5 Things I Wish I’d Known Before Relocating Back to the UK

When you’re an expat, the talk of your “exit plan” is common chit-chat. One minute you’ll find yourself discussing the latest football results beside the water cooler, even if you don’t have much to say about the game. Then, you might casually throw up the subject of leaving the country!

Going for a coffee with a friend can spark an in-depth discussion about the latest binge-worthy Netflix offerings, whilst simultaneously bringing up shared thoughts of packing your bags and heading home. For expats, especially those in Dubai, it's not a case of if we move back, it’s a case of when. Although the UAE is taking measures to make it easier to retire in the country, it’s still not a piece of cake - unless you have a millions dirhams in savings.

I spent seven years in Dubai. I originally went there for three months. Two years max. Even when I was knee deep in launching my own business, I still didn’t feel completely committed to living there. It’s hard. You can absolutely love it and completely loathe it, all in the space of an hour. You go from feeling super independent and go-getting to missing your family and friends so deeply that it can make you want to throw up. Then, you fall in love with the sandpit all over again and thank your lucky stars that somehow, weirdly, you landed in the middle of a desert to create a new life for yourself.

As grateful as I was, and forever will be, for the opportunities, life experience and people that living in Dubai brought me, I had my sights set on living in London again. I missed the theatre world, walking everywhere and the fact that my core best friends were there. But I was torn. In Dubai, not only did I have my own thriving business, but I had also made friends I loved like family…I mean, I married one of them! Like many expats, I decided to wait it out until the universe sent me a sign as to what - and when - our next move would be. When I fell pregnant with my son, we knew it was time. London was calling.

The actual move back to the UK wasn’t so difficult. My husband and I didn’t have oodles of furniture other than the standard expat IKEA items and a pretty awesome sofa we sold easily. We shipped our belongings back using one of the many brilliant services Dubai offers and lived in an apart-hotel for a couple of months while we tied up work and made plans for the next chapter. The transition into London living was masked by the newness of becoming parents. Having a baby was so life-changing that it trumped any feelings of settling back into our home country. It was only as time moved on that we started to realise the differences and understand how much we missed being expats. It’s partly a case of the grass being greener in some instances, and in other ways, only becoming aware of certain things after they’d had time to naturally present themselves to us.

// Tax

Everybody said it I’d feel the pinch. I always said it didn’t matter. “I paid tax before Dubai, it is what it is.” Speaking honestly, you really do feel the pinch - well, punch - when you get hit with a tax bill or watch it yanked out of your salary every month after living in a tax haven. Yes, you have to pay for your services and healthcare in the UAE, but when you can’t get a GP appointment in the UK until next month and the motorways are endless roadworks, it’s not the easiest pill to swallow. I’m sure it all evens out, but there was a simplicity in being paid in full, then paying out for what I needed by choice. And I’d grown accustomed to liking that. The reversal was - and still can be - a hard adjustment.

// Seeing Friends and Family

Or, not seeing friends and family, to be more precise. When you’re an expat, your trips home are a big affair. Everybody wants to see you! You arrange dinners and pub get togethers and make sure you spend time with your bestie’s new baby because you’re missing out by living thousands of miles away. You say things like, “When I move back, we’ll hang out ALL the time.” But when you move back, the motivation for meet-ups changes. Knowing you can see friends and family easily (ie not having to catch a seven-hour flight), means it’s also easier to cancel and suggest a rain check. Suddenly, those you’d imagined seeing every other week become the people you see once or twice a year. It’s nothing personal, it’s just that you’re not in the UK as a visitor anymore, you’re back to normal life and priorities change.

// Kids Don’t Play Out

During my time in the UAE, I worked with a lot of children and teenagers. It was exciting to teach in such a different environment to how I’d grown up and I was often impressed at the amazing lifestyles some families had. But I always thought about how strange it must be for children not to go and play out. Whether it was the intense heat or the busy roads, I never saw kids mucking about on their bikes or playing in a local green together like they did in the UK. But since I’ve been back, I’ve not seen it here either. The streets I used to play around are just full of parked cars. There’s not a kid kicking a ball in sight. Like in the UAE, children are taken door to door to their friend’s houses by car, no walking to and from knocking on each other’s door. Maybe the world got too dangerous. Or maybe they’re just inside stuck on screens.

//Hard to get a GP appointment

The NHS is wonderful. I’m grateful every day that the UK is still clinging onto this incredible service. But it’s not sensationalised news when we hear that the NHS is on its knees. Getting a GP appoint-ment is no longer a case of picking up the phone and getting seen asap. It can take hours to get through to somebody and it’s likely you won’t get an appointment for three weeks. Private healthcare in the UAE can be expensive, especially if you’re covering it from your own pocket, but you can be seen by a doctor fast. Piece of mind is much of the battle. Some might ask why more people don’t go private in the UK, but when you’re paying so much tax during a cost-of-living crisis, it’s just not financially possible unless you’re in the minority earning big bucks.

//You’ll Miss Being Away…

…more than you ever imagined. I felt so ready to leave Dubai when we did. A new chapter was awaiting us. But we look back often. We sometimes wonder, did it all happen? Being an expat is such a unique and enriching experience, being so far from home and living your life from there. I used to stand on the white sands looking towards the Burj al Arab in the distance, watching the waves, and think how wonderful it was to be out in the world, exploring, learning, growing. I’d take an abra across Dubai Creek and hear the call to prayer as the sun was setting and breathe in the culture, so different to what I’d ever known. I miss all that. I miss it more and more the longer I’ve been back, which feels like a contradiction to how happy I’ve been with my decisions and loving London life.

But I guess that’s part of being an expat; you’re always in two places at once.

// Hayley Doyle