Moving to Belgium with a Young Family with Chloe

EPISODE SUMMARY:

This week on Travelling Through Life: A Podcast on the Go we meet Chloe, a friend I met early into living in Dublin. We talk about everything from the shocking difference between Canadian and Danish student accommodation, going on 2 exchanges to countries that she didn't pick, moving her young family to Belgium, completing a Master's in Dublin, and identifying more as a Canadian when abroad than at home. 

Travelling through Life: A Podcast on the Go is a fun & quirky show from Travel with TMc that delves into all things travel & adventures from the road, in the air, & in between here and there. Make sure to subscribe for weekly updates!

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MORE RESOURCES & LINK FROM TODAY’S EPISODE:

Northwest Territories
Rotary Youth Exchange
Temagami
Copenhagen, Denmark
Hygge
Irish Travellers
French Immersion
Brussels Childbirth Trust
Eurail Tickets
Rødgrød med Fløde
Saudade
Mini Jetsetter


CHAPTERS:

00:00 Introduction to Chloe
06:36 First Trips & Childhood Experiences: Cross-Continent Road Trip to California
08:26 1st International Exchange: Brazil (Rotary)
17:38 2nd International Exchange: Denmark (University)
29:00 Living in Toronto: George Brown (College)
29:25 3rd International Exchange: Ireland (Masters at Trinity College Dublin)
38:35 Moving to Belgium with 2 Young Kids
53:34 If You Were to Move Your Family Abroad Again - Where To?
56:07 How Did You Decide on 1 Year Abroad as a Family?
57:37 Sell or Rent Your Home When Moving Abroad?
59:14 Travel Traditions
01:02:57 Documenting Travel Memories: Scrapbooks
01:04:35 Returning Home to Canada: Resigning & Daycare
01:08:15 Language & Travel: Portuguese, French, & 
01:14:34 Impact of Tech on Travel Style: Logistics & Social Connections
01:18:46 Personal & External Impacts of Travel: Canadianness, Walking, 
01:23:34 New Skill from Being Abroad: Adaptability
01:24:30 Untried Types of Travel: All-Inclusive Resort
01:26:32 Weirdest Sleeping Spot: Ferry Floor
01:27:24 Where is Home?
01:31:09 Necessary Travel Items
01:33:14 Spotify Travel Playlist: Chloe's Choice
01:35:19 Speed Round: @MiniJetsetter,

Transcript

Tara (00:06)
Hello, welcome to Travelling Through Life, A Podcast on the Go. I'm your host Tara and the founder of the blog Travel with TMc, which is where you'll find free destination guides, points and miles consulting for Canadians, a little bit of van life, and much more. Travelling Through Life: A Podcast on the Go. It's a fun and quirky show. We delve into everything travel and adventure, whether from the road, in the air, or in between here and there.

Make sure to subscribe wherever you listen or watch. We're on YouTube as well. And leave a 5-star review or a thumbs up. These 2 things make a huge difference in helping the show reach a wider audience. So thank you for your support. In Season 2, my guests and I cover a wide range of travel topics. And it's my hope that you'll hear yourself reflected in these guests' stories. And maybe that you'll hear the way somebody else travels and think, ⁓ maybe I'll give that a go the next time I'm out in the world.

This week on Travelling Through Life: A Podcast on the Go, I chat with my friend Chloe. Chloe and I met in a hostel on one of my first nights in Dublin when I moved there. We promptly learned our first lesson in Irishisms before heading "out out" in Ireland's capital. Chloe is a dancing machine. She's a master of cozy spaces. She's a world traveller and has lived on 3 continents. Now she's a mom of 2 young girls and works with children with autism.

On the episode, we talk about everything from the shocking difference between Canadian and Danish student accommodation, cross-continent road trips as a kid, going on 2 exchanges to countries that she didn't pick, learning Portuguese, moving her young family to Belgium for a year, completing a Master's at Trinity College in Dublin, and identifying more as a Canadian when abroad than when at home. She also talks about how much she misses Tim Hortons when she's away,

even though she doesn't think the coffee is good. All right, thanks for listening and let's dive in.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (02:06)
on the podcast, we have a very special guest.

This guest I met, I think it was night 2 of Dublin, which is a big deal because we've been friends ever since then and that was like 13 years ago. Her name is Chloe Scott. She is a world traveller extraordinaire. She has lived in several countries. She's travelled all over the place with her family growing up.

as a solo female in her twenties and now with her family living abroad. So Chloe, welcome to Travelling Through Life: A Podcast on the Go. It's good to see you too. It's been too long. And I actually, I feel like I have to start this by saying, I'm so sorry I haven't come to visit you in Europe. I'm so sad that it hasn't worked out. We talked about this so much beforehand and yeah, I don't know, life.

Chloe (02:43)
Thank you so much. It's so good to see you.

I know.

I

know life happens, yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (03:01)
But

seriously, and I get jealous every time I see people go, I'm like, I need to book the flight. need to go visit Chloe and her family. But I will see you back in Canada very soon. What, a few weeks you'll be home?

Chloe (03:07)
Hehehehehe

Yes.

Yeah, so we leave July 8. So yeah, it's like 3 weeks away. We've like, got to get ourselves in gear and start packing soon. Yeah. Yeah. I know.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (03:21)
Holy Moses.

That's wild. Like that's flown for me

and I'm not the one who's had the experience. I can't imagine how quick it's flown for you. Crazy.

Chloe (03:31)
I know. I can't believe it. Yeah, we

just sort of had the last of our visitors come and then now we're like, alright, we need to make some moves here to start getting ready. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (03:39)
Get ready to go. Yeah,

well, why don't you tell all of the lovely listeners who you are, what you do, and where you're calling in from today?

Chloe (03:52)
Belgium. ⁓ So 6 hour time difference to Canada right now. And yeah, me and Tara met in Ireland ⁓ quite a few years ago now. I was thinking back like,

You know, like it just everything feels like a couple years ago. I didn't really it was like, was it 13? That's

Tara (Travel With TMc) (04:08)
It really does.

It's 13 years ago, we met in 2012. It doesn't make sense to me, I don't feel that old.

Chloe (04:13)
That sounds wild. I'm like, but wait, we're still

we're still so young. How could it be 13 years ago? Yeah, so I'm, you know, happy to kind of talk on some of my experiences living abroad as like, you know, exchange, I was a Rotary exchange student, an exchange student in my undergrad, a master's student, and then now as a family, those are kind of all the bits and pieces of me living abroad and all very different experiences. So happy to talk.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (04:22)
Yup.

Chloe (04:43)
little bit of it with some of them. Yeah, yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (04:44)
Yeah, travelling through life as it goes.

Where did, so I know your parents, your parents are amazing, but where did the travel bug come from for you? Was it because of them and like early living scenarios and whatnot? Can you speak to that a little?

Chloe (04:52)
Mm-hmm.

I think probably so when we were when I was when I was a baby, we lived in the Northwest Territories in Canada. So I think that was like, I think my first flight was at 3 weeks old, like my parents flew to Niagara to, you know, to have me around around family and then they flew back home. But we've always you know, even if it wasn't like international trips, we've always taken lots of road trips and you know, kind of like always been been going places and my my mom's parents actually sort of

this feels a bit full circle. My mom's parents ⁓ lived in Brussels for close to a year when I was actually, I don't even know if I was born yet, but ⁓ that's sort of like a funny little just like coincidental thing. So they definitely had that travelling bug too, like ⁓ where a lot of, know, snowbirds kind of go to the States, they would often come to France and, you know, come to Europe rather, you know, like that would be more so they would like rent an apartment for

Tara (Travel With TMc) (05:44)
That's so cool!

casual.

Chloe (05:59)
a couple months and do the Europe thing rather than sort of heading to the sun of Florida, you know, sort of travelling. So I think that's definitely my grandma and grandpa played a part in that too. Yeah, yeah. Sort of coincidental and, you know, it just feels like, yeah, sort of living through them. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (06:15)
I had no idea. That's so cool. That is a very full circle kind of moment.

Yeah. That's so sweet. We'll have to interview

the girls when they're our age and see if they're living in Brussels as well. Yeah. Too cool. Do you remember your first trip as a family? Like, I know you went on the flights 3 weeks and whatnot, but do you remember like ⁓ a trip that you guys took growing up at all and that really sticks with you?

Chloe (06:30)
Yeah. Yeah. I know.

I think, I mean, there was a lot of road trips. dad's family's from Québec, so there was a lot of 8 hour road trips to Québec every year. But sort of the, I guess the big one is my dad worked, he did a contract in California. And so he was already out there. And then, ⁓ like my mom and me and my brother and my aunts drove out to California. So that was like,

you know, sort of like stopping in weird places and, and, you know, like little roadside motels. And that's one thing I sort of, you know, remember being there and like, you know, remember kind of where we stayed in the pool and like, you know, certain things about, about that trip that sort of, I think those are some like early memories anyways.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (07:34)
I can only imagine how fun that would be knowing how much of a good time your aunts and your mom are and just like the dynamic must have been hilarious. Yeah, that's so cool. Okay, so lots of road trips throughout North America. Did you go camping as a kid as well? You went camping, no?

Chloe (07:40)
Yeah. Yeah. ⁓

Yeah, yeah, we would like go to, know, like my parents live now. ⁓ There's like MacGregor Park, those kinds of things. Yeah, so we definitely like, I'd say my parents, especially my dad is like pretty outdoorsy. ⁓ So definitely did a lot of hiking and those kinds of trips. And then we grew up in Niagara, so the escarpment there like did, you know, lots of things, outdoorsy things around home. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (08:10)
Yeah.

beautiful outdoors thing. Yeah.

All the nature.

Very cool. Do you think that the road trips and the travel experiences as a family growing up impacted your decision to then move abroad in? Was high school for the first time or was it elementary school?

Chloe (08:38)
It was it was right after high school. like after I graduated grade 12, I sort of like wasn't sure, you know what I wanted to do in university. And so I applied for the like a Rotary exchange. So Rotary International, they're all they're all over the world. didn't know that much about it really. But applied and then they pick where you go. So you sort of like put some ranking, I think I'd probably put places that speak French because I had learned some French in school.

I did not get that. got Brazil, but it was a great experience. So was in Brazil for a year, obviously didn't speak any Portuguese when I left, but that was an amazing experience. So you live with different host families. So, you you're really immersed in the culture, you know, in the living with, ⁓ living with local families. So ⁓ that was, that was a big, you know, a big experience coming from, I came from a quite a small town. So that was like pretty eye opening.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (09:21)
Yeah.

Any shout out to small town Ontario?

I'm sure we'll have a few listeners from there. Yeah.

Chloe (09:35)
Grimsby. Yeah. I feel like wherever I go,

people like somehow know someone from Grimsby and it's like such a little town, but it's one you have to drive through it to get to Niagara Falls. And so everyone's like Grimsby, I've heard of that. You know, it's like sort of the last like, you know, coffee stop like, you know, before you before you get to Niagara. But it was it was a really nice place to grow up. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (09:58)
Yeah.

Okay, so Brazil for a year after you finished high school and you lived with how many different host families?

Chloe (10:08)
with 3 different host families.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (10:11)
Cool, and were they in different regions or was it all in the same area?

