Moving abroad has made me realise how bloody dire the UK is

[MattHancocksPrivateNurse]

We moved abroad 4 months ago and after the normal wobbles and adjustments I am now shocked at how different (and much better!) life is. We have considerably more spending money despite paying for private school and healthcare (which are much much better than the UK). It’s safer, considerably cleaner, better public services and much better food quality.

already I can’t see us ever going back and already want to explore somewhere new eventually! But if anyone is feeling low and despondent about the uk which we really were and gets an opportunity (or has a transferable job) I would 100000% recommend looking into it.

i wish we had done it 10 years ago tbh. AIBU to never come back bar the odd visit to see family and friends?!

Good luck OP but despite your best intentions I’m not remotely jealous, you come across as horribly smug and I suspect this thread hasn’t gone as you hoped!

I know!

I lived in Oman for quite a few years. It is nothing like living in other ME countries and yes it is very safe. Omanis are known as peace keepers and have always been involved in hostage negations. However, for me TBH it was all pretty boring unless you loved the outdoors. It is worth buying a boat to get out to Banda Karan at the weekends and we loved our trips into the desert.
Eating out is limited and I think serving alcohol in restaurants and dancing has been scaled back a bit since the death of the old Sultan? l If your DC attend the British School in Muscat education will be pretty good. Other schools are not so much. Hospitals and medical is ok but variable.
Club membership at the Intercon was worth it just to have somewhere to go and swim when the heat becomes relentless. It also had pretty good tennis provision. Ramadan in
Oman is pretty strict unlike Dubai.
Glad you’re enjoying it.
I couldn’t wait to leave after five years.

Oh god! Good luck! Oman???

We have much to be greatful for here in the UK but it’s only travel that gives you perspective.
Yes the country is on the brink of financial disaster, yes much is in dire straits atm but so are many other countries.
I hope sincerely we can rally together and improve the lot of our peoples in the future.

And there is a LOT to be done but we can turn fortunes around. If only we didn’t run the place down so much and our Government actually functioned properly.
The poor quality of our ministers and civil servants is answerable for so much anger currently evident in society.

This too shall pass.

leading some low-income laborers to live in cramped or impoverished conditions.

We have zero hours workers living in horrible slums here in the UK. Is that OK?

Moving to a hereditary dictatorship with 70% migrant workers who aren't even counted in the poverty statistics and aren't entitled to the minimum wage or social security payments has made you realise how dreadful the UK is?

OK

Yes old Sultan was indeed gay but it was
not spoken about. Expat and foreign women do not have to cover but local women do unless they have a very liberal father or husband.
I lived and worked there for five years. It’s a charmed life as an expat, which the OP is. She has not immigrated there from the UK and thus hasn’t really learned the concept yet of how it really is for the construction workers, maids, gas field workers out in the desert working in 50°C. She’s still going for the grass is greener stage.

In countries with purely insurance based health care systems there's no concept of "pre-existing conditions" and in fact most people pay the same monthly amount (you can pay more monthly insurance to have things like homeopathy included or a private room if you went into hospital, but the actual medical coverage is the same for everyone). Most of the western world operates on this model. Only insurance in countries that offer a "public" system alongside a "private" system can sometimes have this concept of conditions that are covered vs those that aren't.

You'd be amazed how good standard health care is outside of the UK.

I would love to move somewhere else but can’t with the ties we have. Lots of defensiveness on this thread but most sensible people know the UK is in a parlous state. The economy is in an atrocious state (far worse than in Liz Truss’s time!) with the debt and the welfare budget sinking us, and mass immigration massively affecting community relations. Unemployment, especially for the young, is appalling, and the cost of living keeps inexorably rising. The one thing that stands out is the lack of hope. None of the big issues are being tackled, and taxes and borrowing are just to keep spiralling.

Talk of women’s rights is interesting. Ask the women of Piddington how safe they and their daughters feel.

Oh but who voted all that governments in?

I have an old friend in Oman, she studied in UK and stayed with me for the duration. Teaching was her chosen subject - by the government, she didn't get to choose which subject she was to study.

