Moving to Germany After 50: It’s Never Too Late

Transcript

A New Beginning

Manuel:
[0:08] Jae isn't here today. He's in the US celebrating all the things you US Americans celebrate this time of year, but he sends his regards. And before we begin, and before I introduce you, I wanted to say: Apologies.

Antje:
[0:25] For? What?

Manuel:
[0:27] For being away for so long. When was the last episode we put out here? everyone.berlin is our website, Episode 60, How to Berlin On a Budget, was in August. Is it December? [It is.] It's December, oh my God! Okay, so basically Jae and I decided that we love this project, We really love this project, we love this podcast, and people like you and others have graciously told us many times that it's a worthy endeavor and that it's a good resource. And we're going to keep doing it, but we're going to slow down a little bit and essentially only do it when we really feel like it, when we have a topic that is burning underneath our fingernails. Is that something you say?

Antje:
[1:15] Yeah.

Manuel:
[1:16] Or did I just make that up?

Antje:
[1:17] Burning under our skin?

Manuel:
[1:18] Burning under our skin, or whenever we have a lovely guest, just like you, who writes in and says: Hey, I have a topic, I have a story, I have tips to share, I have resources, I have questions. Those are actually my favorite episodes now. So if anyone listening either plans to move to Berlin, has moved here, or just has good ideas, good things to say about Berlin, write us an email at ... what's our ...? I don't even know our email! I think it's manuel@everyone.berlin is how you can reach me. Or you can just go to everyone.berlin and click on contact and that's how you can reach us. And then we'll do episodes just maybe not every week or every second week, but once a quarter.

Antje:
[2:05] And you too can invite yourself to be on a podcast.

Manuel:
[2:08] That's right. You can be on this show. You can be in the studio just like you, Antje. You made the way over here to Berlin Mitte, which is where we are.

Introducing Our Guest

Manuel:
[2:17] And I thought your topic suggestion was so great. Do you want to introduce the topic for us?

Antje:
[2:24] Sure.

Manuel:
[2:25] Before we introduce you, just give us a quick ... like what was your elevator pitch for this topic?

Antje:
[2:29] The elevator pitch was that I am a middle-aged person.

Manuel:
[2:33] A middle-aged person. What is the middle age?

Antje:
[2:38] 45 and above.

Manuel:
[2:40] 45 and above.

Antje:
[2:41] I guess, maybe. I'll be 53 on Saturday.

Manuel:
[2:47] Mmh. You can't say Happy Birthday in Germany ...

Antje:
[2:49] No, you can't.

Manuel:
[2:49] ... In advance. In America, you could now say Happy Birthday in advance.

Antje:
[2:53] You could. Yeah, but you can't here. [Not so here.] No.

Manuel:
[2:55] No, we take that very seriously.

Antje:
[2:56] You do. You do. So, I noticed that a lot of your guests, although wonderful information and super interesting, are all pretty young and maybe basically unattached and are free to move about.

Understanding Middle Age

Antje:
[3:15] And it's a little bit of a different situation for someone like me.

Manuel:
[3:19] I hope you help us reach a new demographic here, because I just looked at our Spotify Wrapped. You know, Spotify does this thing where you see ... as a listener, you see what you listen to, but as a podcaster, you also see kind of the 'down break', breakdown [Okay.] of who your audience was. And guess, in the age range between 45 and 54, guess what the percentage of our listeners is.

Antje:
[3:47] 45%.

Manuel:
[3:47] 8% and then 55 plus?

Antje:
[3:50] 1%.

Manuel:
[3:51] 5%. So 13% of our audience are 45 and above. Hopefully that changes, because do people not move anymore when they're 45 plus?

Antje:
[4:05] I think they do, but there's a lot more to consider, depending on your situation.

Manuel:
[4:11] What's your situation, Antje? Who are you? We've known you for a while because you listen to Easy German. [Super fan!] Super fan! You brought gifts, thank you, not necessary. Yeah, but then you also started listening to this podcast.

Antje:
[4:29] Mm-hmm.

Manuel:
[4:29] Why? Who are you?

Antje:
[4:30] Well, I am a first-generation German. My parents both immigrated from Germany in the 60s.

Manuel:
[4:39] Where were they from?

Antje:
[4:40] My mother's from Leipzig, so former East Germany, and my dad is from the Stuttgart area, so Esslingen, Baden-Württemberg.

Antje's Background

Manuel:
[4:48] And what made them leave Germany in the 60s?