Chloe (10:15)
know

all the same area so you like you sort of you know you have you know the same connections like you you sort of meet them ahead of time they're all part of the like Rotary program so you know who you're going to be going to next ⁓ and then same thing like you know you make friends and and like so you're not being shipped around to different areas which is nice because you sort of like your friends you know stay throughout the whole the whole year ⁓ so other you know either exchange student friends or just your ⁓

Rotary is considered like a cultural exchange, but you do go to school. ⁓ like I lived with a host sister and then went to like, I had just finished high school, but I went to like the second half of their high school year because the years are different. ⁓ And then graduated again in Brazil. ⁓ And then did like my high school there had like also like a technical college kind of thing. ⁓ And so then I did like half a year. ⁓ But it was like in Portuguese. So

Tara (Travel With TMc) (11:05)
Okay.

Chloe (11:11)
know, they just sort of expect you to go to class. did some sort of computer class, me and the other students. So really, it wasn't about the academics, it was about just trying to learn the language and then just to be, you know, for the cultural, cultural piece. Yeah, very cool, though.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (11:25)
Yeah.

Definitely.

And to go without knowing, without having a say in where you're moving to for the first time as what, were 18 at the time, like 17, 18? That's such a leap of faith. how did you, I don't know, I wanted to do exchanges growing up, but I always had FOMO about leaving or something that in my head kept me back. was in you to be like, no, I'm doing this, this is gonna be fantastic?

Chloe (11:34)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

I know. Looking

back now, like, can't believe like you're, you I was like, I mean, a small town for, for Brazil was like 80,000, you know, is still quite a few people. But just like looking back now, like I like things are so different now with the with the internet with technology. But back then, like, you were just like, you know, I had my like paper itinerary, like I'm on like a couple flights to get there, like as a 17 year old and like,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (12:11)
Yeah.

Chloe (12:19)
you're just like, okay, there's a family that's gonna meet me with a sign, like with my name on it at the airport. And like, didn't speak Portuguese, you know, but my host family was so lovely. The first host family that they like, at the airport, was like 15 people that came and they all had like my picture and like, they brought the whole family to meet me and like, there was 3 kids in the house. like,

⁓ one my age, that was like the same school as me and then 2 younger. ⁓ And they were just like so welcoming. When I got to the house, they had like labeled everything in Portuguese. Like on the door, said like, you know, like it said door, like the table said mesa. It said, so just to help me like, you know, learn Portuguese and ⁓ even like, yeah, like connecting with my family. Like I had to have like calling cards and you know, like where you had to like put in like.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (13:03)
Yeah.

Chloe (13:15)
75 numbers to like get that through back to Canada. My parents had to like put money on it kind of thing. it just, mean, I feel like I'm aging myself, but like, yeah, it was a very different, different time than, than now. Like, but it was, it was an amazing experience. Highly recommend.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (13:21)
Yeah

How thoughtful of them to do all of that. I mean to have everybody at the airport number one. What a welcoming. And then the like little touches at the house and whatnot as well. That's really neat. was the application process like for anybody who's considering? I'm assuming Rotary still does these kinds of exchanges. ⁓ Did you have to be like a part of it (Rotary) or could anybody in the community apply or?

Chloe (13:38)
I know. I know.

Yeah, they were very sweet. ⁓

Mm-hmm.

yet anybody

could apply. I think it works a little bit different in each country, but ⁓ like my parents weren't Rotarians. I think there was some sort of pamphlet at like my guidance counsellor office or something. So it was just, yeah, you sign up. And then I think there was ⁓ like some interviews and things like, think, you know, not everybody gets to go, but they had, you know, making sure that you're sort of able to be a little bit independent and you know, that families are going to

welcome you and you're going to be respectful of people's cultures and homes and things like that. yeah, certainly there was no there was no like, you know, language criteria or anything like that. It was just yeah, like, I think you just sort of have I think the interview was probably a little bit about like, you know, being respectful, adapting to new to new cultures, you know, how would you do this or that? But yeah, you so you sort of go through a process and then even before you leave, there's there's a big they have these like

these like meetups. So our district in Niagara is called The Best of Friends District. was part in the part in Canada and part in the States actually, like all kind of Niagara area. ⁓ And so they would have meetups where all the outgoing exchange students ⁓ come. So like everyone that's about to go on their year abroad, and then all the incoming exchange students, so everyone that's already from different countries. ⁓ And so like once a month, they would like they did a big meetup in Niagara-on-the-Lake and all you know, they

had like a whole weekend where you, you know, we did like a bike riding and things like that. But so like I got to meet all the Brazilian exchange students that were in Canada and they would sort of tell you about their, you know, things that are upcoming. And so that was really nice. And like, I met a lot of, you know, friends that way. And some of them even I saw when I eventually went, went back to Brazil, like they were in different cities, but that was really nice. And so they sort of prepare you for, you know,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (15:26)
I don't know.

Chloe (15:51)
life abroad and and yeah we did I think we did a camping trip to Tamagami (Ontario) with all the exchange students which is was really cool like in the winter like we did like you know so there was yeah it was yeah like winter like and we did like dog sledding and like so you can imagine all the people like some of them you know coming from brazil are coming from hot countries um so it's really like you know you're sort of out of your element

Tara (Travel With TMc) (16:02)
You did winter camping?

Chloe (16:15)
⁓ And yeah, they do lots of like, they have you like write a letter to yourself that they mail to you in a year, you know, all about like your upcoming year. So it's really, they do a really good job of preparing, you know, as best they can for, know, kind of coming what you know, what's coming up and then know, homesickness or like, you know, things like that. They talk about all that before you go.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (16:21)
⁓

That's so cool.

Yeah,

I feel like I know the answer to this, but being a mom of 2 little girls now, do you think you'll want your kids to do something like that when they're older?

Chloe (16:45)
Yeah, I would I would love them. mean,

I say that now, but then I'm like, I you know, I was a little, you know, got into some trouble, you know, like did things I wasn't supposed to like, you know, it's like, like the rules of exchange, like the before they go, you know, they're like, don't drink, don't date, don't drive, don't do all these things. It's like, you know, you're like, okay, did I follow all of those? You know? But no, like you it's, you know, I think it's, you know,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (17:06)
And all of those!

you

Chloe (17:13)
fairly safe, you're with families, right? So they treat you like one of their kids, right? Like you're like, can I go to this party? And they can say no, right? Like it's different than sort of being abroad just on your own, right? You are sort of like in the household, you know? So I feel like it's pretty safe in terms of not being, you you're not just out on your own devices finding a place to live and that kind of thing.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (17:18)
Yeah. ⁓

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, like we did in Ireland. Oh, that's a whole other ball of wax. Very different kind of travel experience. Okay, well, let's get into Ireland then. So was there anywhere that you lived or travelled much in between, I'm assuming yes, but in between your time in Brazil and then when we met in Ireland?

Chloe (17:40)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

⁓ Yeah, so Copenhagen. So in my after Brazil, I went to university and then in my third year, I did an exchange again, like through the university through I went to Western in London. Shout out. so the third year, I did the same thing where I applied to go abroad. then ⁓ similarly, they choose where you go. I think you probably do some rankings, but I they selected Copenhagen for me.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (18:06)
⁓ right!

Yeah.

Chloe (18:30)
Another one I brought, know, like I might not have chosen, but happy that I, you know, happy that I went there. And so yeah, that was my third year university. That would have been in between.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (18:31)
Yeah.

I think that speaks

to the flexibility of travel too, where like, you know, sometimes I know for people who are just starting out travelling or who are very type A personalities where they're like, I have to do this, this is the way it has to be done, yada yada. But then the expectations are set in a certain place and so the experience isn't what they had hoped for often. But in the exchanges that you've done, mean, it's dealer's choice. You're just going wherever you're told.

Chloe (18:55)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Yeah,

like I really didn't know that much before I went, other than you sort of know a little bit about like I sort of had a picture of Copenhagen in my head, but like, yeah, you don't know.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (19:12)
Right?

What stood out for Copenhagen in your time there? Because that would have been a completely different experience doing that as a university student.

Chloe (19:24)
Mm Yeah. It's such a it's just a very it's such a lovely place. I think, you know, they always have those ratings of like, ⁓ the happiest countries in the world. And like Denmark is often like, top of the top of the list. And you sort of see that when you get there, everyone's just everyone's so content. I mean, they don't have a lot of like, classes really, like everyone sort of like, I mean, you pay pay high taxes there. But it but it means that everyone sort of has a certain quality of

of living and it's not really different, you know, from like, you know, whereas, whereas some places are. ⁓ I think the most striking thing is I stayed in student housing there. And student housing in Denmark is very different than Canada, just like, I mean, so they, they get paid to go to school there, they don't pay and they and they also get like a stipend. So people stay in school for much longer. So I was sort of thinking like I'm in third year, like I'm

Tara (Travel With TMc) (19:55)
Yep.

Chloe (20:19)
student housing, you know, I imagine student housing like it was in, you know, at Western, which was like, you know, it's like pretty wild and like, you everyone's young and but when I got there, like they have like, like, I mean, the student housing is very nice. And then everyone has their own room and bathroom and then you share like a big shared kitchen. Everything's beautiful. I mean, beautiful. Imagine like, you know, it's Scandinavia, right? So everything looks like Ikea and like

Tara (Travel With TMc) (20:23)
Like it is in Canada. Yeah.

Chloe (20:46)
⁓ The kitchen's like so nice and when I first got there they were having like a floor dinner which they did like I think every week or 2 and they're like, we're having roast lamb and this and that and like you know they had the candles all set and I was like this is like student housing like I was thinking like back in Canada like the only decorations are like you know empty bottles and like red solo cups right I'm just like wow like you know but everyone there you know

they're not like struggling students, right? Like, so they like, you know, make nice meals and like, you know, they're not worried about like working part-time jobs. Like some of them would do like a second master's because like they would just continue to pay like, you know, for you to be in school. So everyone's just sort of really like content. you know, when you sit, they say it's like the happiest country. aren't like, you know, like really like outwardly like happy all the time. It's just like, everyone's just kind of like.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (21:28)
man.

Chloe (21:42)
things are good, you know, they're just sort of content with their lives and, you know, I don't know, doesn't feel like there's a lot of like comparison, you know, you know, these people have more or just the ones. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (21:48)
Yeah.

It's interesting what can happen when people's needs are met. Novel thought for the rest of the world to consider. Yeah. Wow. That

must have really shaped a lot of ⁓ ideas about life for you and what it could look like rather than if you had just lived in, I mean, you'd already lived in Brazil, but to be a university student living somewhere else. I feel like Europeans are always so much more mature.

than North Americans, like even talking about making a roast dinner. Do you know anybody your age in university? No, it was like Kraft Dinner, pasta, and like maybe scrambled eggs because we're fancy.

Chloe (22:23)
Yeah. Exactly. Like I was...

Yeah, exactly. Like you had like a jar, jar sauce,

like pasta. And I know they're like, I was like, Oh God, I better like step it up quick. you know, yeah, everyone's just like, they were they just seemed more adult to you. Right? It was like, I was like, you know, I thought it would be, I thought I would kind of be like, Oh, I don't know about this. Like, you know, I felt a little bit more mature than like student living, you know, and then I was like, Okay, these like,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (22:46)
Yeah.

Chloe (22:58)
These people are more of a cheater than I am, you know, so it was a really, it was a really nice, place to live. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (23:02)
Yeah.

So cool.

I know what you mean. I I just, I was there, what, a year ago, a year and a month ago, just for the weekend. And I got a sense while I was there, just in that short period of time of like people being content or people being happy. I obviously didn't get to meet many local people or have that kind of experience like you did, but there's a peacefulness.

