Expats: Raising a family overseas

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(Editor’s Note: This is the second of a 2-part story about Justin and Sarah Walker, Brandon High School graduates who are working and raising a family overseas. See part one at www.thecitizenonline.com)
After spending two years in China and relocating to South Africa, Justin and Sarah Walker knew that they were committed to life as expatriates and a long-term future overseas.
‘We weren’t on vacation anymore,? said Justin. ‘When there were things we didn’t like in China, we just thought, ‘We’ll be out of here soon.? But when you have two kids in South Africa, you build a bridge and get over it. You don’t want to jump jobs every two years, the kids need security and somewhere to grow up.?
The international school they worked for in South Africa was very good, and very privileged. Tuition was about $23,000 for a year for a high school student. About 20 percent of the school’s population was South African natives, with the remainder children of expatriates. Tuition is most often paid for by parents? employers, which in South Africa included Coca-Cola, Ford, Walmart, and Bridgestone. The children of ambassadors often attend the school, too.
The Walkers continued their travel adventures, swimming with penguins and great white shark diving (in the safety of a cage), whale watching. The first two years in South Africa, they mostly explored This September, Justin and Sarah will begin looking for the next place on the globe that they will move to? perhaps southeast Asia, or South America, maybe Morocco or eastern Europe if it’s feasible. They are enjoying their adventures abroad and in their careers in education, they are also receiving a hands-on lesson in life.
their new country, but the last two years, they branched out again, visiting Zimbabwe, Zambia, Botswana, Kenya,Tanzania, and Egypt. They went to Europe, visiting Germany, Austria, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Italy, France, England, Ireland, Hungary, Belgium. They returned to Asia, visiting Malaysia and Indonesia.
But after four years in South Africa, they wanted something different.
‘We were doing the same thing each year,? said Sarah. ‘I wanted to get back to teaching English and he wanted to try different counseling than middle school. We can’t live in one place too long, and don’t want the same job for too long, either.?
In the fall of 2013, they began their search, typical for the field they are in, as September through February is the recruiting season for international schools. They had requirements for their search? there had to be a school where there were openings for both Justin and Sarah, and it had to be a school in a good location for their children. They received an offer for Bangladesh, but they didn’t want to take their daughters to a place that they deemed a little too ‘third world? at this time. They wanted a place where the kids could ride bikes in the street or go to the park and there weren’t many openings for that in Asia or West Africa and the jobs weren’t good fits. They finally interviewed for jobs in Korea that weren’t ideal or exactly where they wanted to live, but then the man that was recruiting them told them about positions in the Middle East. They were intrigued and found jobs at an international school in Doha, Qatar.
They have been in Qatar for a year now, but realize it was a mistake and wish they would have taken jobs in India instead.
‘You have to weigh the information you’ve received and do the research in three days,? said Justin. ‘You’re only getting limited information and opinions and perceptions.?
Their unhappiness has less to do with the country than with the school where Justin works as a student services coordinator and Sarah teaches language arts to grades 7-10, including analysis of classic literature such as Shakespeare and ‘To Kill a Mockingbird.? The school is in a temporary building and the facilities are lacking as resources in the wealthy country are currently directed at construction and other priorities for the World Cup, coming to the country in 2022.
‘The country itself is 80 percent expats,? said Justin. ‘There are so few people there, but it’s the richest country in the world per capita and they have modernized so quickly they don’t have the personnel to build and maintain their own country. All these natural resources in gas and oil and they don’t have the people.?
The school is also lacking diversity. Twenty percent of the school’s population is Qatari, but the majority of the rest of the students are of middle eastern descent.
‘We want our kids to have more diversity,? said Justin. ‘We only celebrate Qatari National Day. We would like a more internationally minded school for our kids.?
Still, Sarah said Qatar is incredibly easy to live in, with access to everything they could ever need or want, with high-end five-star restaurants and hotels. They live in a brand new home, again with a housekeeper, this time a Filipino woman who sends money home to support her family.
