Well, I bowled one of my most pathetic games ever (and that’s saying something), but bowling instead of going to class was still fun. Here I am with a few of my classmates.
AJ, from Ecuador, also here for love.
S, from Bosnia, a refugee.
K, from Poland, another here for her Dutch guy.
And the group. Besides those above, and the blond teacher in the front row, the other students who came to bowling come from Finland, Indonesia, Columbia, Turkey, Poland, Morocco, Viet Nam, the Philippines and China. And other than the Bosnian refugees and the Finn, all the others are here because of their partners, mostly Dutch nationals.
After bowling, we went to a cafe and talked about what we’d given up to come here to be with our partners. Everyone in the group has an education and we all had good positions and lives in our own countries, but had given it all up to come here with our partners. I don’t think it’s an accident that most people in the class are women – it does seem that women are more likely to do that for their partner than vice versa. I also see that in that most of the other English speaking expats I meet are women, and the few men I meet tend to have brought their partners as well. I only know of a few men here with their Dutch partners. But for either sex, it’s very hard to look at what we have here compared to what we had in our own lands.