Chloe (23:21)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (23:30)
to the city that way. I don't know if it was like all the outdoor time and the space that they have to be able to bike without getting hit by cars and stuff like that too, like very simple.

Chloe (23:30)
Mm hmm. Yeah.

The biking is

unmatched there. I feel like it's just the bikers rule the road. I don't even know if I was in a car. I lived there 8 or 9 months. I don't think I even was in a car. You just bike everywhere. doesn't even make sense. I mean, cars are expensive there. So a lot of people, not many people have them. But you don't need them. Everything's so flat and you can...

Tara (Travel With TMc) (23:45)
Yeah.

Wow.

Right. Right.

Chloe (24:03)
Like if you live in the outskirts, you can take your bike onto the metro and then get into the city. If you go out for dinner, you bike. If you go to school, you bike. It's just the way of life there. I always loved the, we would call them the mini vans of bikes. Like a whole family would be like, mom or dad peddling and all the kids in the big cargo, the cargo bikes.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (24:18)
So cool.

In the front? Yeah.

Chloe (24:30)
I think

I saw someone once carrying a cello on a bike. If you're going somewhere, if you're moving something, it's on a bike. ⁓ yeah, everything's done on a bike, but it just feels so safe. The bikes are completely separate roads with medians usually, so it's not like many places where you're like, there's a bike lane and then...

Tara (Travel With TMc) (24:37)
normal

Yeah, I saw a guy with a couch in one of his. Yeah.

Yep.

Chloe (24:58)
there's no bike, you know, it ends and then you're with all the, with all the traffic there. It's like, you they have different, you know, street lights for the bikes. It's, it's, yeah, it just feels like, yeah. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (25:08)
Yeah, so well set up. Yeah,

quite a contrast to places like Toronto or Montréal. I will never forget. I went to Osheaga, oh god, in university a long time ago, in Montréal. And I will never forget seeing a biker who was in the bike lane and this Mercedes Benz with a person dressed real nice inside drove up the opposite direction.

Chloe (25:14)
Mm-hmm.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (25:33)
hit the biker, yelled at the biker for being in the way, and then drove off and I was like, what is this fresh hell where like the bike lane is not a bike lane? And in Toronto, I mean, they're trying, but you're you.

Chloe (25:36)
Yeah. Yeah.

I know it's tough. It's like

you always see like a bike lane and then it's like, oh, then there's construction for 2 blocks. So then there is no bike lane. It just ends and then like, you know, it's or there's the, the subway tracks. People always get like, the bikes always get stuck in those. Yeah. It's just not, not set up for it and they try, but then yeah, it's like, then the people driving look at that. Yeah. I know. I know.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (25:51)
Yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

Right. Stuck. Yeah.

Yeah, you wonder why we can't get it right sometimes.

Chloe (26:12)
like Denmark is, you know, they have winters like us and they swing it. Not as bad as us, not as bad as Toronto, but people bike all year round there.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (26:17)
Yeah.

you

What was ⁓ what was like ⁓ a philosophy or an idea or something that stuck with you from either Brazil or Denmark that you've taken with you through life since those experiences?

Chloe (26:38)
Yeah, I think I've heard of like, hygge from from the Danish word who go. So it's like, like, there's no translation, but it's like, coziness, you know, it's just like, sort of like, you know, appreciating like friends and good times and like, nice, you know, like, I just I just feel like people really like took the time to appreciate things there. Like even like I was saying, I was in student accommodation. And like, I would like, you know, you come out in the morning and there would just be a guy before getting ready for school, he would like,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (26:44)
Yeah! Yeah, yeah!

Chloe (27:08)
have a nice, like, you he'd be eating his nice little, like, you know, an egg breakfast with like a little, you know, wine glass of orange juice and he would like have a candle lit. Like it was just like, you know, like you just see like people really like just take the time to sit down and, and like they would, they would even sort of use that, you know, like often, I mean, obviously they speak Danish there, but they would speak English to me, but like they would be like, how was the party? Like, was it, was it a cozy party? Like, was it, you know, it's just like, you know, was it good friends? And, and like, so I think that's something I always like.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (27:32)
⁓

Chloe (27:37)
even when you move different places, you get the necessities first. But I am always like, OK, I got to have some nice mugs. that's important to me, having tea and coffee and a nice mug and having candles. And I think that's something that I've never forgotten that.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (27:50)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

That's interesting that you bring that up as the thing that you pulled forward because I remember when we met in Ireland and I would go over to your place, you had nested more than I did. Whereas like I made an active decision not to nest. think I had like, my place was as sparse as it could be because I knew I would be leaving. But I was impressed and surprised by the fact that you did nest when we were there and you had like things to make you feel homey and whatever. And I was like,

Chloe (28:11)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (28:27)
There's different ways to do this. Yeah, that's so cool.

Chloe (28:29)
Yeah, yeah. Those are like, I'm like, I'm

not gonna drink out of plastic glasses, like in my own house, like, I'm gonna have a wine glass, I'm gonna have like, I drink a lot of tea. So like, I'm gonna have some nice tea cups. Like, yeah, those are things I think I would like, you know, it feels like you're okay, you're here. Like, you know, this is like, you know, something that I, yeah, that I enjoy.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (28:38)
Yeah.

Yes, be here. Yeah,

Okay, so university third year was Copenhagen. And then you were home to finish university. And then did you do your Masters right away? I'm trying to think of age and timing.

Chloe (28:52)
Yeah.

see, yeah, so I did finish university. did a year in Toronto.  I went to George Brown for a year, so I did a post-grad diploma, again, I wasn't sure. And then from that, I sort of knew what career path I wanted to take, so ⁓ then I applied for school in Dublin.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (29:24)
Yay.

Yeah, so I know best. That's a great story too. We'll get to that in a moment. But yeah, so you did your Masters at Trinity College in Dublin. Do you want to tell the people what you know a lot about because you studied it a ton?

Chloe (29:26)
And that's where we met.

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Yeah, so I Master's in Psychology

and Applied Behaviour Analysis. So I worked at a school for autism and so I sort of like got in as a frontline worker. I knew I wanted to work in autism and then quickly when I got in, I realized, okay, I want to be in this career and then sort of saw like, you know, what you need to kind of move up and needed a Master's in Applied Behaviour Analysis. So ⁓ that's what I did. They're actually

wasn't many programs around actually in Canada at the time. So that was sort of, you know, another push to go abroad. And so yeah, I ended up, you know, kind of looked at all different places. There were quite a few programs in the States and some online programs, but then I saw Dublin and I thought, well, that sounds pretty nice. So I applied for applied for that one and got in.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (30:28)
you

Yeah, and the rest is history. OK, I got to tell the story of how we met And I'd love actually to hear your side of it as well. But for me, like I had just gotten to Dublin. It was September and I was essentially living in a hostel at that time while I tried to find housing. And one of the girls in my hostel room was super homesick, I think is what it was and ended up in your hostel room. And so I helped her move.

Chloe (30:34)
Mm-hmm.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (30:57)
everything from our hostel over to yours and you happened to be there as we were moving her in and I think you just said to me like well you want to go out tonight or something along the lines of like super casual ⁓ and I said yes and then we ended up going out that night do you remember where we went which pub no somewhere downtown

Chloe (31:05)
Yeah.

No.

I know. I'm trying to even think like where would we have known like, you know, at the time or like, I'm sure maybe someone pointed us in a certain direction. I don't even remember.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (31:25)
Yeah.

The only thing I remember detail-wise about that, and it's not because of the alcohol consumed, but was, do you remember when we went to the corner store that's like right on the quays there at O'Connell Bridge where we asked for a mickey of alcohol and that's not the word that you use there? Do you remember? Yeah, for anybody who's listening, if you're going to Ireland, do not ask for a mickey of alcohol. If it's a guy at the counter, he's going to be

Chloe (31:34)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (31:55)
very excited that you asked for a mickey. And you will learn very quickly that it's called a naggin not a mickey. Yeah.

Chloe (31:57)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. ⁓ my gosh. It's like, yeah, even like language differences, you think you're in an English speaking country, but it's like, there's plenty of things throughout the year where like, you don't understand them. And then you use phrases from Canada and they're like, what are you talking about? Yeah, yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (32:12)
my god.

So many scenarios. Yeah, yeah,

definitely. What were some standouts from your time in Dublin and going to school there? Because being an undergrad student is a different ballpark than being a Master's student, especially when you've got to deal with international fees. I feel like you just take things more seriously at that age and with those heightened risks. Yeah.

Chloe (32:35)
Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, I guess that's one thing I would say like if, you know, when I when I was in Copenhagen, when it's an exchange through your university, you just pay your regular university or at the time, that's what it was, you just pay your regular university fees. So if you have a chance to do an undergrad exchange, I would I would do that because it's much more affordable, you know, other than the additional cost of living abroad. But then when you're if you're just applying

be an international student, the costs like shoot right up. ⁓ I mean, in general, the Masters programs are often more expensive, but it certainly was more expensive to be an international student. And so yeah, was like I had to, know, knew going into that, that was like the price I was gonna pay for the year, you had a loan and some student loans around that. ⁓ But yeah, I mean, I was very.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (33:25)
Yeah

Chloe (33:31)
happy to be, you know, accepted into the program. And I actually, because of my ⁓ additional classes I had already taken at the university, I actually only had to do a year of their program. So it was actually 2-year program. You can graduate with a diploma after one year or with a Master's after 2 years. ⁓ And so I sent all my syllabus and transcripts and a nice...

letter stating why I think I only had to do the second year. And they went through everything like in detail and they agreed. So that was nice that I only had to do the second year, which was a lot more, first year was a little bit more like textbook, you know, sort of, you know, learning and taking tests. And then the second year was much more independent, kind of independent study, you know, just writing, writing papers a lot more, you know, just self-led, we didn't have a lot of classes, it was

Tara (Travel With TMc) (34:03)
Amazing!

Chloe (34:23)
⁓ like big class, once one day a week, I think. ⁓ But you had we had some placements. And so it was about a lot more like, you know, you were more involved in the, you know, agencies or schools or wherever you kind of decided to go. And but a lot more like you had to lead yourself, right? So like you had to just, you know, okay, I'm to go to the library from 9 to 5 you know, on the days that I'm not in school and you have to do a lot on your own. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (34:27)
Yeah.

Yeah.

be more disciplined for sure.

Yeah. What was the experience like working in like doing your co-ops in an Irish setting as opposed to a Canadian one too that had to have been cool to pull some experience from that and see the differences when you got back to Canada.

Chloe (35:05)
Yeah.

Yeah, so I did I I placed them at a school there it was with sort of a behaviour class they called it so it was sort of some girls that had you know, been kicked out of classes or you know, were sort of really at the at risk of not graduating high school, you know, being on the like, expelled or being switched to like, you know, behaviour management kind of school. And it was really, really interesting, you know, from

just sort of the background that they were from. Some of them, like their families would have identified as travellers or those sort of communities in and around Dublin. But really a lot of them, I think they had some sort of behavioural challenges because they didn't have a lot of literacy. They actually like their reading level was really poor. So that was the program that I worked in as we helped sort of catch up their reading.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (35:45)
Mm-hmm.

Chloe (36:04)
why they were sort of like wanting to get kicked out of class because they were really struggling. But they instantly liked me because I was from Canada and that's where Justin Bieber was from. So I had some serious street cred with them. So I think that helped, know, them not, know, teenage girls not, you know, targeting me. So they were always talking. That was the only thing they knew about Canada, they were pretty excited about it.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (36:25)
No.