We shared a lot of stories and she came back to visit. He dad has access to her bank account and pretty much all of her life, she can't choose who she wants to marry and that was part of the reason she came to visit me. Its a totally different way of life and privacy for woman is incredibly different in Oman to uk

It is not something I could live with. Will you totally immerse yourself in their culture?

I have a friend who spent a couple of years living there. She said it was like living in a giant shopping mall. Lots of cool stuff but nowhere to explore, really. She found it claustrophobic. Said it would suit people who enjoy long cruises.

Based on her description, I imagine it would be a bit like living in Westfield or the Trafford Centre.

No one likes to be reminded they live in a pile of steaming shit so the backlash is understandable but not less amusing 😂

Nothing like it…Dubai maybe but not Oman. Are you sure you got the right country.
I also lived there for several years.
It’s a beautiful place and not glitzy at all…in fact the shopping is very limited.

Also why are you calling it "the Oman"? That's not what it's called, in English or in Arabic. It's literally like telling people you've moved to "the France" or "the New Zealand". Perhaps you're getting it confused with the UAE?
It's really staggeringly ignorant to pretend to know so much about a country that you can say it's better than the UK when you don't even know what it's bloody called.

I find it hilarious how many people move to countries with terrible human rights records, particularly women's rights, then enjoy preaching what fools we all are staying in the UK. A quick search of the Freedom record of Oman v Uk is 24 v 92! Oman is determined at 'Not Free'. No thanks! In the ME it is all great until it isn't and then the British Embassy is the first port of call! Not jealous, won't be following suit!

100% 👏

The only reason anyone anywhere has a good lifestyle is employment in a needed industry.

The UK GDP per capita is going down, so there are fewer and fewer people each year who have that kind of employment.

At this rate it will be much worse for our children than it is for us. The economy needs to generate more output to support better salaries, better jobs which in turn leads to higher demand for goods and services, and the virtuous circle which a healthy economy is in.

Corporation tax is a key drag on output, because the more of its annual profit a company pays to the treasury, the less it has to reinvest next year in its property, plant and equipment, and in making longer term investments which might not pay off immediately. Longer term investments which companies make like initiating a new product line, research and development, hiring expensive talent on a new or emerging technology and so on, are directly lessened by corporation tax.

The whole region is a ticking bomb now anyway...

I'm sure from your perspective Oman is a great country to live in, you are presumably viewed as a middle class British ex pat or similar. The quality of life you have will be great but to enjoy it you will have to close your eyes to exploitation of migrant workers and other human rights abuses. Your daughters probably are treated very well but I doubt that is true for young females domestic workers etc. you have dismissed some comments like this as bitterness but I assure you it isn't, I say everybody should seek the life they want and do I understand the appeal of a warm country and better quality of living but I don't understand how you can close your eyes to the abuse that is rampant particularly abuse of women, particularly as you have two daughters.

The OP will not be immersing herself in their culture. Unless you marry an Omani you never will.
Everything you say about your friend is true. Fathers and husbands are pretty much in control.
The OP will be living and socialising amongst her own…just like immigrants like to do in the UK.

I said to my friend one day

"why do you have numbers stickers across your laptop case?"

"Well if I leave it in the cafe then someone will telephone me and tell me I left it there"

Don't expect that her in Uk, it will be stolen"

"really? why?"

Oman is much safer than many other countries

she was very proud of the Sultan and was he had done for the country, bring it up into the new century and having modern ways of thinking.

he mother is 58 and has 14 children, her eldest child is 43

They are doctors, surgeons, pharmacists, engineers and have studied and worked in Australia, Germany UK

Life though is very different

I think you must have lived here a very long time ago as your points on Oman are so outdated,

there has never been so many places to eat out and alcohol is more available than before.

The BSM is no longer considered the gold standard of community/embassy school. ABA and TAISM are equally impressive.

Our government health service is fabulous and there are many excellent private hospitals are. Oh and just to add that Omani’s make up about 65% of hospital consultants in Oman.

Club membership at the Intercon? You really were here a very long time ago.

Ramadan - has the same rules as Dubai.

You couldn’t wait to leave after 5 years? Yes. I can well imagine that from your post. In fact I’m not even sure why you felt your experience would be relevant given how long it is since you’ve lived here.