Antje:
[4:51] They actually left separately. They met in the United States. So it's a little bit of a convoluted story. My dad left for work, he had a job, he was an engineer. And my mom married an American, and that's how she immigrated initially to the United States.

Manuel:
[5:09] And then divorced and met your dad.

Antje:
[5:11] Yeah, at a German club in LA.

Manuel:
[5:14] Wow, that's so interesting. [It is. Yeah, yeah.] And then how did you grow up? What was your connection to the German language in Germany?

Antje:
[5:23] We grew up speaking a lot of German at home. And then as early as five, my brother and I would fly by ourselves back to Esslingen and spend our summers with our Oma.

Manuel:
[5:37] Wait, is that legal? You can put a five-year-old in a plane?

Antje:
[5:40] Back then. It was the 70s.

Manuel:
[5:43] That's amazing.

Antje:
[5:44] Yeah, I have this vivid, vivid remembrance of my brother and I sitting behind the counter at London Heathrow Airport, and we thought it would be funny to run away from the stewardesses.

Manuel:
[5:55] Oh my God!

Antje:
[5:59] And, yeah, and then we had these matching ... my mom would make these matching like one-suiters, so we had these like one-piece, I don't know, things that we wore that matched. It was pretty cheeseball.

Manuel:
[6:10] So people could find you.

Antje:
[6:12] Yeah.

Manuel:
[6:13] That's amazing. Okay, so you did have a good connection to Germany.

Antje:
[6:15] Yeah. And that's ... where I probably learned most of my language was as a child, spending six to eight weeks in Germany, most summers.

Manuel:
[6:29] But then you never considered moving back to the homeland?

Antje:
[6:35] I had an opportunity when I was in my 20s, where I came over for six months and lived with some good friends in Magdeburg. And they were very generous and offered that I could stay as long as I wanted. They had three sons and those three sons were very ... not very nice to me while I was there.

Manuel:
[7:02] How old were you?

Antje:
[7:04] 20.

Manuel:
[7:05] Okay.

Antje:
[7:06] So.

Manuel:
[7:06] Typical exchange kind of experience. [Exactly, yeah.] I was there when I was 17, 18 - so almost the same - in the US, I mean.

Antje:
[7:13] Yeah, yeah. Right. Right.

Manuel:
[7:13] Reverse.

Antje:
[7:14] Right. So, I just was ready to come home after that. And then, you know, that's when I met my husband, when I came home.

Manuel:
[7:24] Hello! He's sitting in the audience here.

Antje:
[7:26] So, if I would have stayed, then life would have been completely different.

Manuel:
[7:30] It's those small decisions that can change an entire life. Okay. So, you stayed in the US.

The Path to Citizenship

Manuel:
[7:38] And then fast forward, I guess, or is there anything crucial in the time in between then and now?

Antje:
[7:43] That you want to point out? No, fast forward ... graduate school, well, marriage, graduate school, homeownership, children. And as our kids were younger, as infants, I spoke only German with them.

Manuel:
[8:03] Okay, so they were raised bilingually.

Antje:
[8:05] Well, no. Because as soon as they recognized that it was a foreign language, about three, both of them, were like, "No Deutsch, Mommy." They didn't want anything to do with it.

Manuel:
[8:19] That's so interesting. Because they didn't see a use for it, or ...?

Antje:
[8:21] I think that's what it is. And my mother, who is native, doesn't live far from us. And she too did not want to speak German with them. She thought it would be too hard and too difficult for the grandkids. So once our daughter came, who's our younger child - she was a difficult baby, toddler, young girl - and something just had to give. I couldn't do it anymore. And I think after reflecting on that, my children don't have the necessity to learn German like I had to. And also in our home, because my husband doesn't speak German, there was no like discussion or two-way interaction. It was just me speaking to the kids, reading books, singing songs, whatever. And so ...

Manuel:
[9:12] So they probably have a good comprehension now, but ...

Antje:
[9:15] Maybe, yeah. They're showing some interest again in it. However, now that they're older, it's like: Well, it's on you now to learn it.

Manuel:
[9:26] More effort. I know.

Antje:
[9:26] Yeah.

Manuel:
[9:27] Okay. And so then what sparked the idea of moving to Germany?