You

Chloe (36:34)
Yeah, I think that was sort of like my, know, shoe-in of them, you know, coming around to, you know, obviously they didn't want to be there working on reading with me, but they came around. So, yeah, it was really cool program and it was really, I mean, the schools there are quite ⁓ old school religious, like there's nuns, know, nuns walking around and it's so funny, you see like a nun on like an iPad, like, you know, putting grades in, it's like, it just, you know, feels very like.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (36:38)
Yeah.

Right. Cool.

Yeah.

doesn't compute.

Chloe (37:04)
Yeah, I go like, wait a minute. But it

Tara (Travel With TMc) (37:04)
Yeah. ⁓

Chloe (37:07)
was nice to be part of the community there, in the staff lounge with the teachers and, know, kind of.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (37:15)
Yeah,

I think ⁓ all of the exchange experiences that you've had living with host families, going to university, working in local settings, that's such a phenomenal way to understand a culture better too and not just move there as an "expat" (immigrant) and have a ton of "expat" friends. those are very different kinds of exchange experiences and to anybody who's listening who would consider something like this, I would highly suggest.

Chloe (37:30)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (37:43)
the homestay or doing it through university or getting work with a local company in order to get those experiences similar to that you've had. Like it's just, yeah, it's a different level. Integrate. Yep.

Chloe (37:53)
Because it can be hard to meet locals some places. Even

when you're moving to Belgium, people have said that you probably won't have any Belgian friends you'll meet because there's so many "expats". You sort of have to go out of your way to meet local people. People are also, they're just living their lives too. They don't necessarily want to meet new people. They've lived here their whole lives. They've got their friends and family. that's why it's sort of...

Tara (Travel With TMc) (38:05)
Right.

new friends.

Yep.

Chloe (38:22)
It's always easier to meet "expats", but it's nice to have those experiences that you sort of open up the doors to meet, to be part of the local community.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (38:32)
Yeah

Okay, so take us to Belgium then. How did the decision come to, not as an individual, but as a mom of 2, move with your family, like young kids too. How old are your girls again?

Chloe (38:47)
So when we left, Rhea was 3 and Mila was 6 months. So now a year later, a year and a half and 4. Yeah, I sort of felt like my days abroad were done. It felt like it was so much more approachable as a student. And so I didn't really know that it would be the option for us. I mean, in Canada, like you.

have a house, a mortgage, you know, like your kids are in school, like daycare and you just sort of think, alright, we're sort of settled. ⁓ But yeah, it just sort of came about. mean, luckily in Canada, we have ⁓ long mat leaves. So you can take up to 18 months. And so that was kind of part of it. then my uncle's, my, ⁓ my husband's company. ⁓ He actually was like one of the only ones in his department that worked in Toronto and then the rest of the department.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (39:33)
Thank

Chloe (39:42)
ball in Brussels. And so it made sense. So it wasn't actually they didn't like, say we have to move. It was sort of a bit voluntary on our part. And it, you know, made sense from the company point of view, like, they sort of agreed to it, because he was able to be closer to the rest of his team here. And, yeah, and so that's sort of, we sort of put the ball, you know, put things in motion. And then

Tara (Travel With TMc) (39:45)
Okay.

Yeah.

Chloe (40:09)
of course, as paperwork goes, took longer than we had hoped to get here. But yeah, we got here in the end and yeah, we were here just for a year. So we're heading home soon.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (40:26)
Yeah,

which I'm excited for you. I was excited for you when you got the opportunity to leave because I know that you had said like with having kids that you had felt that your ability to live abroad and things like that, you know, had changed, which is a pretty common, as you already mentioned, mentality here. But then for you to get the opportunity, I could just see a little spark in you like, we come, you know, that was so cool. But I'm excited to have you home as well.

Chloe (40:43)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (40:54)
Can you explain a little bit about ⁓ how the move abroad process worked with a family and what you had to consider differently and what some of the bumps or learning curves were in that?

Chloe (41:10)
Mm hmm. Yeah. So I think even when we said we were going to Belgium, everyone's like, get ready for the paperwork because it's just there's, you know, it's a place that has, you know, 3, 3 different languages. have they just they're they have a lot of, you know, bureaucracy and things like that. So so yeah, there's lots of paperwork to do before before you get here. Everything has to be translated, apostilled, which I had never done before. I don't know if you

had to get things apostilled, like you have to get them like legitimized in Canada. And so there was just lots of lots of paperwork, of course, so like my husband had to get his work permit and then kind of add us all onto that. And so just it's sort of like, you just have to someone kind of just said, like, it takes a long time, but you just you just chip away it, right? Like you just, okay, you do this one thing, you send that in, you know, they return this, okay, now you have to do this thing. And you just you just so

Tara (Travel With TMc) (41:43)
Right.

Chloe (42:06)
trying not to have too much of a timeline because you have to wait for certain things to get done, to do the next thing. And so, yeah, it probably took about close to 6 months, but when it was all said and done of kind of asking to go to then getting the final. And even then we got our final paperwork 2 days before.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (42:12)
Wait, yeah.

Chloe (42:32)
our flight. we ended up having, I think we ended up having to like, like, go get it in Montréal or no, my, my husband's brother was in Montréal. And that's where that that's where the paperwork office like where they approved everything. My husband was ready to book a flight to Montréal to go get it to so that we could keep our original flights. But we ended up getting it through through his, ⁓ his brother happened to be there and was able to pick it up for us. But we were like,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (42:34)
What?

my god.

Chloe (42:58)
down to the wire of like, okay, we're gonna have to move our flights again. I think we had already moved them. But anyways, we got here and then when you get here, the paperwork continues ⁓ to the point where actually we've been here a year and our final paperwork got approved last week. Like they just like, ⁓ we just had our marriage certificate sort of like legitimized here.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (43:15)
What?

Chloe (43:22)
And so to the point now where in 2 weeks from now we have to go and deregister our paperwork before we leave. So it's a whole process, but very, very interesting. Here they have, Brussels is made up of like 19 different communes, they're called, like municipalities in the city. And so each municipality has its own like town hall. So you have to go to your own town hall to like do all of this. And then, you know, it's a little bit complicated, but. ⁓

It seems to work out. It's fine otherwise. Once your paperwork's done, it's pretty easy to live here. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (43:59)
Time to go home. Yeah. ⁓

wild. I didn't realize that the paperwork took that long. That's interesting. And was that mostly tied to like visa logistics or?

Chloe (44:08)
Yeah.

Yeah, it's funny because like, I mean,

the visa obviously, like, he couldn't work until he had to the visa is already done. It's just like, then you have to you have to register. ⁓ Like to be to be like a citizen here, I guess, like to get your identification card. So everyone in the family has an identification cards in Belgium. So like you're considered a resident. So they actually like you go to the commune, you have to bring it's all French or Dutch, depending on which common you are. So you when we first got here, we brought a translator because it was like sort of the you know.

we sort of get by otherwise in life, but you didn't want to mess this up. So you have to like register and then they actually send police to your house to check up on you to make sure you're actually like the people are living where they say you're living. So like a policeman comes to your door, like it was at like 8 o'clock at night and like he checks your passports and like you're like, okay, you're living here. I mean, they're all very nice. It's not, you know, it's not scary. It's just kind of odd. And then yeah, just little things we have to like, you know.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (44:45)
No.

Chloe (45:11)
the school asks for certain paperwork and yeah, but you get through it. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (45:13)
Right?

Yeah, definitely.

So with the girls then you did school daycare. I remember you were talking to me beforehand. You were interested to see how the language would go for them and how they would integrate with peers and whatnot. Can you walk us through that a little bit?

Chloe (45:29)
Yeah.

Yeah, so that was kind of the only thing like we had set up before we came was like my older daughter will be in, was in school here. so that was a local in the local schools in Brussels, you can either choose French or Dutch. So we chose French, of course, because we'll be back in Canada and learning French eventually. So, so she's in ⁓ a fully French school here. It's called Maternelle, which is ⁓ sort of the equivalent of our kindergarten, but they actually start

at 2 and a half here. So yeah, so it starts very early, ⁓ which is kind of nice because if she was back in Canada, she still would have been in daycare this whole year. ⁓ And so she's in the public school here. it's very, which is nice. ⁓ And yeah, obviously, like, it's a very, I mean, Brussels is a very international community. So they're very used to having people come that don't necessarily speak perfect.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (46:05)
Wow.

Mm-hmm.

Chloe (46:30)
⁓ French or you know, lot of the kids speak many different languages. ⁓ So you hear when you like, when I go pick her up, you hear like, you're kind of walking past people, it's like Spanish, you know, you hear you hear like, German, like different languages as you go. So even if it's like the I don't know the teachers, I've never spoken English to them, but like they, you know, everything's in French. But, you know, at that age, you just sort of need to go try it, you know, it's very like, you know.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (46:34)
Mm-hmm.

You've been rocking your f-

Yeah!

Chloe (46:57)
Like the shoes are in the backpack, kind of like, you know, broken French. But for the most part, when they talk to me, I understand, but the output is a little, you know, choppy, but, enough to like, you know, okay, like making sure I'm picking her up at the right time. And, different days have different times and they have different, have after school activities and things like that. So ⁓ all those things enough, you know, enough to get by. And yeah, our daughter's been, I think her French is...

Tara (Travel With TMc) (47:06)
Yeah.

Yeah

Chloe (47:21)
probably surpassing ours now, I would say like, it just sort of like, just sort of like seem to like, all come out, you know, in the past couple of months, like, I feel like, ⁓ you know, she's a little nervous at the beginning, or like, you know, we would try and kind of get it out of her after school. And she, you know, it had to be on her terms, like, she would just kind of like, start singing a French song, you know, and things like that. So I tried to teach her little like phrases before she

before she went or like, you know, we do French books, like the animals and colours and that kind of thing. But then she would come up with a phrase that like, I wouldn't have taught her, you know, like, I said something she said, like, C'est pas grave like, you know, no big deal. Like, I think it's alright Like, it's not serious. Yeah. Which is like something, you know, those little like phrases, it's like, obviously, she like learned those at school. So it's, it's cute to see like all the, you know, all the kids like.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (47:52)
Yeah, yeah!

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

So cool!

Chloe (48:14)
adapting at the school, but she still has one little English bestie at school that they talk English all the time, but that's fine. She's happy there.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (48:19)
⁓

Chloe (48:23)
Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (48:23)
that's what that's going to be so cool to see that as a parent and also kind of bizarre maybe to to hear your kid coming home speaking another language that you like don't speak at home with them. That's so neat. Will you guys try and do French Immersion with her here or no?

Chloe (48:33)
Yeah, yeah, I know.

Yeah, yeah, so she's registered for next year for French Immersion. So yeah, yeah, and actually, so our younger daughter here didn't go to like, she was just home with me all year. So she didn't go to daycare. did, we did like some mom groups and things like that. But they were all in English, like they were like, "expat", you know, community. But she's actually going to be going to a French daycare because we got into one. Yeah, so so that's kind of exciting to like, hopefully.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (48:43)
Yes. Amazing.

Yeah.

Cool. That's badass.

Nice!

Chloe (49:09)
things up and keep for me to keep learning. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (49:11)
Yeah, what a gift to give your kids. Yeah.

That's wicked. And then like from your side of things. So you were I don't even like using this term, but you were "off" off from like career work. But you've had your hands full with logistics, getting the house set up child rearing, all that kind of things. How was the experience for you personally in this time? Because socially, it would have been much different.

