Never Have I Ever

Never Have I Ever is a great icebreaker party game. The rules are simple. Someone makes a statement: "Never have I ever __________." If you have done that action, you lose a point. The last person standing wins (Source). This game can be very entertaining, but have you ever played it with expats? Some answers can be impressive, awe inspiring or shocking. When playing the game with expats, you may have to think outside the box for your statements. Never have I ever… killed a cobra in my kitchen (a friend's experience in 2022 in East Africa). Never have I ever… had a scorpion killed in my house (my house helper killed one at the beginning of rainy season 2022 in West Africa). (Picture Source).

Living overseas can be a daunting experience. As an expat, sometimes it is hard for me to relate to people who have only lived in the town where they were raised. When my family lived in South Asia, we had friends who lived in Central America. On their hard days, they would say "at least it isn't 2066" (our country had a different calendar) and on our hard days, we would say "at least we don't have tarantulas in the living room" (their daily experience). It sounds silly, but it helped us on those hard days. When you live in a different location, whether a new state or region in your home country or a different country, there are no normal routine days. Some days are relatively tame and some days are filled with culture shock and stress. But all of those days combined become a new normal. Meg explains, "The list of new normals is never ending."

I have the privilege of belonging to an expat group on a social media site. I asked the expats, "What is the craziest thing you have done living overseas?" Here are some of their answers and some of mine. (Picture Source).

Critters

Heather (West Africa): Putting salt in toilets to prevent snakes from coming in pipes. Luckily we have not had this issue and I thought it was an old wives tale, until someone in South Asia contacted me because they have the same issue with snakes. For more information, click here. Apparently, more than just snakes can come through your toilet and pipes, other critters spotted all over the world are rats, squirrels, opossums, insects, lizards and frogs (Source, Source, Source).

(Picture Source).

Joanne: "Spraying the furniture with garlic spray to kill the fleas."

If you have this problem and want to know more, click here.

Susan: "Looking down the outhouse toilet to make sure there aren’t any snakes or big spiders before sitting down."

I usually check our inside toilet bowl and seat for cockroaches and/or snakes, before I sit down.

Marissa: "We tried to shop vac up a tarantula (side note... it was unsuccessful)."

Kate: "Telling my baby sitter to not take the kids outside because there’s been a cobra sighting in the neighbor's yard. Trying to figure out how to get a baboon off our car. A rat ate through our car seat strap. Bush rats on our porch as lovely gifts from our dogs."

Jessica (South America): "Rolling up newspaper to light on fire and wave under the lip of the concrete latrine opening to burn the flying cockroaches out before using the latrine."

It is definitely an experience when you discover cockroaches fly, they also chirped in South Asia. So far in West Africa, I have not witnessed them chirping, but we have seen a few fly.

Tamara (West Africa): "Staying up late on the weekend with a few of my dorm girls wondering how a kitten got upstairs in the dorm… only to find it was a huge rat with a long tail and big front teeth."

Carol: "Coming across a snake on the trail by our house that is so long he hangs over both sides of the rather large trail. Being chased by a monkey across the balcony and into our room while yelling at my husband to 'Close the windows!!' Telling my guests to not open their windows at night [because] there [are] bats in that hole right there and standing under a sea of flamingoes as they fly away for the night from the pond right in front of my flat."

Sara (Central America): "I had to buy a vent cover to keep iguanas from crawling into my apartment through my dryer vent. This was after I got home from work one day to find an iguana chilling on the curtain rod in my living room like it owned the place (only took me 2 months to figure out how it'd gotten in)."

I have not had mice or rats in my house since I attached window screen to our dryer vent.

Heather (South Asia): I had to use my "mom" voice so that I could pass through a troop of monkeys. My voice of authority thankfully stopped them in their tracks so that I could pass safe and sound.

Driving

Marissa: "We drove with one of those sporting event noise horns in our car. Our car horn was broke, [it] took 3 months for a replacement part and was mega unsafe to drive without a horn ([in our] culture, you honk at people so they don't hit you). So we'd roll down our window and blow it." (Picture Source).

Food

Lisa (Europe): "Hot dogs are packaged [individually] in plastic wrappers so we have to peel our hot dogs. My kids now refuse to eat hot dogs in the United States - they can't believe that, no, they don't have plastic wrappers - they are totally weirded out by not-wrapped hot dogs and have decided that American hot dogs must have a very thin layer of plastic which people eat."

Heather (South Asia): I found a dehydrated lizard in a package of cinnamon which I just purchased at the store. Yes, I kept (and used) the cinnamon but not the lizard. You get over weird things like this pretty quickly living abroad.

Electrical

Heather (South Asia & West Africa): You have to stick a pencil into the grounding section of some electrical sockets to plug something in.

Heather (West Africa): When my phone or computer overheats, I place them in the freezer or fridge for a few minutes. I have had a whole telephone conversation with my phone resting on a frozen water bottle to prevent overheating.

Hayley: "Having to use a towel when touching any electrical appliance to not be shocked by it."

Speaking from personal experience, getting shocked by 220V current is no joke.

Health

Kate: "[Taking] malaria tests every time there’s a fever."

Laurel: "Learning how to extract mango worms and jiggers."

Courtney: "Removing mango fly larvae from my husband and son…about a dozen of them each!!"

I had friends in South Asia who had to learn how to remove leaches.

Laurel (East Africa): "Evacuating because of an Ebola outbreak in our town during our very first term with our first baby."

Rebecca: "Having our doctor's phone numbers and calling them personally with medical questions/problems! It was hard for me to get used to, but really nice!"

My vet makes house call visits for my cats' rabies shots and annual check up. It is pretty amazing!

Home Care

Rachel (Europe): "I have to put salt in our dishwasher and use a special detergent in our washer to combat hard water build up."

Jessica (North America): "We have to change the input tubes on all our sinks every 12-18 months because they get clogged with minerals."

Lindsey: "Walking 1 mile at 9 at night with my 5 yr old and 9 yr old to fill buckets with local well water because my house was without water for the 3rd day."

Weather

Heather (South Asia): My husband and I would lay on our marble floor to cool off in the summers. In the cold months, our flat was made with cinderblocks and no insulation. We would go outside and stand in the sun to get warm.

Heather (West Africa): To stay cool in the tropical heat, we freeze water bottles and cuddle them like teddy bears. We also take cold baths or showers to cool off.

Work

Christy (Africa): "Evacuated a whole ward of laboring women due to electrical fire, including one woman in the middle of a breech delivery (the woman had to get up and walk quickly to another room with the feet of her baby hanging out and the rest of the body not delivered). Every mom, baby, and hospital staff came through intact by the way."

Mostly, these loony adventures don't make it into our newsletters. Sometimes the expat life is full of drudgery or the excitement of learning to handle something new. You sometimes have to un-learn things from your home country, for example, don't stick things into wall sockets or use a utensil to eat your food, not your fingers. Expats are "not strange, weird, off, nor crazy, [our] reality is just different from yours" (borrowed quote from Lewis Carroll). Hopefully these fun experiences opened your mind a bit to the day in the life of an expat. What are some of your crazy escapades? Message below or send a fan letter. Don't forget to subscribe. (Picture Source).

Source: All names and quotes are used with permission from people in the social media group in 2022.