Antje:
[9:33] I've always wanted to. There was some discussion when the children were young. I had wanted to maybe do a year here, thinking, you know, the children are young, they're not too set in school yet, it would be an easy time to go. We have many friends and family, so as far as connections, it wouldn't have been maybe difficult to have it happen. But it just never seemed to materialize. My husband's career was starting, and him being the main breadwinner of the family, you know, it just didn't work out.

Manuel:
[10:14] It does get, like we joked earlier, but it does get trickier the older you get, right? Like once ... I mean, I didn't even have furniture until five years ago. I just ... I ... [What?!] Between the ages of like 18 and 30, no, 33, basically, I just moved every two years. I switched places so often, sometimes moved to another country, but at least moved within Germany, and I went traveling for two years, and it was never worth it to really invest in like furniture or nice things for your apartment and ... But now that I have that, now that I do have an apartment and did buy some nice furniture ... I mean it's stupid you can sell the furniture and stuff, but it's like: Oh, now it's nice and comfortable, like it's harder to just ... [It's home.] Yeah, it's home. And you ... Especially like all my moves, it was always clear that they were going to be for a year or two, and you don't give all of that up knowing it's just going to be for a year or two, so it gets harder. And yeah with children and stuff in the mix and a career and everything it's even harder.

Antje:
[11:25] And I think in the US, you know, home ownership is a big deal, and so even when we bought our first home in our early 30s late 20s, you know, that's just kind of what you do, is home ... maybe not nowadays because it is ... home prices are very high, interest rates are high. But it's a little bit harder when you actually own a piece of real estate, you know, to be able to leave that, whether you sell it or rent it or whatever else, so.

Manuel:
[11:57] Okay. So what was the point when you made the jump?

Antje:
[12:04] I guess for me, it was ... it was a long ... the jump was a long time coming in between my children being young. And I have to honestly say, what really sparked it in me was discovering Easy German.

Manuel:
[12:20] Oh, that's awesome. But it's ... the language was the [Yeah.] vehicular, the, I don't know, the motor.

Antje:
[12:29] Yes, because I was always wanting to continue with my German, and I didn't have much opportunity. And I kind of ran across your podcast one summer on our family vacation. And I was like ... blew my mind, because you guys could laugh at yourself. You made fun of Germans, which just like, I was hooked right then, because most of my family, like, they're so serious and nobody makes fun of Germans because, you know, Germans are perfect and the best.

Manuel:
[13:04] Serious people. Yes.

Antje:
[13:04] Yeah. So it was like, wow, there's people who actually could laugh about themselves in Germany. That's amazing. So, that was the big kind of impetus for continuing my language growth. And then I did end up in February of 2023 here at the GLS Schule, because you guys advertised it, and I did an intensive couple of weeks and it was wonderful. I was by myself, which I do like to be, like travel on my own.

Manuel:
[13:40] It's pretty brave, though.

Antje:
[13:41] Yeah.

Manuel:
[13:42] If you're going to be at a place for how many weeks?

Antje:
[13:44] Three weeks I was here. [Three weeks.] Mm-hmm.

The Move to Germany

Manuel:
[13:46] Okay.

Antje:
[13:47] So, and, yeah, and so just for me, it was, you know, improving my German, and thinking about also the time in my life where our children are getting older, our sons in college, our daughters, a senior in high school. Like there is maybe the possibility of empty nesting, you know, maybe somewhere else. And then that was when I also seriously considered getting my citizenship, which apparently wasn't available to us when we were children. I'm not quite sure the story there, why my parents didn't get our citizenship, so .. .

Manuel:
[14:29] But it was easy enough when you were an adult?

Antje:
[14:32] It was actually easy enough because my father did naturalize in the '70s because our family wanted a vote in the US. My mother is still a German citizen. But through the father, it's pretty easy to prove. So I just had to find documentation that he was still a German citizen when we were born in '70. My brother was '70. I was '71. And we had that. And then they just recently, and I don't know why, but they just recently opened up a rule where people like me, that our children, we have 10 years, and then our children get it too, even though I wasn't German before my children were born.

Manuel:
[15:21] Okay, so your children can get German citizenship.

Antje:
[15:23] Yep. And we all three have it. We've accomplished it, we all three have our passports. And I actually ... [Congratultions!] Thank you. I actually entered Germany this time around as a German citizen for the first time.

Manuel:
[15:35] How was that feeling being waved through?

Antje:
[15:38] It was great. I went through Icelandic air and so we were in Reykjavik is where you do the passport control. And the guy was like, "Why don't you just use your German passport?" I was like, "Well, why? That doesn't ... I mean, will they let me back out or I don't have a stamp? Will they let me back in?"