Chloe (49:26)
Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (49:38)
integrating or finding communities? Like how was it finding the mom groups or where were other spaces that you met people or you know what was that? ⁓ Yeah, what was that like this time?

Chloe (49:48)
Yeah, I know.

I think so Before I came, there was a few like sort of Facebook groups of like, schools and you know, schools in Brussels, that kind of thing. So that was nice to get the like, the information, like I would like look up her, you know, different schools, and then you have to try and get her into school. Like they don't have, like At home, you just put your address in and they say this is your school. They don't have that here. So you just sort of go find your school yourself. So it could be full or like you just sort of have to like

Tara (Travel With TMc) (50:13)
⁓

Chloe (50:15)
ask around if it's a good school. And so we found the school first and then found accommodation near the school. So that was sort of nice. was a few like, you know, you'd see moms like or moms or dads like talk about certain schools. And like, you know, a lot people say like, if you go to the school, reach out, you know, my kids in, you know, this class. And so there's a few, you know, sort of groups that form kind of from the school, like "expat" family at the school. And then

Tara (Travel With TMc) (50:18)
Wow.

Chloe (50:44)
there's another group that ⁓ is called BCT, British or sorry, Belgian Child Childhood Trust it's called and that I would say like, if anyone's coming here with a family, it's like a really big ⁓ network they have like, they have sort of a clubhouse, they call it where they have like, more organized, pregnancy classes, and those kinds of things. But then it's sort of like a grassroots organization where like, people just kind of create like,

park meetups and, ⁓ I've hosted a bunch at my house just like coffee dates, you know, you just sort of say like, my daughter is, around the age of one, like if anyone wants to come between this time to this time. And so that's been really nice. I would say that's something like, you know, it could have been isolating otherwise, or I'm just like, drop my daughter. Because even when I go to my daughter's school, most of the families are French speaking and really parents are like,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (51:23)
Yeah.

Chloe (51:36)
on their way in and out to work. For the most part, no one's really hanging around. So I would say that that wouldn't have been a great way to meet people. But this other organization, it's mainly "expat" families. There's some Belgian families. But it's just everyone's kind of like from the UK or Germany or anywhere. There's a lot of... Because Brussels is the head of the capital of Europe,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (51:39)
Yeah.

Chloe (52:03)
your headquarters are here. So a lot of like, families that work, for the embassy, all the diplomats. so yeah, a lot of a lot of different families, like they'll have, you know, different groups, like they'll do like, dad park dates and like mom's night out, you know, like where you can go out for dinner, you know, and so there's lots of, I would say there's like,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (52:08)
diplomats and things like that.

Chloe (52:26)
enough to kind of like fill your time as much as you want. I didn't do everything in that group, but they create sort of like local kind of offshoots, know, for sort of like hyperlocal, I guess, where it's like just your little neighbourhood even. You sort of say like this park, if anyone wants to come like these times to these times. So ⁓ that's been nice. And then often you sort of meet other moms ⁓ that you sort of connect with and you maybe just plan to like.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (52:46)
Yeah.

Chloe (52:53)
them for coffee or you know like you I think that's sort of been a nice ⁓ I think my year would have been different without that that organization so things like that or I think a lot of places have things like that or even just like you know Facebook groups or things that are like I think that's come a long way

Tara (Travel With TMc) (53:03)
Yeah.

Facebook groups, yeah.

I have a million more questions for you on this topic and I'll be interested to see what else listeners want to learn about. A, as a family moving abroad, but B, from the logistic side of things, the social side of things, the language side of things, I think we might have to have you back for another talk about more of this in detail.

Chloe (53:31)
Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (53:33)
Of, if you had to go back to Brazil, Denmark, Ireland, Belgium, where would you move again for another year?

Chloe (53:43)
Hmm. That's hard to say. Yeah, yeah. It's hard to say. think, I mean, I just feel like we're here now, right? We're so situated. Like, I just feel like we could have extended our time in Belgium. It feels very, like, easy to get. But like, honestly, it's sort of Brazil. I think Brazil would be a little bit of a harder move. But I mean, ⁓ like Denmark and ⁓

Tara (Travel With TMc) (53:45)
As a family, because you know the family, yeah.

Chloe (54:11)
Ireland obviously both like you can get by pretty easily in English. I mean, obviously Ireland, but like even even even Denmark, like I mean, everyone speaks very good English there. So like the kids would probably, you and they have a lot of like international schools and things. So I mean, I think, yeah, know, it's hard. It's hard to say here. I would just like, you know, we're already so situated here that I would like just probably be happy to stay here. I think

Tara (Travel With TMc) (54:16)
Hmm.

Yeah.

It's hard to pick.

Chloe (54:40)
Brussels is a really, I don't know, it's an easy place to live. don't know, even though it's a big capital city, it doesn't feel like, you know, when you go to London or Paris, they feel a lot more like hustle and bustle, they feel so much bigger. Brussels is big enough, but once you're in your sort of little pocket of the city, in our neighbourhood, we're just walking back and forth to school every day. Yeah, it sort of feels...

Tara (Travel With TMc) (55:02)
Yeah.

Chloe (55:06)
Just like, you know, as usual. So it'll be actually kind of weird to go home, I feel, but now we're happy to go home to Canada too. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (55:08)
Yeah.

I'm wondering about that, the reintegration

to Canada. I mean, it's not gonna be your first time coming back again and doing the whole reverse culture shock thing, but for your girls, it'll be interesting to see how it goes. Is this Udit's first time living in another country as well?

Chloe (55:22)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, pretty much. I mean, he was, you know, born, he was born in India. But yeah, he's been he's been in Canada, basically his whole whole life. So ⁓ yeah, I think he's gonna miss it. He really likes like, at home, he mostly worked remote. So he didn't really have much of a team around in the office. But here he would go to the office every every day and ⁓ where he works, they have like, they feed them so they get lunch every day. And so he would sit with his colleagues and you know, have that more like

Tara (Travel With TMc) (55:32)
RING RING

Exactly.

⁓

lovely.

Chloe (55:55)
community

aspect, whereas like, you know, he would see them on the screen, you know, before, but here, you know, you sort of get to know people a little better. So I think that's something he'll probably miss, you know, going back home. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (56:05)
Yeah,

definitely. Did you guys choose to do a year abroad because of kindergarten coming up for Rhea or like why was the year timeframe chosen or was that something that work said this is what the company will allow?

Chloe (56:22)
Yeah, so they sort of they offered a year visa. And so I think if it was like, going to be extended, it would sort of have to be indefinitely like he would have been just moved to the to the Brussels office. So there was a what wasn't sort of like, you know, you can just do another 6 months, another another another, you know, year. And it was sort of like, we'll give you this year or like you commit to just just moving here full time. And yeah, part of it is like my you know, my daughter will start school.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (56:32)
Mmm.

moving. Yeah.

Chloe (56:50)
that's sort of like on schedule for backing back in Canada. And because we're doing French Immersion, ⁓ you sort of have to hit ⁓ like kindergarten or then you don't go I think until grade 3. Depends on the school board. But I don't know if they would have made an exception if she was coming from a French school. Maybe they would have. But  yeah, certainly, I think our all the paperwork was done, it was done for a year. So certainly, if we stayed, it would have been

Tara (Travel With TMc) (57:03)
depends on the school board, yeah. Yeah.

Chloe (57:19)
another round of paperwork. ⁓ you know, we have, you know, family support and we have a house at home. So there were certain things if we were going to be staying longer that we would have, you know, had to probably, go back and sell our house or, you know, can't just have it like sitting there. So

Tara (Travel With TMc) (57:22)
Yeah.

Right, yeah.

Do you wanna touch on a little bit how you guys chose what to do with your house while you were away? Because that's another big logistic piece for families that are looking to move abroad. Do we keep the house? Do we sell it? Do we rent it? Do we, yeah.

Chloe (57:45)
Mm.

Yeah, yeah,

I know we sort of we weren't really sure what we were going to do. ⁓ We thought about selling it but you know just then you're trying to get back into it. I didn't like the idea of going back home and not having anything you know especially as my daughter's gonna start school like you want to be sort of where it's situated but ⁓ so we ended up we were like just planning to keep it ⁓ keep it vacant.

⁓ But my in-laws ended up doing some construction on their house. So they moved in for a little bit, which was nice. So they, you know, kind of were able to watch over our house. And then ⁓ I don't know if we actually just are doing some construction right now in our house. So ⁓ yeah, so we were reconfiguring our upstairs to 4 bedrooms. Now, you know, it's 2 kids. So we still have the guest room. And so that's a little bit weird to do from abroad, but ⁓ we're making it work and it'll be nice to.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (58:32)
Cool. Yeah.

Chloe (58:42)
hopefully be done by the time we get home.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (58:45)
Yeah,

you'll come home to somewhat of a different house. That'll be interesting too. Yeah. Yeah. Awesome. Alright. I'm looking at the time. You and I could gab for forever. This is like not only just a podcast chat, it's like a bit of a catch up for us as well. ⁓ I have a few questions. Do you have some time still?

Chloe (58:47)
Yeah, I know. Yeah, kind of bizarre,

No, I know, I know. ⁓

Yeah.

I don't

hear any babies. My daughter's sleeping, ⁓ she's the timer.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (59:09)
Okay.

Given that you've done a lot of travel by yourself and as a kid in your family growing up and now as the parent, do you have any through lines, travel traditions or things that you, rituals or things like that when you're travelling or moving abroad?

Chloe (59:34)
What do I do? I mean, I often will, I just like to sort of like get a coffee and walk around places. feel like that's like, I'm not big on like you have to hit every museum and every X, Y, Z or just only the Instagram spots. think like, I sort of like to like, I often will look up like neighbourhoods and sort of like when you're booking accommodation, just, I mean, now even like with family, like, ⁓

Tara (Travel With TMc) (59:53)
Yeah.

Chloe (1:00:03)
search family friendly neighbourhoods in Lisbon or whatever, and you just sort of like, ⁓ no, we went there. I would love to go to, I really like Lisbon, you know, just sort of like getting the vibe of a neighbourhood wanting to make sure it's safe, it's, you know, ⁓ I mean, especially when you're just travelling like a to be, you know, ideally like walkable or,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:00:08)
Lisbon, are you moving to Lisbon next?

Chloe (1:00:30)
⁓ I mean, now with having kids, like sometimes it's nice to like be able to go back during the day to your hotel, like we have kids that nap and things like that. I think it's always sort of, that just getting a general sense of like the city or the country to sort of where you want to like locate yourself ⁓ first. And then I always do like a bit of research on things that I want to do, but ⁓ never have like a, like I used to be more like strict itinerary, but now I'm

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:00:39)
Yep.

Chloe (1:00:58)
more, especially the kids a little bit more loose on like, you know, on the day to day of like, just kind of like we want to get up and we want to sort of hit some of these spots. But you know, we might take turns along the way and like to be a little bit more relaxed than I used to be. I used to have like printouts of like 12 o'clock do this. 3 o'clock do this. Yeah, yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:01:14)
Go with the flow. Yeah.

No way! I don't see you doing that at all! That's

so interesting!

Chloe (1:01:25)
I think back like

when I was in Copenhagen, my friend came and we did like the like one month like Eurorail, you know, like different country every 2 days. Like, ⁓ and I mean, that was a little bit, we didn't have as much access to internet and things, right? So it was, I feel like if that was one thing too, I used to plan a lot more because it was like, you had your hotel, you had this, like you, you know, I would like write out like,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:01:34)
⁓ yeah.

