. It's available for a lot of different age groups from zero to 17 years old up to 60 to 74. So check our link in the show notes, get all the details, and I hope that this is helpful for you. Without further ado, let's jump into today's topic and I'll see you on the other side.  

Kristin:    00:07:42    I have been living overseas for at least 15 years in more than 60 different countries and while there's certain things that I do miss about my home country of the United States, there's also quite a few things that I don't miss. And as I've been over in Europe for the past couple of months, I've been reflecting a bit on that. And so I wanna share with you today some of the things I don't miss so much about the US. I think the first thing is not having to drive everywhere. I've had a car since I was learning how to drive when I was 15 or at least had access to a car. And so growing up, I mean I never took public transportation. I was from a small town in Florida and you had to drive to go everywhere. But once I started traveling internationally, I realized that you don't actually need a car in many countries because the public transportation is so good.  

Kristin:    00:08:38    And that's certainly the case here in Europe. You don't need to drive, you can take the bus, the metro, the train, and the trains are so good that you can go to different countries without even needing to get on a plane. The bus system is really good as well and that's just not the case in the US. Like yes, we do have public transportation, but it's not as good and the distances are also really far. So we're not gonna get into why the US is designed the way it is in the urban planning, although there are some really good videos on YouTube about that. But if you're outside the city center in a lot of places, then you probably need to have a car or it's really helpful. And so one of the things I don't miss is having to drive everywhere, at least, you know, 20, 30 minutes to get somewhere and then having to pay car insurance and gas and everything like that.  

Kristin:    00:09:33    But of course, you know, I wanna rent a car sometimes and I still enjoy driving and I like the freedom that having a car provides and I've always been grateful to have a vehicle since I could drive. But I also like having the option of just being able to hop on a bus or a train and go anywhere. Another thing related to driving that I don't miss is all of the billboards everywhere in the US I feel like every highway is just filled with advertising and you know, I really don't notice it that much in other countries and I've taken the bus and the train around places in the UK and I haven't seen any, so I don't know if it's against the law or something, but that's just something very characteristic of the US when I go back is that I just notice all of the billboards everywhere.  

Kristin:    00:10:27    And I actually talked about this in another video of how strange it is to see medical billboards, like hospitals advertising their emergency rooms and things like that, which you would never see in other countries. Um, and hopefully that you won't have to go to the hospital. But that kind of practice and mindset in the US is very strange to me. And when I go back after being abroad for some time, it's always one of the first things that I notice and I definitely don't miss it here. I feel like, you know, you can just look out the window and see the nature and see the trees and not be reading advertisements for hours and hours on end. Kind of along the same lines as the billboards on the side of the road. Something that I do not miss is being subjected to pharmaceutical commercials every five minutes if I wanna watch tv.  

Kristin:    00:11:24    Now of course all of us have Netflix now and we watch YouTube and we watch other things. But anytime I wanted to watch normal TV in the US it's insufferable the number of pharmaceutical commercials and it just makes you aware of all kinds of conditions and side effects that you really don't wanna know about and you don't wanna think that you have them. And being in other countries, you just forget that pharmaceutical commercials exist. I mean you see other types of commercials, but it gives me such peace of mind to not have to waste any of my life watching pharmaceutical commercials. I would be happy if I never saw another one of those for the rest of my life. Like if I have a problem, I will go to the doctor, I will figure out what is wrong. I don't need some pharmaceutical companies marketing to me with their super cheesy generic commercials where they're making horrible illnesses seem fun, like, oh, you can have this bad thing that's happening to you at a picnic.  

Kristin:    00:12:32    And it's just very weird. Like all of the marketing with pharmaceutical companies is just very strange and it shouldn't be allowed, quite frankly. Um, it, it shouldn't be so profitable. And so I wholeheartedly do not miss pharmaceutical commercials or the sky high price of drugs for that matter. I had to get some paracetamol, which is like a Tylenol Advil type of painkiller here. It cost 50 cents, 50 cents. I mean that's how much drugs should cost. They should be affordable for everybody. They should be widely available. Um, you know, if it's something without a prescription and seems quite simple, but yet in the US that box would probably be six or $8. Another thing that I don't miss about the US is all of the fast food and chain restaurants. I grew up on McDonald's, Taco Bell, Burger King, all of that stuff. Thanks mom and dad, but I definitely don't miss it.  

Kristin:    00:13:35    I mean, sure that was the eighties and nineties and it was a big thing then, but I, I don't miss having the lack of selection that you can have in a lot of places in the us. Like I lived in North Carolina for a couple of years and I felt like all of the restaurant options were mostly fast food. And I know it's that way in a lot of America and I really like having so many options here of locally owned restaurants where you don't feel like you just have to eat fast food or commercial national or international chains that are in strip malls. The restaurants here can be locally owned, you know, small mom and pop places and just a lot of privately owned restaurants compared to the big chains. And of course those chains are still here as well and they have their own chains here in the UK.  