Manuel:
[15:57] Yes, yes, we'll let you back out. You can stay for the election in February and ...

Antje:
[16:04] Oh, right.

Manuel:
[16:05] ,,, Depending on how it goes, you can decide to stay or leave.

Antje:
[16:08] Right. So I was like, "Okay." So it was actually pretty exciting. And he was so friendly. I could not imagine actually doing it with a German passport control person.

Manuel:
[16:18] Okay, so you got your citizenship and you did your Sprachkurs at GLS, and then you convinced your husband: Yes, we're moving here.

The Future of Relocation

Antje:
[16:27] No, I've never convinced him that we're actually moving, 100%.

Manuel:
[16:31] Oh, so that's still in the future. You haven't made that jump yet.

Antje:
[16:36] No, and I don't ...

Manuel:
[16:37] It's the working project right now.

Antje:
[16:38] Yeah, I don't foresee it in the near future happening 100% of the time.

Manuel:
[16:45] Okay, I see. Now I understand where you're at. And why Berlin? If you're ever going to move here, is it going to be Berlin? I mean, Leipzig is the new Berlin, and that's where your mom was from.

City Comparisons

Antje:
[16:58] And I still have family there.

Manuel:
[16:59] Stuttgart's also nice, more sun. What are your thoughts on the best city to move to?

Antje:
[17:06] Well, I do love Leipzig. I've been there many times. And it just ... I feel at home there. Berlin is amazing, you know, I feel at home here, too. And I do love larger cities, so I could see that. If I were to think about practicality, actually, in the Stuttgart area, my cousin lives in Ludwigsburg. She's a single engineer. She's got a five-room apartment.

Manuel:
[17:40] Oh, wow! Not so possible in Berlin.

Antje:
[17:44] Yeah, yeah, so there's definitely a room there for me. And I actually got a job offer while I was in Ludwigsburg.

Culture Shock and Identity

Manuel:
[17:52] That's amazing.

Antje:
[17:53] So I could work.

Manuel:
[17:56] It sounds like it could all work. When you emailed me, you said there was a bit of a struggle comparing the two cultures, the US culture and German culture. What did you mean by that? Did you have culture shock when you first came here or ...?

Antje:
[18:13] It's not culture shock. It's more like an internal struggle within myself, where you hear Germans, like they love America, but then they secretly hate certain things and vice versa. Like, you know, Americans are like, well, "Why do you want to, you know, go over there?" So it's more an internal struggle within myself about: Am I American? Am I German? I'd like to identify as more German than American, but nobody will really let ... Well, I can do whatever I want.

Manuel:
[18:51] Yes, you can. That's what's so great about being an adult.

Antje:
[18:54] Exactly.

Manuel:
[18:55] No, but I know what you mean. Like there is, I mean, I've also heard from people listening to, especially the other podcast, Easy German, that they're worried about anti-Americanism.

Manuel:
[19:07] Especially these days you know when we criticize the direction that politics is going, democracy is going, and then ... but at the same time I think it becomes clear - like I'm speaking about me personally now - I love the US, I was ... it was very influential on me. I was there as an exchange student when I was 17. I've consumed all of the, you know, media, all the movies, Hollywood, so many bands that I love are from the US. It's like so, so influential and obviously so much good has come out of it. All the tools I'm using right now - not all of them but a lot of them - all the tech is coming from the US. But especially when you love something then you also care a lot about it, and then when you feel like it's going in a wrong direction you're also going to speak up about this. But I think often it also comes across a little bit crude, and there is a lot of fun being made of a lot of things and then people perceive that as anti-americanism, but I'm not sure if that term's very good. And in the US my feeling was that Germany is popular among people in terms of like, "Yeah they make good cars and good pretzels and good beer," but that's like the extent of it Like it's a kind of a limited view of what this country or this city does.

Antje:
[20:30] Yeah. I think for me, there's just some sort of energy resonance, that I feel at home here, that I don't ... Of course I feel at home in the US, in Portland, in our home, but I don't ... It's not the same feeling as when I'm here, and ...

Manuel:
[20:51] It's weird, places can do that to you. [Yeah.] Where you just ... there's something about this place ... And I've, I listened to an interview with Hape Kerkeling. Do you know him? Mm-mm. He's a very famous German comedian. [Okay.] But he's in his 60s now and he actually turned serious, he's not doing comedy anymore.

