On Sunday, March 12, 2017 the Expat in the City fair opens its doors from 10 am to 5 pm to all internationals living in Munich. The tickets are free if you order them online in advance; after 10 am they are EUR 10,- at the door.
In preparation for this post I asked Elisabeth Egger and Barbara Bijvank, the event organizers, about their own expat experience. This is what they had to say:
What is your personal Expat experience?
Barbara: I’ve basically been an expat all my life. Through my father’s job we ended up in Qatar and later I lived in Oman for 8 years. As a student I lived in the USA, Canada and Surinam and finally as an adult I ended up in Munich.
Elisabeth: My parents moved to Spain when they were young. I was born and grew up there. So I was already kind of born as an expat ;-) I moved to Munich 21 years ago.
Why did you decide to organize the Expat in the City fair? Was there a key moment in your personal life that made you see the need for such an event?
Barbara: When I moved to Munich, I found myself pretty ‚lost in the city‘. I was looking for a job, but didn’t know how or where. I didn’t speak German as good as I thought I did :). And meeting people wasn’t so easy in a city. When Elisabeth and I met, we found out we had very similar ideas about what was missing in Munich for the international community. It took some time to get from idea to an actual Fair, but when it did it was a pretty amazing ride!
Elisabeth: I moved to Munich 21 years ago where I learned what it is like to set up a new life away from friends, family and an own support network. This journey led me to set up my own language school where I taught German to Expats and helped them set up a network abroad. This is where I met Barbara. She started to learn German with me, we threw together our experiences, strengths, passions and ideas and we ended up setting up an Expat fair for Munich. As Barbara says, a pretty amazing ride!
What do you love most about Expat life?
Barbara: What I like most about expat life is the chance to meet people from all over the world and experience new things. It can be challenging at times, but I think it is so worth it!
Elisabeth: I think Expat life allows us to discover and be curious, to reinvent ourselves and to write our own stories. I think this is a wonderful opportunity to have and this is what we aim to encourage.
The blogger event takes place from 3:30 to 5:00 pm in the Bavaria Room and is hosted by Dana from Wanted Adventures. My talk about the challenges of repatriation is scheduled for 4:05 pm. I will be joined by Isil from Move to Munich and Munich Mom blogger Laura. The blogger presentations are followed by a 30-minute Q&A session. So please stay, say hi and ask us all about expat life and blogging!
At this point I also would like to give a shout-out to Dominika from From Munich with Love. She was the one who introduced me to the Expat in the City team and made my participation possible. Thank you, Dominika!
For more information on the programme, the venue and the free tickets please hop over to the website!
I hope to see you on Sunday!
This post is an unpaid cooperation with Expat in the City. The photos were provided by Expat in the City. All opinions are my own.
Thanks for the lovely blogpost Tina – looking foward to sunday!
You are welcome! And I’m really excited about Sunday, too :-)
Have a great time! You’ve got so much to tell about repatriation, I’m sure the audience will love it.
Thank you, Jonna! I wish you could be there :-)