‘People (American friends or family) will say to us, ‘I wish I had a housekeeper? and I say, ‘Well, I wish I lived around the corner from my parents, who could take care of my kids,?? said Justin. ‘There are pros and cons and you take the pros where you can get them overseas… I give up certain things. A concert comes and we can’t see it. We can’t have Thanksgiving dinner with our parents and siblings and cousins.?
In Qatar, they are experiencing vastly different weather and cultural differences. Temperatures reach 120 degrees, making running, a pursuit for both Justin and Sarah, difficult. They alternate days on which they get up at 4:30 a.m. so they can run in 90-degree temperatures. They have taken to other athletic endeavors such as swimming or cycling. Justin plays ice hockey.
Sarah has adapted her attire to what is expected of a western woman in Qatar. She wears what she likes in her home, but out in public, she must have her knees covered and the more of her arms that are covered, the better. Qatari would like American women to have their elbows covered, but they are not overly strict. There are different rules for Qatari women, who are expected to wear a full black burqa, and also for Muslim women who are non-Qatari, who are expected to wear head coverings, but not the burqa.
‘The first few months there, I was uncomfortable with what our kids were viewing, the whole perception and what they thought,? said Sarah. ‘I learned a lot about the religion and I have overcome a difference that I wasn’t familiar with.?
‘These were our notions of everything we have been striving for in our generation,? said Justin. ‘Our kids don’t have any preconceived notions, and they have learned that what they are seeing is part of the (Muslim) religion and culture… In any country, you have to be more open-minded about it, or you will hate living there. There are a lot of things we disagree with, but we have a choice about the place we live in the world. If we don’t like it, we can move on. They’re not going to change for us.?
Qatar has one of the lowest crime rates in the world. Justin recalls leaving a Mac Pro on the front seat of his car and then remembering he forgot to lock the vehicle, but not being very concerned about it. When he returned, the laptop was there. But while the low crime is a benefit, the reason for it also causes unease for the Walkers. Penalties are severe and the justice system has been criticized by the United Nations for defense lawyers? lack of access to evidence and discrimination against foreigners.
‘We did not have any concerns about terrorism or even crime moving here,? said Justin. ‘People have more to lose by being deported or detained. If you are accused of a crime, you can go to jail indefinitely. No lawyer, phone call, or bond. It’s the kingdom. Do I feel like someone is going to break into our house? No. But I have a small fear that I have no rights as an American citizen. Nobody’s going to steal (possessions), but they could steal my freedom. I could get in trouble just by an accusation or Sarah could get in trouble for the shirt she wears. They have all the control, you have none.?
They will stay in Qatar for one more year and have a lot of travel planned, including Germany, Jordan, Poland and Saudi Arabia, the latter of which they will only be able to go to on their way elsewhere. They would like to visit Israel, but that is out for now as getting that passport stamp would preclude them from traveling other places in the Middle East.
Inexpensive travel is a definite perk of their lifestyle.
‘We experience things many people have only read about,? said Justin. ‘It’s totally different to stand in front of the Taj Mahal or Angkor Wat in Cambodia. Every vacation is amazing. I can’t pick a favorite. Egypt is amazing? cruising down the Nile and seeing stuff that’s 4,500 years old and the pyramids, it was really a great trip. The beaches in the Philippines and Thailand are unbeatable. Everyone goes to the Caribbean and Mexico, but Thailand you can go for $10 a night and the waves are the sounds at night. Climbing Kilimanjaro and going on safari and the Christmas markets in Europe are unbelievable. They take an old town square and put up all these booths and sell mulled wine and cider and cookies and ornaments and wooden bowls and there is music and the castles and churches are lit up and you get that Christmas feel.?
Their children have not had that otherwise, they note, as you can’t get that on the beach in Thailand and they have never lived in a place where it snows at Christmas. While they miss some of the holidays and other traditions they grew up with, Sarah and Justin try to differentiate between whether it is something the kids need or something they as parents want to give their kids.
‘Home is the people around you and what you’re doing,? said Justin. ‘Home is spending Christmas with family eating cinnamon rolls, or going to the beach and body surfing. We’re replacing Little League memories and Thanksgiving dinner.?
Toward the end of the school year, the family is excited to come back to Michigan for a visit. They go to waterparks and breweries and the lakes. Justin and Sarah run on dirt roads again and the kids spend time with both sets of grandparents, whom live in Ortonville.
