Shane Brierly is a New Zealand born Executive Chef who spent most of his culinary career in Australia from the tender age of 18 which is many moons ago. Now old and grizzled, he loves the expat life and so far has worked in Dubai UAE, Kazakhstan, Thailand and Vietnam.
His website is chef-a-gogo.com which has photos, food & recipes from both his day to day cheffing and also the more exotic side of his travels. Or follow him on twitter @chefshane.
As with any upbeat story, there are downsides to living life as an expat. You leave your home country reading contracts in great detail, but you quickly learn after the first few overseas assignments that they aren't really very important. A nice piece of paper is one thing, but getting the contents enacted and honoured in realtime can be another entirely. Fighting a war with your employer is hardly desirable in any environment, and overseas in a foreign country with limited resources and no long term or influential friends, it will definitely be a dead end street. Consequently you generally put up with what you find when you arrive, and make the most of it. Some companies play by the rules and some don't - as is normal anywhere. Your recourse as an expat is limited, and a change in management or economic circumstances can lead to profound changes or job loss. As can landing in an environment characterised by rampant corruption and gold-toothed smiles. It certainly doesn't pay to skip jobs every few months, so it pays to research the company you'll be working for pretty thoroughly and make sure they have a history of following up on their commitments. Once you are there, with or without a visa, working illegally or otherwise and dependant on salary with all your possessions at stake it is too late to find out you have no rights - or no way to claim the rights you are entitled to. Definitely get the working visa first. You also have no real friends. Or perhaps, more realistically, you have better friends than ever before, more closely aligned with your core beliefs and values. It's just that they are short term transient types like you, in a country for several years, and then on to the next place. You do make many great friends, who generally end up located overseas and out of reach except for irregular catch-ups, stopovers and holidays. You do meet some incredible people and colourful characters working around the globe, and it opens your mind and life to truly great opportunities and experiences. It also turns your opinions, perceptions and beliefs around totally. You don't have the same core of childhood friends, neighbours, community and long term industry peers that you develop when working in your home country. Is it a bad thing? I don't think so. I look at many people that I know back home who live in the same suburb, making the same daily commute with the same mundane daily pattern of life and the same weekly trips to the supermarket, movies, beach and mall - and I shudder thinking that it could be me. There's no better life than expat life as far as I'm concerned. I've lived life as a chameleon and I've gone through many changes - hotels, restaurants, contracting. At home I lived in big cities, rural outback and Far Northern tropical towns. I've been single, married, family man and divorced. Overseas I've learned to adapt and also to live without the lifetime collection of possessions that tend to define us in our own country. I don't think you ever escape challenges and dramas, and you certainly can't escape problems. The types of problems you experience do change though, and so does your ability to cope and respond, even to anticipate and plan around possible issues. I think that helps you grow both as a person and as a chef. I've lived in and travelled around the Middle East, challenging then overcoming my Australian preconceptions and attitudes. I wallowed on tropical beaches under palm trees, travelled around the region, drove fast on six lane freeways, smoked shisha with mint tea in myriad exotic cafes, and learned to do business "the Dubai way or the highway" I've cooked for ludicrously rich and over the top personalities in Central Asia with egos bigger than the 6 Escalades the two of them arrived in. I've selected my ingredients personally from early morning trips to Russian markets. I walked past fields of wild marijuana and apple groves on the foothills of the Almaty mountain ranges for daily exercise, wheezing & getting passed by sprightly local septuagenarians running past me. I had to learn Cyrillic script to work out what the shops were, and got to exercise both my camera and my fat ass in some of the world's most beautiful places. Now I'm in Southeast Asia for last 3 years. It's my favourite part of the world and I love the people, experiences and way of life. Also the quirky and illogical things that you can only experience here. (I am missing all of the gold teeth, Russian bread, and vodka shots with cherry juice chasers from Kazakhstan though) Working in Australia would have been safer and more predictable, but that's not what I need in life. Life experience is what it's all about, and as long as I keep a sense of humour and avoid becoming old and jaded, it just keeps getting better. Plus the holidays, festivities and reasons for celebrating change from country to country. We've just had a hectic January but a couple of days ago the functions dropped dead along with the occupancy. Next week it's Tet, the Vietnamese New Year and the anticipation and tension in the lead up to the massive 4 day Public Holiday and celebration is almost palpable. It's a huge thing and everybody in this country has plans and will travel. I'm off to Thailand in February after working Tet. That's Expat Life. I'll try and make the next post more culinary focused.
{{user.name}}