Right.

Chloe (1:01:47)
how to get from the station to the hotel or like, you know, you're also didn't have a lot of money so you weren't taking cabs. Like it was, so I think that was, you you had to like know which trains you were gonna hit and yeah, now, we were a little bit slower paced and that like, you know, just kind of plunked somewhere for like, you know, 4 or 5 days and like, you know, you have things that you, that you want to do, food you want to eat and, and, but not necessarily. I mean, you know, my kids aren't gonna.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:01:54)
Yeah. Different kind of travel.

Yeah.

Chloe (1:02:14)
do a 3 hour museum tour. So it's you just kind of, it's not the time in my life to do those, you know, really some of those things. But yeah, I feel like just like to just sort of get a sense of the city, know, just like walking around with a coffee, know, eating in a nice little square kind of thing, Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:02:22)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

I

think it's one of the most underrated pleasures of travelling is that simple get a drink, either sit and people watch and get a vibe or wander around and just feel for a place. I feel like there's an art, a bit of an art and a science to it that isn't talked about a ton, but I agree. It's one of the best. Do you still scrapbook too? Because you're big like.

Chloe (1:02:41)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Yeah. Yeah.

I'm

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:03:01)
For anybody

who doesn't know Chloe, she is an arts and crafts queen. It blows my mind the cool stuff that you make. Yeah.

Chloe (1:03:07)
Yeah, I

haven't done it in a while. But I was thinking about it for this trip. now that my you know, a daughter like, you know, 4 year old that's sort of getting into crafts, I think like, I'm to try and like with with her like, you know, won't be like the main scrapbook because you know, I don't want her to miss. But there'll be a kid friendly version where she's allowed to, you know, I'll probably do like, you know, the you know,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:03:17)
Yeah.

you

Chloe (1:03:31)
the ones you can order now, like where you kind of have all of her pictures there, because it does take a long time that I don't necessarily have. But well, I think I'd like for her to have a keepsake of like something that she's kind of created and like, you know, she could like take it for show and tell or like, you know, something of like, I think, because I do wonder at her age, like, for like, is she going to remember, you know, this year? I don't know that she will. But I hope like, I think looking back on some of the memories I've had young, like, they're almost like,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:03:36)
Yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

Chloe (1:04:00)
did I remember them or are they sort of created through pictures? So I think it would be nice for her to have like a keepsake of a, you know, something to look back on. Maybe she'll be like 6 or 7 looking back on the pictures it'll keep those memories. So yeah, hopefully when I get back and get the house all set up and get my cross-paw out. Then...

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:04:19)
Yeah.

Chloe (1:04:20)
speaking, yeah, get back

into creating something because I think that's I mean, I'm not one I don't buy a lot of souvenirs. But I think that sort of like this, the scrapbooks I'm happy to happy to keep and, you know, look back on.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:04:31)
Definitely, those are treasures for sure.

And when you get back, do you have to hop into work right away? What's your timeline that way?

Chloe (1:04:40)
No, I've just resigned actually from my position. Yeah, I know I was there 10 years. So that's kind of wild. But yeah, just with our timing,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:04:42)
WAAAAH!

Chloe (1:04:49)
yeah. So yeah, we're gonna figure it out in the fall. I worked about it is about an hour commute. And now 2 kids, I was sort of, you know, happy that like, I'm hoping that I get something a little bit more local, maybe a bit remote, maybe part time even, because we don't have ⁓ before and aftercare for for so we just got a daycare spot, which we're happy about. But yeah, like my daughter's school starts at 9:30. So like,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:04:58)
bright.

Yeah.

Take care. Yeah.

Chloe (1:05:15)
Like I used to leave, I know, and so I used to leave at 730 to get to my job at 830. And now I'm like, okay, like, you know, it's sort of figuring that out. So unfortunately, because we got French Immersion spot, the school we didn't expect. She's not on the, she was on the wait list. And so, so we'll see how that all is going to turn out. Luckily, all the kids I know in the neighbourhood are

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:05:16)
Wow, that's late!

Right?

Oy vey.

Hmm.

Chloe (1:05:43)
going to the same school as well. Everyone's in the same in the same boat. So, you know, if we do find if I do, you know, find full time job, like we'll figure something out with like some sort of nanny share or whatever, but just happy to have a little bit of flexibility in the meantime to sort of ease back in.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:05:56)
Right.

You always have such a good attitude about things. You're just like

so positive and go with the flow and things will work out. I love that about you. Yeah.

Chloe (1:06:07)
Yeah, yeah, like I feel like I present

as that if you ask my husband, he'd be like, she's stressing about this, like, or trying to get, you know, my like letters to the daycare being like, please give us a spot. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:06:20)
Yeah.

Like I'm not a mom yet, you know, if I ever am sort of thing, but I, I don't know why our system can't get it together on like daycare and timing of things. ⁓

Chloe (1:06:25)
Yeah.

It is like ruthless. Like here I'm like, I'm like,

it's so nice to kids go to school at like 2, 2 and a half. Cause I feel like it just sort of gives an even plane for people, you know, like for families that like, you know, it's not like you're fighting, you know, it's just like, you just, at 2 and a half, you figure out what you have to do ahead of that time, but it just sort of gives like all families like, okay, like they have a spot from, you know, like 8 30 to 3 every day. And

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:06:40)
Yes!

Chloe (1:06:55)
sort of like, if you need other care after that, you figure it out, but at least like, you know, it's not years of yeah, literally. Yeah. So, yeah, so we're happy to have a spot for our younger daughter. And then, yeah, our older daughter will be in school, but yeah, obviously, like the school hours and the work hours don't quite align. yeah, we'll see. It's been a big, you know, transition for the family, but happy to sort of like ease into it a little bit more versus like having to like,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:07:00)
It's not the Hunger Games in the meantime.

Yeah.

Yes.

Bam. Yeah.

Chloe (1:07:24)
Yeah,

land and full time back to you know, for everyone.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:07:30)
Yes. Yeah. So positive. I love it. Yeah.

Chloe (1:07:32)
I'm like summer in Canada, it's so nice. I'm excited too.

My parents live a few hours away from us, so getting to go up there, I know, that's so exciting. Can I send you a picture of you guys? So cute.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:07:40)
popped in to see them. Yeah. That was such a nice visit.

it was great to see your parents. That'll be nice for you to

Chloe (1:07:50)
Yeah, yeah, well this summer, this summer you

can come up again and while I'm there. I hope I get invited this time, just you and my parents.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:07:55)
I'll be up there. I'll come visit you guys. Yeah. I'll come visit you guys for sure.

Yeah. Too funny. Okay. We have, you know, we've touched on some of the other topics that I usually like to bring up with people. We've talked a little bit about language.

Chloe (1:08:06)
See ya.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:08:15)
⁓ Do you still, like at the end of your time in Brazil or Copenhagen, not so much Ireland, because we know what you pick up there for all the great swear words and idioms and such. ⁓ And with Belgium, like have you retained much or used much of the languages? Do you enjoy any of that or are you like functional, what I have to do to get by and then I'm done with it?

Chloe (1:08:21)
Yeah. Yeah.

No, I do. I mean, do like languages. So when I went to Brazil, ⁓ they didn't speak a lot of English where I lived. So I would say I learned Portuguese much better than I had ever learned French, you know, in my like, however long we learned in Canada, 10 years of language instruction, I think just because like you're so immersed in it. when you land there, it's like, and you also don't have like Google Translate, you do now, like you're just sort of like playing charades and like getting by. And I feel like that is the best way to learn.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:08:54)
rates.

Yeah.

Chloe (1:09:08)
⁓ And so like I was pretty fluent. I was, you know, got by pretty good by the time I left in a year. Definitely much more than French. ⁓ And even then that was like, I hate to say it, like almost like 20 years ago that I came back from Brazil. And like even when we moved to Brussels, like my Portuguese would have been better than my French. Like when I would like try and speak, know, like Portuguese would come out first, and there are a lot of like sort of similarities in the languages, but now it has...

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:09:09)
Yeah!

though.

Yes!

Chloe (1:09:35)
shifted a little bit. Like I would say my French is still not great. like, don't, I'm not totally immersed in French here, right? Like, you know, I get by with at the store and at school, but for the most part when I'm speaking to like, you know, friends and, know, I'm speaking all in English. So when you're not forced to learn it, even though I'm like, you know, doing the Duolingo thing. And like, you know, when I go into a store, I really tried to speak French before I have to switch to, you know, some English words.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:09:44)
Right. Yeah.

Chloe (1:10:03)
I think it really makes you learn the language much better. And then Denmark, they speak such good English that Danish is just like, I would try and say things in Danish and they're like, I feel like what I'm saying sounds like what you're saying. And they're like, we have no idea what you're saying. Some of the sounds, I just don't think we have them. Like the O with the slash.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:10:04)
Yeah.

⁓ It's another level.

We don't make them, no.

slash through it, yeah.

Chloe (1:10:29)
It's hard to

do. It's very like throaty. There are certain things that they want people that aren't Danish to say. There's one thing they always tell you to say is this dessert name. And it's because it has 3 of those O's in it. So I'll completely butcher it. But it's like Rødgrød med Fløde. And it's like red pudding with cream or something. It's just like if you don't grow up with that, if you don't speak that language, know.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:10:34)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah. Your muscles don't make it. Yeah.

Chloe (1:10:59)
you're just not going to get it. Yeah. So, and I mean, they

learn English to such a, you know, high standard there that it's just like, it would be very, I did a little Danish course when I first got there. And, you know, they teach you little funny things like say, I have a hangover and things like that. was all university students, which is jeg har tømmermænd. I still remember that. It means like, I have like a hammerhead or something. Yeah. So, and like, you know, the little like day to day like,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:11:07)
Right.

You

Bye!

Chloe (1:11:29)
Tak means thank you and you still sort of say those things, but just to be respectful. But yeah,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:11:35)
Do you find that you, if you're out in public in Toronto or somewhere else, because Toronto is so multicultural, if you hear other like Portuguese or Danish or whatnot, do you feel your ears kind of prick up and it's just like, yeah, it takes you back? Yeah.

Chloe (1:11:43)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Especially like Portuguese, because I would say like

I can, you know, it's almost like on the streetcar or something, it's almost like, oh, like, I'm like in on a little secret, you know, even though I'm sure like, you know, there's there are plenty of people in Toronto that speak Portuguese. yeah, I do. mean, you know, know that I know you love languages and I actually have a minor in linguistics. So that was I always I think I feel like I've told you that. I don't know.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:11:57)
Yeah.

Great.

Yeah.

Did I know this?

Probably. It's been a while since we've talked about university. Yeah.

Chloe (1:12:13)
⁓ yeah. But I do, yeah, I do

find like learning languages is very, it's so interesting. It's so hard to do. It's you really like when you're travelling, like the privilege that we have speaking English, like you really get to know that, right? Like that you could just go anywhere in the world and kind of like get by enough. Like if, know, if you need to go to the hospital or you know, you need to like get something, like there's always going to be someone that will help you out. Whereas like, yeah, like not everyone has that or like.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:12:21)
Yeah

Yep.

It's true.

Chloe (1:12:42)
I mean, you sort of take, like people here just like, many of them just speak 4 languages. you know, we don't, like when you're English speaking, you're not sort of like, okay, we have to, you know, we have to learn these other languages to travel the world. It's just sort of like, you know, that you'll always get by. But yeah, definitely don't take that, you know, don't take that lightly. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:12:49)
Yeah.