Kristin:    00:14:28    You've got Pret, you've got like pizza places and you know, you can find all of that, but you also can find a lot more variety here. And so I have to say, I'm not even missing Chick-fil-A sorry Chick-fil-A, but <laugh>, I feel like I've had plenty of us fast food in my life to uh, hold me over. And so I'm really enjoying eating at nice little cafes and bakeries and restaurants that I've never heard of before because there's only one of them, something that I don't miss whatsoever are having conversations about politics with everyone or kind of just conversing about the main headlines of the day. That's something that every time I go back to the US it's like this onslaught of political news. And even when I go visit family members and friends, the first topic of conversation always has to do around politics or something bad that happened on the news.  

Kristin:    00:15:31    And every country has a political system and every country has news, but for some reason they're able to dilute those topics and balance them out with other things. If you're in the US and you get BBC channel, then you've probably noticed that the programming is a lot different than on CNN and Fox News and MSNBC. And it's just a reminder that there's a lot more to life than following what's going on in politics. I remember when I was a little kid and I didn't know what politics meant yet and I would hear adults talking and they'd be like, Ugh, politics, you know? And so if so many of us have that opinion about it and we know that a lot of it is so fake, it's like we can be informed citizens without having to know about every single scandal and what every single person is doing at all times.  

Kristin:    00:16:27    And so I, I've just really enjoy and relish in being able to live my life without knowing what everyone is doing over there and you know, can still keep abreast of the news and the headlines from anywhere in the world. You just don't have to have it in your face 24/7. Another thing that I don't miss about the US is the fast pace of life, like that rat race feeling that you get depending on where you live. Of course I just got back from New York and it was a bit of a reverse culture shock when I got back. I made a video for you about that. But coming back here to England, it's just so peaceful and relaxing. And granted I'm not in London, but whereas in the US I sometimes get this feeling that I'm not doing enough. Like you can kind of feel guilty for relaxing sometimes, but here, like I feel guilty for not relaxing <laugh>.  

Kristin:    00:17:29    Like I'll see so many examples of people relaxing and having an enjoyable day that it makes me feel almost guilty for working. It's kind of the opposite and people still work and have normal lives and jobs and get things done. It's just the energy is just different and it's just so much more peaceful. And of course there's peaceful parts of every country, but uh, I felt this on and off for decades. I remember when I first moved to Costa Rica when I was 20 years old, that is something that really stood out to me was that people just had a lot more leisure time and seemed to enjoy life and like a leisurely pace of life more. And I guess that's why they call it Puerto Vida, you know, the pure life. But as I was going back and forth between Costa Rica and the US I would notice it a lot more when I went back to the US to finish my university and also go to grad school and then moved back to Costa Rica.  

Kristin:    00:18:30    I think that's when it really hit me because I had just come out of business school and I feel like I was brainwashed into, you know, going into corporate America, that's what business school is for. And then going back to Costa Rica and doing the opposite of what all of my classmates were doing. At first I kind of felt guilty for not, you know, taking a full-time job back in the US but then, uh, once I was in Costa Rica and kind of started to ease into that kind of lifestyle, I just really loved it. And I really haven't gone back since. A sort of random thing that I don't miss about the US is getting so many spam calls. When you go to another country and you swap out your SIM card for a different one, all of a sudden those calls stop. I don't know how many do not call list I'm on, but they don't really seem to work.  

Kristin:    00:19:22    And even though I still have my US phone and sim card, I'm mostly using a UK SIM card on my primary phone. And so I don't have to worry about getting all sorts of spam calls and voice messages, like robo calls and things like that. And it's something that I only notice when I pick up my other phone to check messages. Like when I landed in New York and I swapped back to my US phone, I had 70 spam voicemails, <laugh> and I kind of forgot that that existed. So I definitely don't miss that. And I love only using my phone for the purposes that I like and not having some random scammy companies intruding on my privacy. And then a big one has to be the cost of living. And this is something that has not changed since the first time I moved abroad in 2002.  

Kristin:    00:20:22    So 21 years ago I remember getting to Costa Rica and being shocked at how inexpensive everything was. Now the prices have gone up there quite a bit in recent years, but it was the same when I went to Australia. I can remember telling my parents and my friends that I was spending-- that guy was going fast. I was spending about half of what I was spending to be a student at the University of Central Florida. My rent was half the price, my food bill was half the price. And I was living in a beachfront apartment in a town called Miami Beach. Not Miami, Florida, but Miami, Australia, just up the road from uh, Burley heads. And I was just shocked, you know, 20 years old, living on half the cost of a crappy student dorm. And I felt like there was this big secret that no one had told me about.  