Antje:
[21:09] Okay.

Manuel:
[21:09] He's written a few books. His first and most famous book was when he walked the Jakobsweg. It's a famous pilgrimage, and he wrote about that, so he's talking about more serious stuff now. And he did a lot of research about his ancestors and he has this theory - and I can link the podcast episode, it was Hotel Matze - where he talks about that there is a connection to the places that your answers just come from. And he has lots of anecdotes where it's like: this person was always so drawn to not ... or he himself personally was always drawn to Amsterdam and specifically a specific area in Amsterdam that he just loved and felt so drawn to. And then only later through his research he learned that both sides of his family came from Amsterdam, from this particular area in Amsterdam, actually lived on the same street. And then he has other stories. And it's very anecdotal, I don't think there's scientific research necessarily backing this up, but he has this theory that you can ... the places where your ancestors come from, you feel it [Yeah.] in your bones somehow, [Yeah.] and what you're describing seems to confirm this.

Antje:
[22:26] I remember as a kid, my grandmother took us, you know, to some old church or something. And there's something about that damp stone smell that you can't get anywhere else. Like, I never experienced it anywhere else, and that just ... yeah. And then I remember we were underneath the church and there were some tombs. And I saw something and I thought it was echtes Blut, you know, and I was just so drawn to that, I don't know, the drama of it all, I guess. But yeah, there's just something about being here. And especially I feel it more in the eastern part of Germany than I do in the west, even though I spent most of my time in the west. We did travel to East Germany quite a few times when it was still East Germany, but I don't know what it is.

Manuel:
[23:15] Interesting. Yeah, but maybe when you eventually move here - if and when you eventually move here - you'll have that yearning for Portland, you know. You probably will never just fully be able to settle and say: Yeah, this is ... this is it. I have everything that I need here.

Antje:
[23:32] No, I agree. And I've been here almost a month and I do miss my home, especially around the Christmas time here you know, we're not with the kids [Mm, yeah,] and miss our dog terribly.

Manuel:
[23:47] Aah, God, of course. Okay. And then you also wanted to rant about bureaucracy, is what you told me.

Antje:
[23:55] Oh, my gosh.

Manuel:
[23:56] Because you said it was easy to get the citizenship.

Antje:
[23:58] It was easy. But, you know, you read up on all this stuff, and you have to have all these documents and they have to be translated and they have to be notarized. And, you know, so you're just worried about providing this, you know, portfolio of documents in front of the consulate and hoping that they'll take it. And it was so interesting when we arrived. We have an honorary consulate in Portland, so that's where we went to submit our paperwork. And the first question was ... she was like, "So what makes you think you're German?"

Manuel:
[24:40] That's a good question. What makes you think that you're German?

Navigating Bureaucracy

Antje:
[24:44] Yeah, so that was kind of like: Oh!

Manuel:
[24:46] What was your answer?

Antje:
[24:47] Well, I mean, I just thought the spin was really funny. It was kind of like this negative, kind of like prove-me-wrong kind of spin.

Manuel:
[24:56] Was it in English or in German?

Antje:
[24:57] No, she did communicate in English, but she was German, yeah. And so then, you know, I submitted the form, and of course I carefully filled everything out by hand because there was no way for me to actually do it on the computer, so I had to print them out. And my maiden name is Zündel, which is Z-Ü-N-D-E-L, but in the US, we always spelled it Z-U-E, and so that's how I wrote it out. And she right away crossed it out on the form, was like, "No, they won't accept this." And she wrote with the umlaut. And so right away, my form was a complete mess. She like crossed out all my names. And I'm like, but are they going to take this?

Manuel:
[25:39] Like a German teacher correcting the exam.

Antje:
[25:41] Yeah. And I'm like, "Should I refill this out?" She's like, "No, no, they don't care." And I'm like, "But I had to notarize and translate." So on one hand, I thought they really cared, but then on the other hand, I mean, it was just ...

Manuel:
[25:54] But I had this realization only recently, I feel like way too late in life, which is that all of this stuff, like everything, the world, all this official stuff, documents, certificates, translation, it's all made up.

Antje:
[26:10] Yeah.

Manuel:
[26:10] It's all just pieces of paper that people have thought up. And it's like, does anything really matter? Like, I don't know. I hear so many stories of people looking for apartments in Berlin.

Antje:
[26:23] Oh, my gosh.

