Episode 1: Becoming RB Abroad

In the first season of the RB Abroad Podcast, Rebecca shares what it’s like to move to another country and live in another culture. In Episode 1: Becoming RB Abroad, she explains how she came to move to Belgium in the first place and why she is doing this podcast thing.

Please note, this episode does contain some instances of language that you may consider offensive. In other words, Rebecca says a few cuss words.

Music in this Episode

Peach Pie – Contemplative Acoustic – Provided by Jamendo

Peach Pie – News – Provided by Jamendo

Peach Pie – Tears of Happiness – Provided by Jamendo

Audio in this Episode

All audio (excluding music) and narration in the RB Abroad Podcast is recorded, edited, and produced by Rebecca Bramlett unless otherwise noted. In this episode, audio also includes:

• “Accordion” by user “lepolainyann” on freesound.org, Creative Commons license.
• “Crowded fast food restaurant” by user “boedie” on freesound.org, Creative Commons license.

Transcript

Hello and welcome everybody! I am Rebecca Bramlett and this is the RB Abroad podcast, where I tell you about the time I moved abroad for three and half years.

(music begins playing)

In this pilot episode I’m talking about how I came to move abroad and why the heck I’m doing this podcast thing.

Just a warning for my clean mouthed listeners, or my friends who might be listening with their kids riding along in the car, this episode does contain a few instances of some curse words. Sorry.

I’m an almost 40-year-old mother and wife, among other things, who moved abroad with my family from the United States to Belgium three ½ years ago. This podcast, RB Abroad, and particularly the first season, is something I wanted to create because I wanted to share what it’s been like to live through the stressful, frustrating, complicated, and exhausting, and challenging, but also beautiful, and rewarding, and fulfilling experience of moving to another country and living in another culture.

It’s been such a unique and life-altering experience for me, I want to share my story so that my friends and family can more deeply understand what I’ve been experiencing these past few years, but also to encourage, and inspire, and inform other people out there who might be considering a move abroad, or who are just curious about what it is like.

In a few months, my expat experience will end and we’ll be moving back to the States. So, I’m using this podcast, particularly this first season of this podcast, to reflect on my past three and a half years living in Belgium, and tell you everything about the experience, and hopefully to bring some closure to it for myself.

(music ends)

So, my story of how I came to move to Belgium starts well before the actual move. The more I’ve thought about it, I realized that my story of how I came to move to Belgium started well before I even knew it would ever be a possibility.

For the first two decades of my life, I would not consider myself a “traveler”. I grew up in a family that didn’t really take many vacations. Our holidays were most often either spent at home, or visiting grandparents in upstate New York. And, when we did take vacations, it was pretty much always the same summer vacation to the same location, in Upstate New York, every year. Aside from those vacations, I can really count on one hand the other family vacation experiences I remember.

But all this is to say, I was raised in a family that didn’t travel much and never really went too far from home. We lived in Alexandria, Virginia, a suburb of Washington, D.C. and until I was 17 and headed off to College, my world was this safe little bubble that was restricted to this just small strip of land that was on the East coast of the United States. That w