‘Our families have accepted this as our life,? said Sarah. ‘Everyone has a situation that creates difficulty for them, ours is distance. But all of our family lives in Ortonville and our kids get a great relationship with aunts and uncles in summer… They are independent kids, accepting. We are proud of who they are becoming, they are eager to learn and they have learned a lot. They are worldly I guess.?
This September, Justin and Sarah will begin looking for the next place on the globe that they will move to? perhaps southeast Asia, or South America, maybe Morocco, or eastern Europe if it’s feasible. They are enjoying their adventures abroad and in their careers in education, they are also receiving a hands-on lesson in life.

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By Susan Bromley
Staff Writer
(Editor’s Note: This is the first of a 2-part story about Justin and Sarah Walker, Brandon High School graduates who are working and raising a family overseas.)
Ortonville most likely seems a tame vacation destination to most, but for Taelyn Walker, seeing the cows at Cook’s Farm Dairy was a walk on the wild side.
Taelyn, 6, has lived in four different countries in her life, including South Africa where she regularly saw giraffes and zebras wandering around and fed an ostrich through her backyard fence. When her parents, Justin and Sarah Walker, brought her and her sister Kaelia, 5, to Ortonville, cows, like the horses and pigs at the Johannesburg Zoo, were a novelty.
‘Going to Cook’s was an exotic experience for them,? said Sarah. ‘Taelyn tried to feed a cow hay and it was munching on her braid and she thought it was so dangerous.?
The Walker children, barely into formal schooling, have already experienced a travel education that most people don’t achieve in a lifetime. Their parents, both 1999 Brandon High School graduates, are working and raising their family overseas.
Justin and Sarah (Pepera) Walker married in 2004. In 2006, they were living in Colorado, with Sarah working her first teaching job, and Justin studying for his doctorate degree when a friend who was working at a school in China called and told them the school needed a counselor. Justin had not finished his dissertation and he and Sarah weren’t seriously considering the opportunity, but their friend was persistent. The founder of the educational organization flew to Colorado to meet with them and ended up hiring both.
‘We thought we could try it out for a little while and see if we liked it,? said Sarah. ‘This was before owning anything? we were renting and got sick of the town we were in. We loved Colorado, but couldn’t see the mountains where we were. We were on the same page, we both always liked to travel.?
In 2007, they left the United States for a new life in Shenzhen, China, where Justin would work as a counselor at the international school and Sarah would teach high school English for the next two years.
‘There were things we absolutely loved about China and things we absolutely hated and nothing in the middle,? laughs Sarah. ‘I loved the full body massages for an hour and 20 minutes for $4 every week. I liked the ease of living, it was simple. We didn’t know the language and we were in an expatriate bubble.?
They hated the lack of personal space. In public spaces in China, such as the subway or on the bus, people are right up next to each other, touching. Sarah notes that if you leave any kind of gap while standing in a line, people will cut in front of you.
They were disturbed by babies and toddlers without diapers or in crotchless pants defecating and parents simply shaking it off into the street, and they note that China doesn’t have the social supports the U.S. has, lacking shelters for the homeless for example.
The food there was a love/hate relationship for the Walkers. Justin notes they loved the stir-fry, but meat could be oily, fatty, or unidentifiable. On menus, they would often point to whatever pictures were available for what they wanted. Justin recalls that in their first week in China, they went to a local restaurant and pointed to one of five pictures on a menu. The waiter kept pointing at something in the distance and placing his hands on his stomach. Thinking he was making a motion that indicated the menu item was delicious, they nodded and said that was what they wanted. When their order came, the meat was gray, chewy, and they figured out he had been tapping his stomach because the food was pig intestine.
Their apartment was small, their undersized washer and dryer fitting in the kitchen which didn’t have a stove, so they made do with a toaster oven. Justin likened living in China to living poor in New York City and Sarah said they have learned what is important to have and what isn’t and downsized accordingly. ‘You don’t need a dishwasher when you don’t have 30 dishes,? said Justin. ‘When you only have a couple bowls and a Walmart knife you have to wash those things every time. That’s in stark contrast to the way we live now, we haven’t washed a dish in five or six years, we have a housekeeper.?