Manuel:
[26:24] And the lies they go through to get them, because you have to submit lots of documents. We've done episodes on this. You have to have the SCHUFA and the Gehaltsnachweise, and people fake these documents. Apparently, I'm not going to say everyone, but apparently a lot of people fake these documents. And it's such a rampant thing because ... A, because there's not enough apartments and people will do anything to get them, but B, because it's all made up. Like nothing means anything. Like people don't check if these documents are real. No one calls the employer to say: Is this actually the amount of money the person earns? It's all just made up. And I'm sure at the consulate they have a little bit of a stricter system, but maybe these forms aren't so important.

Antje:
[27:13] I don't know. It's almost like they'll make you feel just scared enough, you know?

Manuel:
[27:18] Exactly. It feels scary.

Antje:
[27:20] Yeah. And so, yeah. And like, I kept my maiden name, and my father passed away a long time ago, so I kept it as a second middle name, and then added my married name. And she was like, "Well, that's not going to ... they're not going to take that, because your Familienname or Geburtsname, my birth name, was my maiden name. And then on my actual name part where you wrote your first name and your middle name, I wrote my first name and my two middle names, which again, the second middle name is my birth name.

Manuel:
[27:53] Complicated.

Antje:
[27:53] And she was like, "Oh, you Americans and your fantasy names. You just make stuff up." And I'm like, "But it is my name. It's not a fantasy. I didn't pick some random name." And she's like, "I don't know if they'll take this."

Manuel:
[28:07] You may need to change your name if you want to become German.

Antje:
[28:10] Yeah, they took it.

Manuel:
[28:11] They took it?

Antje:
[28:12] Yeah.

Manuel:
[28:12] They accepted it?

Antje:
[28:13] Yeah.

Manuel:
[28:13] Yeah. I have heard this, that Germany is much stricter with names. Like apparently in the US, you can name your baby, essentially ... Because like Elon Musk named his baby something like ... didn't he name one of his children, X?

Antje:
[28:26] One of his 12 children?

Manuel:
[28:29] 12 children. Yeah, I think one of them was called X. In Germany, I think it has to be on a list. Like there's a list of approved names. I'm pretty sure X is not on it.

Antje:
[28:38] That's very German.

Manuel:
[28:40] Yeah, but it's also like, there's a lot of choice. Do you really need to have infinite possibilities when it comes to naming your child?

Antje:
[28:48] Well, I guess in the US you do, because you know, you're free.

Manuel:
[28:51] It's all about the ultimate choice. Okay, yeah, there is a lot of bureaucracy. I mean, there's too much bureaucracy. And especially, bureaucracy is one thing, but the biggest problem in my mind is that it's all so analog. You know that you can't ... like the Scandinavian countries are so much better with these types of things, whether it's getting married, having a baby, getting money for your child that the government owes you. All of it is just done online and here it's just all on paper still.

Antje:
[29:22] Everything I had to submit was on paper. There was nothing I could submit digitally.

Manuel:
[29:27] Yeah, it's a huge problem. And part of the problem - not to get sidetracked too much, but - is the federal system here, because it's like hard for the federal government to say: This is the system that we're going to use and then everybody has to stick to it. But that's what you need when it comes to a digital system.

Antje:
[29:48] Sure, sure.

Manuel:
[29:51] Anyway, what else would you like to complain about?

Antje:
[29:54] Well, then, I had forgotten when I submitted my papers that I had also filled out a slip to have them sent to me, you know. I pre-filled out the address label to have them sent to me, and then ... [The what? The passports?] The passports yeah. And so when finally - this was all sent down then to San Francisco which is where the actual consulate is and that's who did all the approval - of course I had to do a name recognition because they wouldn't recognize my married name until I got our marriage registered here in Germany and then they would recognize the married name. And then I got this email about our passports are ready, I can come pick them up. And I was like, "Wait, what? I have to come to San Francisco to pick up the passports?" So they didn't even know that I had filled out this address, this envelope for them to send it to me. And then I had just emailed them like, "I need to come down there during these certain hours to pick up?" And, you know, and then two days later, they show up in the mail. So, like, they didn't even know.

Manuel:
[31:07] Oh, my God.

Family Support and Concerns

Antje:
[31:09] Yeah.

Manuel:
[31:09] Okay. So, that's bureaucracy for you. You also talked about a bit of a lack of support from your family on both sides.

Antje:
[31:21] Yeah, I feel like it was, yeah, there was a lot of ... I don't know if I want to say negative, but there was a lot of like, "Well, why do you want to get your citizenship? Why do you want to do that? Why does it matter?"