Definitely.

You've tossed a couple cool phrases our way, a couple cool words. Any other favourites from any of the languages that you know? Or anything that's like weird and you're like, oh, this always sticks in my head.

Chloe (1:13:13)
Yeah,

well in Brazil they say like, Que saudade I don't know if you've heard that. like, I miss you, like longing. like, you know, like whenever, like I think that's something, you know, even like seeing you now, it's like, Que saudade, like I haven't, you know, like it means like this longing or like, ⁓ but they use it a lot, in the day to day, if you haven't seen a friend in a long time, like you would say like, you know, like have like, like, saudade you know, ⁓ that's sort of, I think,

there's those words that sort of don't translate like hygge and saudade there. Those are things that you learn and they're like, you know, there's there's sort of like a big, a big part of the culture, right? Like you sort of like, when I think of when I think of Copenhagen, think of like coziness and like saudade Like I think of like just the, you know, Brazilian people are so like social so it's like, it's not just like an odd word in the language that we don't have. It's like, it's like really like, you know, at the front and centre of that

of that culture. I almost want to put those words in my house somewhere. think I need signs of all the different places that I've been, things that you don't want to give up when you go home. It's like, okay, those are the pieces I need to bring back to my life and to our family.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:14:10)
Yeah.

Yeah, yeah

Yeah.

You want to retain? Yes.

Yeah,

100%. With tech and everything and how it's changed through our lifetimes, like we've already talked a little bit about how when you left for Brazil, like, you you weren't watching on TikTok everything about the place you were going to move to or whatever else. How has, I don't even want to call it the evolution because I have thoughts, but how has tech changed how you travel and move abroad and experience

Chloe (1:14:47)
Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:15:01)
these different parts of your life?

Chloe (1:15:03)
Yeah, think, well, one thing is the planning. I think I probably do a little less planning because I know I can just like, sort of look things up and Google Maps things like, you know, is easier to do to do now. And then I think, yeah, just being connected to people, I think, like, if I were to move here without technology, I think, like, having that opportunity to like get information on schools, like that

helped me help ease my anxiety of like, just throwing my daughter into a random school here and knowing nothing about it, right. So like getting feedback from from parents and then like, yeah, those like social connections, like I think that's made a big difference. Like I think I sort of without technology, I can't imagine really like how I would have met people. Like, of course, like, you know, like,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:15:35)
Right?

Yeah.

Chloe (1:15:49)
you know, even as an adult, right? Like, it's like, you're not really going up to people in the grocery store being like, hey, you know, you have a kid, like, do you want to hang out? Like, sure, you can do that. But it's like, yeah, like you sort of like, there's these places where like, you know, maybe not physical places, but like online places where it's like, people are coming for a need, like, you know, moms that are at home or like, you know, like families that want to go, you know, go somewhere or like, in Brussels, there's a Facebook group called like, ⁓

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:15:56)
Be friends!

Chloe (1:16:17)
Women of Brussels Meet Up or something. So it's a lot of you, know, even women that come with like for work, you know, that want to like meet up with other, women to like, they have all sorts of all sorts of different like, you know, they're gonna go to a concert or like they have crafting groups or book clubs, things like that. You know, whereas like you might not want to like do certain things in the city like at night on your own, right? Like they're like, okay, let's plan to like, go together. So I think things like that have really

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:16:28)
Yeah.

Chloe (1:16:47)
they sort of open up the doors to meeting all sorts of people with the same interests or sort of same stage of life.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:16:54)
Yeah.

So interesting the way you phrase that, you said, you know, there's places, not physical places, but online places where we do that now, where we find community. It's almost like our brains have shifted to find it weird if people do that in person, but I kind of want to bring that back. Like, I kind of want to be the person at the grocery store. I know, I know. Yeah.

Chloe (1:17:01)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. Yeah, I mean, we met in person, right? there are people that

I had, like, you know, even just like, like our daughters are friends at the school and you sort of like, you know, there was a lot of, you know, a few months of just sort of head nods and waving and then, you know, I sort of like approached them and was like, you know, my daughter's birthday is coming up, like, do you want to come over for a play date? But it's almost like, you know, it's that putting yourself out there, like it's like a date or something, right? It's like, you know, would you guys be open to like...

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:17:22)
Right.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Chloe (1:17:38)
exchanging numbers. So there's probably people more outgoing than me that do it more often, but I'm not that outgoing. But I don't know.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:17:47)
You are so outgoing. You are. You're a special

person. Honestly, Chloe, if we hadn't met, I was just talking about you yesterday with, who was it, my parents or someone. And then this comes up for me all the time when, I don't know if you remember this, it might not stick for you, but like there'd be nights in Ireland where...

You'd be like, let's go do something tonight. And it would be maybe drizzling or I'd be comfy at home or I'd be lazy or whatever. And I'd be like, I don't know. And 10 minutes later, you'd be outside my apartment and be like, get down here, we're going. And if it wasn't for you, yeah, a hundred percent. If it wasn't for you, I think there's a lot I wouldn't have done. So I think you are social.

Chloe (1:18:18)
Yeah, let's go!

Your parents are probably like, remember that

bad influence on you? No.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:18:32)
My parents love you.

No. Yeah. And like all the people I met through you, like your friends at Trinity and whatnot, you're social. You're social. Oh man. Okay. So we've also heard like a bunch about how travel has impacted your life. And I don't want to say just travel because living somewhere is a completely different experience. you know, we've even

Chloe (1:18:41)
Mm-hmm.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:18:59)
talked about your time in Belgium today as a trip, but it hasn't been a trip. It has been your life for the last while. ⁓ What are some ways that these places and experiences have impacted you and changed the trajectory of your life? And on the flip side of that, how do you think about you being in another place and your impact on those people in those places?

Chloe (1:19:25)
I know it's interesting. think like I really like when you're away, I really identify as a Canadian. Like you don't really think about it in your day to day life. But then it's like when you're abroad, I think I'm like very proud to be Canadian, very like proud of where we come from. I think like, you know, people have an idea of, you know, us being like respectful and polite and, you know, friendly. And I think like, you sort of want, to uphold that, like, know, to sort of like, keep that reputation alive. ⁓

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:19:37)
Mm.

Chloe (1:19:53)
And then I think you also like there's things, when you're when you're abroad that you think, okay, like, I want to like, bring this, you know, back back with me, like, I sort of, you know, even thinking about going home, we sort of we, you know, live just outside of Toronto, like the suburbs, you know, and it's like, we drive everywhere. And like, we, you know, like, we go through like, a drive through to get coffee. And those are things like, I just think like, I always had like a big like, you know, like venti coffee in my head, I was always going from one place to another and like,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:20:10)
Yeah.

Chloe (1:20:19)
You think here like no one, no one does that. Like here I walk, I walk pretty much everywhere. ⁓ Like if you're like, you would never see, like you never see anybody just like walking around with a coffee in their hand. Like at school drop off, like no parents have coffees in their hand. Like they're all like, if you're going to have coffee, you like go somewhere and you sit at a cafe and you enjoy it. Like, you know, it's sort of like, I think even though it's a big city, doesn't feel like so much hustle. ⁓ Whereas I think like,

you know, when I when I go home, I want to like, you know, make sure I'm still doing like, you know, walking places and like really sort of slowing down and appreciating time time with people. And I think, yeah, that's sort of something I don't want, you know, I don't want to change. And even I mean, I think it's sort of one of those things of like, when you're in a different country, you want to do everything and see everything like, I think my daughter's gonna we're gonna get home and she's gonna be like, what are we doing this weekend? Because we do something every weekend here, we're always

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:20:54)
Yeah.

Yeah.

my God, yeah, the amount of like

trips you guys have taken has been so impressive. That's another reason why I wanna have you back. Like you guys have gone so many places and done so many things this past year as a family of 4. It's incredible.

Chloe (1:21:22)
Yeah

I know.

it's I mean, it's so easy. Like, I mean, we went to, you know, the Netherlands this weekend, just because like, you know, it's only an hour. Like, it's just like, whereas like at home, I feel like we're like, you know, it's like, are we doing this weekend? I don't know, mowing the lawn and like, you know, like going grocery shopping and like, I don't know, it just felt like we, you we didn't do as much. But like, there's, mean, there's so much to do and see in in Canada. And I think like, we want to like, bring that sort of like, you know, I think I think it's because we knew our time was limited here that we like wanted to

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:21:43)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Chloe (1:21:58)
do and see everything, whereas at home you just sort of think you have all the time in the world. then it's like, sometimes you just don't do all those things. So even if it's just small road trips, feel like you do this all the time. I'm going to have to go to the archives of all your blogs and everything, because you have so many nice write-ups of just interesting little day trips in Ontario that we just maybe haven't got to. So we want to bring that.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:21:58)
Mm-hmm.

Right.

you

Mm.

Chloe (1:22:27)
that home of like, you know, continuing to just do new, you know, do new things with our kids and, and not just sort of like, kind of be back to, kind of like preparing for the week and, know, like that sort of like, just, you know, being in like, a million extracurriculars and like, I know you just sort of feel like you don't have you don't have the time to like, I don't know, see new things. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:22:35)
Yeah.

Right.

It's like you're busy instead of you're living. Yeah. Yeah.

Chloe (1:22:53)
I think that's

probably some of it being in a new city, being in Europe, the way that they experience things, there is just a lot more walking and things close by. But I think it's also just when you know you're abroad or you know you're in a new place, you don't want to take that time for granted. So I think that sort of sense of adventure, think making sure that we're bringing it home.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:23:18)
So cool. Man, I can't friggin' wait for you to get home.

Chloe (1:23:21)
You're gonna have to call me out on it if I'm like

not doing anything I'm gonna get a little too comfortable

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:23:25)
I will. ⁓

I'll book your next plane tickets for you, Chloe. Yeah. What's a new skill that you have honed from your times abroad? Or something that you didn't anticipate ⁓ picking up as a skill, maybe either.

Chloe (1:23:32)
Yeah.

Mmm.

Hmm.

I don't know, feel like adapting to, to different, I mean, different languages here. It's sort of funny because like, I'll have like an English group and then I'll be dropping my daughter off in French and then like 10 minutes away is like, you're in like a Dutch speaking, you know, know, town. So I feel like that's like, you're just always sort of like, especially here, you're always, you're always adapting to like, you know, the way different, different kinds of, you know, people, different, different languages, I think.

and being sort of, yeah, quick to adapt to new things, probably.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:24:27)
Mm-hmm,

mm-hmm. I feel like you're very good at that. Is there a type of travel that you haven't tried yet that you'd like to either as a couple or as an individual or as a family?

Chloe (1:24:38)
You know what? We've never done an all-inclusive. We never, like you always see people that are, you know, going to like, I know, like it's like, yeah, I've just, it's never been something I really like has interest. I've never been to the Caribbean. I've never, like, it's never really, like I, like you see pictures and you're like, okay, it's a beautiful beach. I've, like, I've just never really been on the sit on the beach kind of person. But then like with kids, it's sort of like, it might be nice just to not have to worry about like where we're going for dinner and not have to worry about this.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:24:44)
What kind of Canadian are you if you haven't been to a- Neither have I.

Yeah.

Chloe (1:25:07)
Like I think, you know, it's something there are some ones that are quite kid friendly and then also have like childcare in them that like, you know, like we could go for dinner and like, you know, we've sort of talked about like with some friends maybe doing something like that. But it's, it's sort of something I've just like never really been interested in. But now like, I could kind of see the appeal of like less, less planning. But who knows? I don't know if we'll actually do it. Exactly. Yeah, I think we've always been like trip people. We've always been, you know, like

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:25:15)
Yeah.