The Walkers didn’t have to learn to speak Chinese fluently as they were in an English speaking school and Justin said in China, everyone wants to learn to speak English. Instead, Justin and Sarah learned to count in Chinese and how to direct a cab, as well as the phrase for ‘too expensive? so they could haggle when making purchases. They were in southeastern China, on the border of Hong Kong, where English is even more common.
They traveled extensively, and relatively inexpensively, while they lived in China, too, seeing more than a dozen countries in two years including Vietnam, Cambodia, Philippines, Thailand, Australia, New Zealand, and Singapore while they were on summer break from school, or on the other various breaks during the school year.
Their close proximity to Hong Kong, with elite hospitals, also helped make them feel comfortable starting their family while living abroad. Taelyn was born in Hong Kong and Sarah loved how the doctors there were more about following her birth plan, in contrast to their daughter Kaelia’s birth 16 months later in Colorado, where doctors were more concerned about following their own wants rather than Sarah’s wishes.
When Taelyn was 4-months-old, the Walker family returned to Colorado so Justin could finish his dissertation. In 2010, he obtained his doctorate and they welcomed their second daughter, Kaelia, in June. They enjoyed living in Colorado Springs and thought perhaps they could stay there for a couple years, but Justin searched for jobs through international education organizations and saw an opening in South Africa. In August 2010 the family relocated there.
‘It was South Africa, how can we not apply to South Africa?? asked Justin. ‘We had done Asia and this school was a step up from the caliber of school in China.?
The salary was better and additionally, the South African international school, like most schools overseas, paid for their housing (often fully furnished), insurance, transportation, and roundtrip airfare once a year for the entire family to and from their home of record.
‘Everyone wants to live in Berlin or Munich, but they don’t offer the same perks,? said Justin. ‘They may pay $70,000 or $80,000 per year salary, but they don’t pay accommodations or airfare home. Switzerland or the Netherlands are sought after, but they pay high taxes, and it’s a huge ding into your salary and you don’t see Social Security from it and you’re not eligible for their health insurance plan. Salary in itself is not a clear indicator of a good package.?
He notes that they can’t afford to live in London because the international schools there don’t pay enough to cover the cost of living in that city, nor do they have the benefits. Western Europe in general is harder to save money because of the high costs. He turned down a job offer in Poland because there was no housing perk and the salary was lower than what they received in China. While some expatriates don’t care because they want to live in Paris or another high-priced location, the Walkers are concerned with their retirement, which they are entirely responsible for funding.
So they landed in Johannesburg. The downfall was that segregation still exists in South Africa more than 20 years post-apartheid, much of it due to the limited education for blacks from the apartheid era.
‘Now, 20 years later, you are able to get a job no matter what race you are, but without the education, you see more white people in those positions,? said Sarah. ‘Racism wasn’t anger or hatred, just segregation. You would see a huge line of black people waiting for a taxi, but no white people waiting.?
Justin said he was only white person on the road, running seven or eight miles to work.
‘White people don’t walk? you’re the white, entitled, 10 percent minority. There wasn’t redneck bigotry, it was just this underlying current you felt in a political or education discussion. They (whites) just didn’t quite see them (blacks) as equal.?
Aside from the racism still present in the country, the Walkers loved their 4-year stay in South Africa, a country about the size of Texas, with a wide variety of terrain, from mountains, to rain forest, to desert, to beach. They found it to be an ‘outdoorsy? country, with lots of runners, walkers, hikers, cyclists, and swimmers. The weather was glorious, with more than 330 days of sunshine per year and no humidity. Their summer, from November to March, featured temperatures in the 80s and 90s. Winter, from May to August, had temperatures in the 60s during the daytime and 30s at night. Most buildings were concrete, with no insulation and no furnaces. They used space heaters to warm a room.
The Walkers enjoyed safaris and excellent food and the perks of having a housekeeper. Having household help is expected overseas they said, and obtained at very reasonable prices.
Despite the chilly winter nights and the segregation, they were determined to adapt, and they did.

Next week: Life in Qatar

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