Manuel:
[31:34] Not even for the move, the potential move, but just for getting the citizenship.

Antje:
[31:38] Well, that too, you know, and ... And I was realizing that there was just ... it kind of goes back to like, I'm not German enough in either country. [Mm Hmm.] It comes back to that. But also I think for my mother, it was more of like she's in her 80s, and it's like, well ... and culturally, you know, children take care of their parents in Germany. Family takes care of their family much more than they probably do in the United States. And so she was, I think, deep down worried that I would leave her, when maybe she might eventually need some help as an ageing person.

Manuel:
[32:22] She has no interest in returning here at her age, probably.

Antje:
[32:26] No, she's been here so long. I mean, all her family's here. She's really close with her sister who's in Leipzig.

Manuel:
[32:32] Wait, she's in the US?

Antje:
[32:34] Yeah.

Manuel:
[32:34] Yeah, by here you mean there?

Antje:
[32:35] Oh, I'm sorry, yes, I meant here, by like, yeah, the West Coast, US. It's an interesting situation for her because she considers herself to be a lifelong refugee. She was born in what I believe was Czechoslovakia at the time, the Sudetenland, and then they escaped and fled and then ended up in what became East Germany, and then she fled East Germany. And so to have the home that my parents built, which they literally built from the ground, it's like she feels like she has something finally in her life, that she never felt like she had anything [Yeah.] growing up. Which I get, you know, the post-war generation and and things like that, so ... And then it's been hard on a more primary family level with my kids and my husband just not maybe understanding how important it is to me, but also just this fear of just instability and what a move might mean like that.

Manuel:
[33:48] And have you considered kind of a trial move for six months?

Considering a Trial Move

Manuel:
[33:53] Because, I mean, you can sublet your house.

Antje:
[33:57] Right. And I think that's what it might look like in the near future, is where I might spend - and it might just be me - where I spend three, four, maybe up to six months over here.

Manuel:
[34:08] I recommend the summer for this experiment.

Antje:
[34:11] It's too expensive to fly over here for the summer. [What?] It's going to have to be the winter.

Manuel:
[34:16] Are flights that much more expensive or which part is more expensive?

Antje:
[34:19] The flights in the summer season, they're a couple thousand dollars.

Manuel:
[34:24] Really?

Antje:
[34:25] For the season, yeah.

Manuel:
[34:25] It's that big of a difference?

Antje:
[34:27] It is.

Manuel:
[34:27] Even if you book in advance?

Antje:
[34:30] You might save a little bit, maybe up to a thousand if you book in advance. But a lot of the better flights, at least cost-wise, are in the winter.

Manuel:
[34:40] Well, it makes sense because you don't really want to be here in the winter if you're just visiting. I mean, it's also beautiful. I mean, I just got back from the US and Mexico and I like being back. It's cold and rainy and grey, but it's also nice and wintry and Christmassy. But also after three months of that, you're done, but you're not done. You have another three, four or five months of it ahead of you. I mean, it's not that bad, but basically November till March is kind of ugly.

Antje:
[35:15] That's Oregon, though, too. I think we're on about the same latitude, so our climate is very similar to Germany. We have lots of rain. Although with climate change now, things are very extreme. Yeah.

Manuel:
[35:30] So you're considering spending a winter or two here?

Antje:
[35:34] Maybe. Yeah, I would love to. And then, I mean, that would mean for me, I would like for it to be, you know, I need to pay for myself while I'm here. It's not something that I can just have a big old vacation, so thinking about can I find a mini job or something that can help support me.

Manuel:
[35:53] I mean, you can always teach English if you're from the US. I'm not sure if you're interested in that.

Antje:
[35:58] I guess I could, yeah.

Manuel:
[35:58] But that's something that a lot of people do, freelance, you know. It's a bit of a hustle but definitely possible because there's lots of schools.

Antje:
[36:08] Yeah.

Manuel:
[36:10] Yeah. What are the other logistics of this? What is ...? Do you know of any websites that help with this? Well, I mean, in your case you wouldn't sublet your house, I guess, since [No, someone would ...] your family would still be there, but have you heard of any home swap thing, like do you have any tips for people who want to do something like this?

