How our Amerika adventure started in 2017

4 Years ago we made the decision to take the plunge, we were going to move to America with our two kids of 5 and 7 years old. My husband could work in Attleboro, MA for a few years. When we started discussing this, I said I didn’t want to go for just one year, as it would most likely take up to 6 months to acclimate to a new house, neighborhood etc. I would want to go for about two years. At the moment we left we had decided on returning to Holland no more then 2,5 years later. We didn’t know yet how much we would love our life in Raynham.

July 8th 2017 we said goodbye to all our loved ones in Holland. So many mixed feelings, we worked towards this moment for so long and we were ready for our adventure but boy, did saying goodbye hurt! We walked through customs all crying, but after we went through customs we were soon ready for our trip. Eriks company had booked us business class, which was the first time ever and a very cool treat. So the trip was very comfortable.

After the 8 hour flight we arrived in Boston. Erik and Nynke went to pick up our rental while Pim and I waited at the airport with our 10 suitcases. We were supposed to meet our landlord at our new house to get the key and then we would go and stay in the Marriott hotel at the Nip for a few days while buying our furniture and cleaning the house. We couldn’t wait to start our new life. And then disaster struck, we were driving on the 93 when all of a sudden we were hit of the road. A lady hadn’t checked her blind spot while changing lanes and hit the car next to us, which then hit us. We were very lucky as we were in a spot with a guardrail. Our car folded around that but when we stood still, we looked at the kids in the back and a 50 lbs suitcase was on top of our 5 yo Pim, we couldn’t see him nor hear him, he didn't respond. Thank goodness two cars behind us had seen everything and they stopped to help us. They called 911 and they were able to get the kids out of the car safely. As the suitcase had bruised Pims head, we ended up in the Ambulance to South Shore Hospital only a few hours after arriving in the States. To make a very long story short, we couldn’t have been more lucky on how this turned out. Crashing on a highway driving around 55/60 (it had been quite busy on the road) we could have easily ended in the trees and then we wouldn’t have been here telling this story!

No need to mention here that our first few weeks were bumpy and very emotional. The kids wanted to go back to Holland as their first experience in the States was the accident. Thank Goodness for our good friends Wayne and Michelle (Wayne is a co-worker of Erik that he knew from previous travels) came to the hospital right away, so did our re-location agent Claire. They helped us out with everything. After that we were so thankful for the contacts we made during our pre-assigment trip, when we found our house, a few weeks before moving. We had met the principals both at Merrill and at LaLiberte and they were so welcoming. We got in touch with Pam who we emailed with in the weeks before leaving and who told us about the Play to K program and the opportunities for volunteering in the schools. About three days after arriving in Raynham we went to the Play to K picknick and met our good friends Tristin and Leslie and many more other wonderful people. We knew right there and then that we had landed in the right place. Raynham was really the place to be for us!

For our Raynham friends that read this the rest of the story is known. We couldn’t have been more lucky with the teachers the first year. Pim had Mrs Trott in Kindergarten and Nynke started 2nd grade with Mrs McSweeney. And all without speaking a word of English, they did awesome. After that first year Nynke was proficient in English and Pim was almost even better in English than his sister al thanks to Mrs Swart (the ESL teacher) who had been so wonderful of even meeting us before school started to make the whole transfer as easy/smooth as possible. The ESL program in Raynham is really THE BEST. We have been so lucky! As soon as we had all the paperwork in order to be able to volunteer in the schools, I started helping out. I loved meeting all these new people and helped where I could. Everything in America is so much different and I am very curious, so I attended every PTO meeting in both schools where I often didn’t understand big parts of what was mentioned. I mean, for real….what is a grant???? Now I know off course, but it took some time:-). Everyone here was very welcoming as well and when they asked me if I wanted to take over being President at the PTO at LaLiberte I really thought: what do I have to offer, I still don’t know how everything works. But with a great team around me, it has been a fantastic experience. As we speak I’m in my 3rd and last year of being president of the LPO and what a great experience was that. I have learned so much, about the schools, about the people in it, but definitely about myself. This year is nothing like other years, which is very sad as it is my last year here, but I feel lucky that I’m still able to work with the other boardmembers on making it a great year, with all the challenges we face every day.

And then the time has come, After this schoolyear ends, our family will move back to Holland. We had to make a decision on whether to stay here (with lots of challenges to face like trying to get a greencard etc etc) or moving back. We have stayed almost twice as long as we planned before we moved here. We have made so many friends that feel like family here in the area and it really pains us that we are leaving that behind. We LOVE living here and have always felt so so welcome! But as Nynke is at the age to start highschool (which starts around 12 years in Holland), this would be the best time for her to transfer. Also, we cannot even stay longer then 2022 because of our visa. Being able to live in the States is not for everyone. Not everyone in America knows how difficult it is and how lucky you have to be to get a visa. It is a huge process to go through which costs a lot of money and especially time and work (miles and miles of paperwork to start with). Then you can still get a no if anything goes wrong. If we would try to get a green card it can take years and years not even knowing if we would be granted one. And going back to Holland will be more and more difficult the longer we stay here. We have decided that the time has come to end our adventure here, with much pain in our hearts. Many people know I have a blog in Dutch and have complained that they want me to write in English as well. As we are moving in a few months, I decided to start a blog for my American (and other European) friends that don’t speak Dutch. This way I can take you all on the adventure of our Remigration to Holland. Not sure how often I will write, time will tell. But at this moment we are definitely already working on our return (think about buying Christmas decorations in the sale to take to Holland:-)), but also we told our landlord we are leaving, we are looking into moving companies, thinking whether we are taking our car back to Holland, we are looking at flying back on July 9th if all goes according to plan and we even are talking to people to do some renovations on our house in Holland. In the meantime, we are enjoying the moments with our friends here when we can see them (which is challenging enough with Corona around the corner all the time). But we are challenging the cold to spend as much time with the people we love here and we hope that Spring will come very early in 2021 so we get to spend much time with everyone. We are not gone yet, we have about 6,5 more months here and we are planning the make the most out of it!!! We hope to see all of you somewhere soon!!

Will be continued!