How to Pack Up Your Life in the US and Move to Spain

Are you ready to be a US refugee?

This is the paid post after: What Should You Do If Your RV Furnace Dies in the Dead of Winter? If you don’t have a paid subscription, don’t worry. The last post was free, and the next one will be too. This post is for the people who help me pay for grad school and adventures with paid subscriptions—and those who have appeared in my blog posts and videos over the years. Thank you!

---

Moving to Spain is one of the best things I’ve ever done.

I can’t imagine living in the United States as an immigrant right now—where even citizens and Native Americans are getting detained. I lived through four years of that already and have no desire to worry about whether a speeding ticket will have me on a military flight back to Jamaica.

I much prefer to be in Spain, where no one has asked me if I’ve ever been a prostitute or whether I have any affiliations with Russia or Muslim terrorists. And yes, those are real questions I got asked during my interviews for residency and citizenship in the United States.

One of the most hilarious things I’ve experienced in Spain is that people are excited to hear I’m from Jamaica. However, once I mention that I lived in the United States before moving here, they furrow their brows and look very concerned.

“Es muy peligroso, no?” they ask, lowering their voice.

Meaning: It’s very dangerous there, isn’t it?