Antje:
[36:27] I mean, there are some - I have looked up - there are some home swaps, but you know again you have to be able to swap equitable homes and that would mean then my family couldn't live in the home, you know. But like you mentioned, there are people who are, you know, leaving their apartment for a few months or whatever, so that could be a possibility. Again, there's my cousin in Ludwigsburg who has a five-room apartment and she lives there by herself, and so that is kind of an easy thing as far as lodging. And I did a job shadow in Stuttgart for work that I do - similar to what I do - at home. And there's actually someone who wants to go on a sabbatical for six months and they found someone to cover her for three months, but they were like, "Hey, if you want to come here for the last three months, you could." And since I have my citizenship, it would be easier than if I didn't.

Manuel:
[37:28] Yeah, because then you could come for three months, but you wouldn't necessarily be able to work.

Antje:
[37:32] Right. [Yeah.] So, job-wise, it would probably be more through connections than any official posting, I guess.

Manuel:
[37:45] Okay. Do you have any other tips, learning things you've researched? What else would people who are middle-aged, 45 plus, need to consider if they're thinking about moving to Berlin? Is Berlin too crazy of a city to move to at that age?

Antje:
[38:02] Not for me.

Finding a New Home

Manuel:
[38:03] Is everyone in their 20s?

Antje:
[38:04] Not for me. I dig it.

Manuel:
[38:06] Are you going to go clubbing?

Antje:
[38:09] Er, no!

Manuel:
[38:10] Me neither. You don't have to be old to not go clubbing.

Antje:
[38:15] We thought about going to see some music last night, and we were like: Let's just go to bed.

Manuel:
[38:19] I know the feeling very well. I put concerts on my calendars and I used to buy all the tickets for all the concerts because I would get very excited when I get them. I have the apps that tell me when the bands that I listen to on Spotify go on tour. I get very excited. I'm like, "Oh, I gotta go see this band and buy the tickets." And then I was in the situation so often where I was just like, "Oh my God, I don't want to go. Let me try to find someone to buy these tickets last minute." And so now I also learned, here's a life hack for Berlin: unless it's like literally Taylor Swift, you can get a ticket in front of the door always, even if it's sold out. There's always people selling tickets in front of the door. Sometimes, if it's like really sold out, you might have to pay a little extra. Most cases, you get it cheaper, actually, because people buy tickets and then they can't go and then they give it to someone and they sell it in front of the door, or there's the scalpers, but they misjudge. Like you can almost always get it cheaper at the door, even if it's sold out. And so I, unless it's like a band where I'm 120% sure I'm not going to miss this concert, I just put it on my calendar, and it's a special calendar that's just called Events. And this calendar means: I'm marking it, and if I feel like going out that night, I'll go and get a ticket at the door. But I'm not buying tickets in advance anymore.

Antje:
[39:42] Yeah. No, I figured we were looking at some jazz music and it all said you could buy at the door, you may not have the best seat or whatever else, so, yeah, yeah, so. .

Manuel:
[39:54] Okay. Last words?

Antje:
[39:57] Last words.

Manuel:
[39:58] What are your recommendations for people listening that are 45 and older or younger? Maybe you have some advice for the young folks.

Antje:
[40:08] Well, for the young folks, do it. Do it while you're young. It's a lot easier.

Manuel:
[40:13] Is it not too late? It's so hard to get an apartment now.

Antje:
[40:16] I know. Yeah, I mean, listening to the episodes where you and Jae were talking about ... even him getting an apartment sounds very complicated.

Manuel:
[40:25] It's stressful, but it's not impossible. Like, you know, people still move here and they still find apartments. And what we were just talking about, you can always get something for a limited amount of time.

Antje:
[40:36] Right.

Manuel:
[40:36] That's always possible. And it's also always possible to find a shared flat.

Antje:
[40:41] Right.

Manuel:
[40:41] And so unless ... You just can't be so hung up on the idea of having your very own permanent apartment right away. That might take a year or two or even three. You just need to be able to go through that time with temporary solutions.

Antje:
[40:57] Which is much harder for a middle-aged person who hasn't lived with roommates for 20 years.

Manuel:
[41:02] Yeah. I suppose you can solve it with a lot of money. Even then it's hard, but yeah.

Antje:
[41:07] Yeah so. But I guess I would say there's always a way for things to happen if you really want them to happen and you put the effort in. And I think it's important to be flexible, too, you know.

Final Thoughts and Advice

Antje:
[41:27] My idea of moving here and living here has evolved over even the past few years into more of what can work for my family. And that may not look like me being here 100% of the time, but it certainly would involve me coming at least once a year for an extended period of time.