Sula and her husband moved from Dallas to Germany before relocating to the UK. Helene Sula
Helene Sula moved to Europe in 2016 after she started making money with her travel blog.
Her blog, “Helene In Between,” enabled her and her husband to move to Heidelberg, Germany.
Today they live in Oxford, England, and plan to explore other continents in the future.
This is a machine translation of an article from our US colleagues at Business Insider. It was automatically translated and reviewed by a real editor.
This essay is based on a conversation with Helene Sula, a travel blogger and author of Two O’Clock on a Tuesday at Trevi Fountain: A Search for an Unconventional Life Abroad, and has been edited for length and clarity.
Helene Sula – a travel blogger and author of “Two O’Clock on a Tuesday at Trevi Fountain: A Search for an Unconventional Life Abroad“ – tells her story of how she managed to make money from her blog and move to Europe. Sula grew up in Dallas (USA) and spent time in London every year as her parents taught a study abroad program there.
Sula says of her parents: “They loved their work, they could make a difference, and their schedule was flexible. I remember thinking, ‘Is there a job like that out there for me?'”
After graduating in 2009 during the financial crisis, she took the first job she was offered – at Dave and Buster’s, a Dallas-based restaurant company. During that time, she and her husband took extensive 10-day trips around Europe and eventually decided to move there to see more of Europe.
A travel blog as a source of income
Sula and her husband traveled through Europe before moving there. Helene Sula
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“We thought the best way to continue travelling around Europe would be to move there. But we didn’t know how. Europe always had an attraction for me – it was always in the back of my mind,” says Sula.
In 2011, Sula started her travel blog “Helene In Between“. At first, she wondered if she would ever be able to make money from it since no one was making money online at the time. She worked hard on her blog and eventually found a way to monetize it.
The blog enabled her and her husband to move to Heidelberg, Germany in 2016 without ever having been to the country before. They spent a year researching where to move before settling on Germany.
“We had always travelled to bigger cities before, but this time we wanted to go to a smaller city and see something we had never seen before. It felt like a completely different world – like when Harry Potter first went to the wizarding world,” says Sula, fascinated.
Living in Europe is not a utopia
Sula explored old buildings and castles in Germany. Helene Sula
Nevertheless, there were also problems: “We were full of excitement. And then, of course, reality caught up with us. Everything is different. It’s a different language.”
Although they were impressed by Germany, they found that life there was not perfect. On the Internet, however, she often reads that Europe is so much better. However, she disagrees. There are advantages and disadvantages in every place in the world. Sula emphasizes that life in Europe is not automatically better and that you can encounter problems everywhere.
“Living like that — with the motto, ‘If this happens, then I’ll be happy’ — is a recipe for disaster,” she says. “Because wherever you go, there you are. There will still be questions and problems that arise,” Sula continues.
She says of her time in Germany: “It’s really beneficial to be open and see what you can learn. We often think of Europe as a utopia because it has a healthcare system or because workers have more free time. There is definitely something to these things.”
But making a blanket statement about Europe is inappropriate. “Life can be hard, no matter where you are,” says Sula.
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After three years in Germany: return to the USA and move to Oxford
After three years in Germany, they returned to the United States, bought a motorhome and traveled around America. Four years later, they moved to Oxford, England, where they now live.
She says of the famous city in England: “It was so wonderful because I think Oxford is very similar to Heidelberg. They are both university cities – Heidelberg has the oldest university in Germany and Oxford has the oldest university in the entire English-speaking world.” It is also close to London and an airport. It was the perfect choice, says Sula.
They plan to stay in England for two years before returning to the US and exploring other continents such as Australia, New Zealand and South America.
Life abroad has its ups and downs: “You miss your friends and family at home. You often feel lost, whether it’s because of the language, driving or the different rules.”
But for Sula it was always worth the effort.
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