Any MNers in South Africa?

[notmydog]

How long are you planning to stay? Can you see yourself living here on a long term basis? We?re both early 40?s with 6-year old DD. Very confused at the moment as to whether to move back to the UK or try to make it work here. We?re in the Garden Route, it is lovely here. Love going to the beach after work, DD is in a good state school, fairly low crime rate. But of course we are extremely concerned about the future. I just want to settle down whether here or in the UK. I want to buy my own house. If we buy a house here, we won?t be able to go back to the UK for at least 4 or 5 years. My entire extended family is in South Africa (although we don?t see them that often ? they are all in Gauteng).

Sooooo confused at the moment. We feel very pushed to make a decision NOW, before DD gets older. I don?t see a future for her here, and I?m afraid that she?s going to end up back in the UK when she?s older and we will be left here and not be able to afford to return. Our business is not doing well, we?ve been trying to sell but we?re not getting the price we would like. Should we just cut our losses and run? Of course the economic and job situation in the UK is scary and that?s the main reason why we thought we should wait a bit before we go back.

We do not have any family in the UK, but we do have lovely friends there and we both are fairly homesick for the UK. It is just such a different place to raise children, and I?m not sure that my DD would necessarily be happier there. When I make a list of pro?s and con?s the pro?s are just so much more in the UK?s favour. But leaving my family here (again, I?ve been through this trauma once before) is just breaking my heart. My mum is turning 80 in November.

HI there. I'm v near SA (as you may remember) and COMPLETELY understand where you're coming from. It's such a complex place and so difficult to plan ahead in the ordinary way. i don't know what to advise other than keep your options open -could you afford to get a smallish bond on an SA flat which would rent out easily if need be and even do the same and get a mortgage on a flat in the UK?

6 is still such a flexible age, I assume she's still at pre-primary? I'd say in my experience it gets much harder when they're 8-9+, much more focussed on friends/surroundings then. If that's the case with yr dd, you've got a couple of years breathing space and time to be with your mum. Gauteng much nearer now than it would be from UK.

OTOH the UK obviously has its appeals. It's relatively SO much safer as you say and this is a big factor with kids. Hard to know how to guage the economies - SA with its hugely higher unemployment but bigger growth and uK with its recession but much lower unemployment. Helps that there's infrastructure and support in the UK too, imho.

I don't know what else to say, in not dissimilar position though other way round. Hard to make a judgement call. Hope I've helped in some way.

Indaba waves from Cape Town (and thinks about saying Howzit .

Been here 6 years.

No idea how long we'll stay. I'm really happy here. Husband not so keen so long term he wants to leave but we keep signing on mentally for a couple more years at a time.

We've looked at going back and its not as scarily as expensive to buy in UK as we first thought, once we understood we could never afford to live in a big city and definitely not be able to commute into London.

There seems to be an increasing amount of vitriol coming out of the mouth of Malema which doesn't help.

Having a UK passport has always made it easier to be more upbeat about the country. My SA friends laugh at me and say "you can always run" if you need to. But I love the "lets make a plan" attitude.

I've had jobs that have made me appreciate what we have here, and lived in Sydney (much prefer here by the way).

Have had mates that have transferred back to english education system and they seem to manage.

Good luck with what you decide. I don't think there is a wrong or right answer.
I'd go with where you will all be happiest......who knows what future will hold anywhere.

I'm not keen on SA, personally. I'm from a mixed background myself and grew up in multicultural London, I am not a racist and never will be. I have been four times and always hoped that after twenty years or so of freedom people would be a little more integrated. Sadly in SA most people still think along racial lines. I always found this very hard to deal with, as I am not used to having one's identity based almost exclusively on colour.

But in your case OP you have your family in the country, albeit not locally and your roots are there, so you have more of a tie to the place. Living in different countries is a wonderful experience especially for kids and so as Indaba has said, there's no right or wrong answer really.

Thanks you so much everyone for your input :) We have put off our decision to move back to the UK, for the time being anyway. First want to see how the whole economic crises pans out. Here at least we both have jobs and a a fairly stable income. We have found a lovely house to buy at a bargain price and we will hopefully be moving in January. I think having my own place will also make me feel more settled here. We definitely want to move back eventually, but maybe wait another 4 or 5 years.