Kristin:    00:21:19    And it's still that way. I, I always spend more when I go back to the US and even if I travel to an expensive destination like Tokyo or back to Australia, 'cause it has gotten more expensive there now, especially with the uh, exchange rate last time I was there before the pandemic. But there's really nowhere that I go that I spend more than I do living in the US. Sometimes I'll spend the same amount. I mean obviously if you're staying at super luxurious hotels and things like that, it will be more expensive. Or if you're living in a really expensive country like Iceland or Switzerland, it will definitely cost more. But I've even found in, you know, quote unquote expensive places like Norway and Finland that the cost of living is still lower than it is for me in Florida. So the high cost of living in the US just generally is not something that I miss. And I know that there is inflation and a cost of living increase around the world, but it seems particularly noticeable in the United States. So what are some things that you don't miss about the US when you go abroad? Let me know in the comments below and also what are some of the things that you do miss and maybe I can make a video about that.  

Kristin:    00:22:43    Okay, welcome back. So could you relate to any of the things that I don't miss so much about the United States? It seems like a lot of people on YouTube did as well. Almost a thousand people left comments on this video. Marlena said, I've been outside of the USA for over 10 years now. I don't miss the horrible healthcare system, the high property taxes, the bad GMO insecticide filled food, the billboards, fences, cost of living, social tensions, television everywhere, bad fluoridated tap water, car culture and more. I now live in the Andalusian Mountains in Spain and I don't think I'll ever go back to the us The healthcare system in the US is one of the reasons why I'm so excited for Nomad Health by SafetyWing so that you can get global health insurance in more than 175 countries around the world. So definitely check that out in the show notes if you're looking for an alternative to being in the US healthcare system.  

Kristin:    00:23:45    And while I do agree with Marlena on all of these things that she doesn't miss about the us no country is perfect and despite my love of travel and living abroad, I think I'll always keep returning to the US because it was where I was born. My family is here, many of my friends are here. So although we like to gripe and complain about many of the things that we don't like about the US, you know, it's still a great country and there's still a lot of pros as well as cons. And if you've been listening to the podcast for a while or watching my videos, you know that no country in the world is perfect. So this is not something to just beat up on the US about. There's pros and cons to wherever you go in the world, but it, it's definitely the US can be quite a polarizing country compared to other places.  

Kristin:    00:24:37    DF says, I flew into Frankfurt, Germany got on a train from inside the airport and rode all the way to southern Italy. It was very comfortable. Plenty of room, a snack bar and a restaurant. Yeah, I mean, trains, <laugh>, Europe does trains really well. Many other countries do as well, but the US is not one of them. Being in Florida, there's now what's called the bright line that goes between Miami, Fort Lauderdale and Orlando. But it just makes you wonder, why don't they have a train that goes, you know, from Miami to New York or uh, I don't know, like all around the country, we should have trains to be able to get around the state from major cities or especially in places like California where they have the coastal train and you can just hop on and off and go all the way up the Pacific coast.  

Kristin:    00:25:29    We should definitely have that on the east coast in Florida because even though we have this train now, if you're not going to between Miami and Orlando, it's not really useful because it doesn't make stops along the way and it should also go from Miami to Jacksonville. So it's just kind of frustrating that it takes our governments decades to make something that's not even really that usable. Wizard says. Coming from the UK, I found the billboards in the US for lawyers, bail, bondsmen, political candidates, sheriffs and hospitals. Very odd, I have to say I do as well. And a lot of people replied to that. Someone also posted and the billboards about machine guns to rent. Yeah, I have been noticing a lot of signs to buy guns since I've gotten back for Christmas, and that is a bit off putting. It's something that I didn't notice as frequently a year or so ago, but I've been noticing it more on this trip.  

Kristin:    00:26:28    And Alexia says, I'm so tired of the tipping culture here, especially that 25% or more is standard now. And sometimes mandatory places that shouldn't be asking for tips are now asking for them. I wish establishment owners didn't burden their patrons for this, pay fair wages to employees. If everyone in the US stood up to this nonsense, the business would be forced to change. I have to agree with Alexia. Yesterday I got a smoothie and they had added a mandatory 25% service charge to my smoothie to-go. My smoothie was $15. I mean, it was very shocking to find out how the tip culture originated in the US dating back to slavery. And it has been a way for restaurant owners to subsidize the cost of labor and it's just become mass accepted and standardized in the US and really embedded into the culture. So unfortunately, I don't see it changing ever, but it seems like the standard tip amounts keeps going up. But what do you think or is there anything that you found strange about the US when you came to visit? Or is there something that you don't miss now that you're living abroad? Click on this videos, link in the show notes and go make your voice heard, leave a comment and I look forward to reading it. And if you're looking to move overseas in 2024 and want some help, then you can reach out to me using the link in the show notes and apply for relocation support. Or you can go to TravelingwithKristin.com/relocation.