One of the most difficult but underrated things expats have to deal with is keeping in touch with family and friends back home. Lucky for expats today who live in the Age of the Internet, they have it much easier than previous generations did, but that still doesn’t make dealing with a six, ten or fourteen hour time difference easy.
An inability to keep in touch can lead to homesickness, which can get so strong that you may start to feel the need to return to your home country without giving life as an expat a chance. But as an expat, you have most likely chosen your current life situation because you want to be stimulated by your environment; experience new things on a daily basis, meet interesting people from all over the world and put yourself in a great position to travel. There are many other benefits to being an expat in Thailand as well and if you’ve already taken the steps to become an expat, you shouldn’t let a simple problem get in the way of enjoying every minute of it.
Here are some tips to keeping in touch with family and friends back home while living as an expat:
Decide on a method and stick with it:
Today there are so many ways to keep in touch, but there’s not one method that works best for everyone. Identify how to keep in touch with each person who is important to you and focus on only contacting them through that medium.
Consider whether you or the other person will realistically be reaching out more. Depending, choose a medium that works for the person who will be receiving messages. Typically, it is the expat who reaches out more because non-expats might assume that since you chose this life, you are not interested in the relationships you left behind. This might cause them to shrink away; to stop asking questions or even stop responding to your messages. If you contact them through a medium that you know they check regularly, you will maximize the chances of them seeing your messages and hopefully, make it more likely for them to respond in a timely manner.
Pencil the important people in:
It’s too difficult to keep regular contact with everyone, so pick four (or less) people that you want to regularly talk to, and establish a time each week that you can talk. Make sure they are aware of your work schedule and when you are regularly at home so that if they want to give you a call, they don’t have to feel put off by thinking that you’re probably busy. Sometimes, the time difference actually makes this easier to do than if you lived in the same time zone because if you are only free between 10pm and 11pm to talk, that might be at a very convenient time for the person back home. Even more helpful is to send a text message whenever it comes to mind that you want to talk to that person and suggest a few times that might work best for you. That way the person can respond as soon as they see the message and set their alarm so they remember you have a phone date.
Make it a priority:
You can’t regularly talk to everyone you want to keep in touch with, but that doesn’t mean you have to completely lose contact. Again, with so many mediums that we use today to keep in touch, it can be tedious or even overwhelming to respond to messages from people who are lower on your list of priorities. Even if you really care about the person, you may get caught up doing something else and forget to respond. To minimize the chances of messages falling between the cracks, tell yourself that you will spend a certain amount of time each day or each week to check for and respond to messages across each platform. Even better, respond as soon as you read each message. It’s easy to say “I’ll respond later” to messages, but to remember to go back is another story. Be honest with yourself; responding to a friendly message doesn’t have to take that much time or sound like a literary masterpiece. The person on the receiving end will be happy to hear from you no matter what the content is.
WIFI is an amazing invention. Use it!
Lucky for expats in Thailand, there is basically wifi everywhere you go. And because there are now so many free wifi platforms on which to communicate, it really should not be an issue of finances that keep you from spending an hour on the phone once a week. Whenever you move into your new Bangkok condo, beach villa in Phuket or townhouse in Chiang Mai, opt for the best wifi you can get, because it’s worth it. If that’s not an option for you, just find a good coffee shop, internet café, restaurant, etc that can give you their free password.
Viber – an app that works across all mobile devices. It allows you to make phone calls (usually with great quality) through wifi as well as full messaging capabilities, including text, photo, video images and more.
WhatsApp- WhatsApp is the most popular texting app out there. You can make texting groups so everyone in the group can share messages and photos that are delivered to everyone’s smart phone in real time.
Skype – Perfect for those who have not yet joined the smart-phone bandwagon. You can make voice calls with a microphone or video calls with a camera.
Facetime- Facetime works for two callers who both have iPhone. The video quality is usually pretty good and the iPhone contact list connects you directly to the facetime capability without having to download another app.
Facebook Groups – Facebook groups make it easy to keep in touch with multiple people at one time. You can create a group page and invite anyone you want. With these groups you can share photos, videos and links on a wall that only the members can see, and everyone who is a member will get a notification when someone posts something new.
Line – This one must be mentioned because it’s Thailand’s favorite texting app. It allows you to communicate with the craziest emoji’s out there. It’s a fun way to communicate, but might be best to keep using this one only with your fellow expats or Thai friends.
Any other suggestions for how to keep in touch with people back home while living as an expat? Share in the comments section below!