Definitely, it's a vacation versus a trip kind of thing. Yeah.

Chloe (1:25:36)
happy to sort of plan and, you know, to do all that, making all the plans and all the, you know, all the accommodations and stuff. But yeah, I could see like, you know, especially, you have a week off work, it's like, I want to come back rested. So that's maybe something I don't think I'll ever get on a cruise. But I can see  I can see it all-inclusive.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:25:58)
Yeah, that's cool. That makes so much sense with kids as well. I totally get that. Yeah. ⁓

Chloe (1:26:02)
Yeah, yeah. Although they do have some nice all-inclusives

like in Europe and Switzerland and stuff. Maybe that's more my vibe. Yeah, they have like cool outdoor playgrounds and like, know, where those little things you can go down the mountain, things like that. That could probably be.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:26:10)
⁓ nice. I didn't even know that that was a thing there, but I guess that would make sense.

Yeah, that's

cool. That would definitely be for sure. Awesome. ⁓ Of all the places that you've been, what's the weirdest place you've slept in?

Chloe (1:26:38)
Weirdest place I've slept? mean, definitely like, you know, trains, planes and automobile. I think I've like, I took a ferry once from Italy to Greece and like slept on like the ferry floor, like I think outside me, me and Cara, like, it was like, you know, at the time where we we were travelling very cheaply. It was actually part of the Eurorail pass where it's like, you could pay extra for a room, but like, we weren't going do that. So

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:26:56)
Yeah

Yeah.

Chloe (1:27:04)
It's like, it's like, very

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:27:04)
why would you do that? Yeah.

Chloe (1:27:06)
much like, you know, just like on our backpacks, like sort of, you know, I'm sure we didn't sleep much, but that's offhand, where you can think of with a sort of odd place to sleep.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:27:13)
Yeah.

a ferry floor. That's definitely a weird place to sleep, but makes sense given the trip. Yeah. Do you feel more at home in any of the places that you've lived or travelled to or like what is home to you at this point as well?

Chloe (1:27:20)
Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, I'd say like, Belgium is like, we feel most at home now, I think just because like, we're, I mean, not maybe not more than Canada, but I think like, yeah, like the like, how do you phrase it, like the reverse culture shock or reintegration, I think like, there will be things that were sort of like, this is different, like, you know, moving home, I think like day to day now, like, you know, if we were to extend our time here, like, it just feels like

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:27:52)
Yeah, I would.

Yeah.

Chloe (1:28:00)
you know, our like apartment here, you know, we set everything up and like all the furniture is ours, you know, like everything was, you know, feels very much like us now. So that'll be, I think, like a little bit different to go back home, like, I feel like, yeah, Canada's changed a lot in a year. like, think just sort of like, yeah, I think, think like, because you're here with a family, like, it's just, you sort of...

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:28:20)
Yeah.

Chloe (1:28:27)
know, you're like the day to day is like because we're you know my daughter's in school and like it feels like we're really integrated into like the neighbourhood. ⁓ That would be different that would be kind of odd to leave but ⁓ yeah I think Canada will always be home.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:28:38)
Yeah.

Always be home.

Yeah. Yeah. I meant to ask you earlier. Did you get to know your neighbours at all? Because I feel like I mean, yeah, because I don't know about you, but because you've lived in Toronto as well as I have. And in Toronto, people in apartments don't meet each other. Like I remember moving to Toronto. My sister was like, we don't do that here. And I was like, what? But now you like you have a home in Toronto and like you would know your neighbours there. Did you get to know your neighbours much at all in Belgium?

Chloe (1:28:47)
Here?

Mm-hmm.

No.

Yeah.

⁓ So we live in an apartment here, it's ⁓ mostly apartments here are like maximum 4 stories. So like our apartment is like 4 stories and only 2 apartments on each floor. So like 8 units. So you sort of see like that, our neighbour, we know he's like, you know, it's a family that they have like teenage ⁓ kids, but he's sort of like our, like, if we need help, we go to him. Like he's sort of like, most of the people

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:29:25)
Okay. Yeah.

Chloe (1:29:38)
own their units here. So ⁓ they all sort of know each other. And ⁓ in our apartment here, we have a real fireplace and one day it just started smoking. And so I ran over and was like, help! like, you know, can you tell me what I'm doing here. It's because people below us had a fire, like had a fire in there. And our thing wasn't shut like our floo. So but they're whatever it's called, like, you know. he was so nice and like, was just like, he would come over and like,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:29:49)
⁓

⁓ your flu, yeah.

Chloe (1:30:04)
He's like, do you want me to come check it? ⁓ so, you know, like we don't spend a lot of time with them, but I think like, especially when you're abroad, having like a few contacts that you like, know, people that if something were to happen, someone that you can go to. so that's been nice. And there's this like really cute little older couple that lives on the first floor. like, the guy is always out, I mean, they're probably in their 80s or 90s, but the man is like always in a little like...

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:30:08)
No.

⁓

Chloe (1:30:28)
dress shirt gardening outside and so like, you know, they'll they'll speak French but you know, we get like, always like, bonjour mademoiselle like, he's always like, or like, he always like calls me like, madame and like the kids mademoiselles so it was very cute. So they always try and you know, or like, you know, asking questions where the kids are going to school or you know, what are they doing? And where are going? So they're very sweet. They're like,

always like out in the Neighbourhood Watch. They're always like out on their balcony looking around or like sitting on the little, like in front of the building. I feel like they know what's going on. If you ever had questions about the neighbourhood, it'd be them. Yeah. Yeah. So that's nice.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:31:03)
Yeah. They know what's up. Yeah. Too funny.

Okay. Changing tracks a little. What are ⁓ one or 2 items that you always travel with or that when you've moved abroad, you're like, I've got to have this.

Chloe (1:31:18)
Mmm.

I feel like I'm not like that attached to that much. mean, obviously you bring your, know, your everyday items, your clothes, but ⁓ I think this time, like what was biggest is like we had certain things for our kids that we knew that like, you know, certain like blankets and stuffies and things that like felt like home for them. I think that was, you know, sort of when you're packing like.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:31:41)
Mm-hmm.

Chloe (1:31:46)
things that you bring in your carry on, right? you don't want to go missing. Because I think what a big move it was for them. Those are pieces that you wouldn't want to lose because it's a few pieces of there was things like that. Even ourselves, a few pictures or things that we brought from home, family pictures and things that we were able to put up.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:32:02)
Yeah.

Chloe (1:32:14)
you know, in our apartment here to feel a little bit like, you know, the kids are so young, they didn't really understand that first, like what was happening. We lived in a hotel for a month and and I would say to my daughter, like, we're going home. She's like, which home? you know, like, like we're going back to Canada, like we're going to the hotel, like, you know, so we like, now like, it's funny because here there's, we got blue couches. And so she was like, the home with the blue couches. We're like, yeah, that is our home for now, like for the next year, like that's where you, that's where you're coming to. And so, I mean, now she.

She obviously got used to being here, I think those, having some pictures and some of those items that of bridge the gap between, okay, wherever our family is and these little items, that's home right now. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:32:45)
Yeah!

Yeah. Yes. Yeah.

Yeah,

that's perfect. That's such a cute way of putting it too. I love that. The home with the blue couches. ⁓ that could be a children's book. Chloe, you should write a children's book this year. The home with the blue couches. ⁓ I love it. ⁓ Okay, so as a part of like a bonus for listeners, I'm putting together a travel playlist, ⁓ which is compiled of people's songs that either represent

Chloe (1:33:08)
I know! ⁓

Mmm.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:33:30)
the type of traveller that they are or that reminds them of a trip or a time abroad? Do you have one that stands out?

Chloe (1:33:41)
I'm trying to think of what that song was that we used to... What was the song was that we went on the road trip? Thrift Thriftstore remember that?

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:33:50)
my God, Thrift Store makes me think of you every time. I like...

Chloe (1:33:51)
And

Cecilia makes me think of you, of course.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:33:56)
⁓ dude. Okay. Heads up for anybody who does karaoke with Chloe because she may pick a song that you don't know and she'll have the time of her life, but you're standing up on stage without lyrics like I was. ⁓ my God. Yes, Cecilia is so true. I was wondering if you would mention as well. I don't know what her, the name of the artist is something like Lykke Li or something like that or Lykke Lykke Lee here or something. Do you know who I'm talking about?

Chloe (1:33:59)
Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:34:24)
Yeah. And she had that one song when we were Dublin that came in and came on in the clubs all the time. And for me, that's like a Dublin throwback every time, but Cecilia for sure. Or yeah, Thrift Shop Mumford. ⁓ my God.

Chloe (1:34:32)
Yeah, and Mumford and Sons was our time in... I think that's something I like, you

know, I was like, I don't know, that's something I'm ⁓ one of my favourite bands of all time, I think. And like, yeah, we were able to see them in Dublin. then, yeah, it's funny now because I like, I mostly listen to country music in Canada. And so I still do here, but it's not really part of the culture here. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:34:47)
Ugh. Most epic night.

Yeah,

yeah. ⁓ and there's another song too from your bachelorette. I don't know if that would be one for you as well. But remember we're Avery and then we were all doing that like you, me, Avery, Heather, like all trying to learn the dance. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Too funny. Okay, so we're gonna toss a bunch of songs in there for you then. Nice. Okay, we're gonna do a speed round and this will wrap things up for us.

Chloe (1:35:05)
Yeah, yeah, me forced, I think I forced it upon everyone, but yeah, yeah. ⁓

I doubt.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:35:26)
So in a word or a sentence, we'll look at you to answer these questions. Okay? All right. Where was your last trip?

Chloe (1:35:32)
Okay.

The Netherlands.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:35:41)
Where's your next trip?

Chloe (1:35:42)
Home, back to Canada.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:35:46)
What is your dream destination?

Chloe (1:35:49)
Mm. ⁓

Well, Iceland, I'm going back to Iceland in September.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:35:58)
You are no way. Oh, that's such a nice time to go. Oh, wait, is that for a wedding? Yeah. Oh, give her a big hug for me. That's so cool. What a perfect place to we'll get into that another time. OK, lovely. Do you prefer to see many places or to get to know one really well?

Chloe (1:36:00)
For a wedding? Yeah. Yeah, I will.

Hehehe

gets to know one really well. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:36:19)
Yeah, I thought you'd

say that. ⁓ Are you more of a bougie or a budget traveller?

Chloe (1:36:25)
Although my husband will probably roll his eyes about that now. ⁓

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:36:27)
I

love it. Guided tours or choose your own adventure.

Chloe (1:36:38)
Choose

your own adventure.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:36:41)
Mm-hmm. Would you prefer to explore the ocean or outer space?

Chloe (1:36:46)
Ocean.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:36:47)
Cool. I can see that with you for sure. ⁓ Favourite travel YouTuber, blogger, podcaster, whatever that you go to for your resources? No, you can't say that. I need to take this question now because it does sound like a you actually came up in, you've come up in 2 other podcasts. I don't know if you listened to the Guess Where Trips one at all, but we talked about you quite a bit ⁓ because you had...

Chloe (1:36:48)
you

Yes! You like?

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:37:14)
Yeah, no, you're very popular. Who was... ⁓ When you were planning your trip to Copenhagen, was it? There was a mom Instagrammer that you were telling me about, and the woman from Guess Where Trips, Jessica Off, is like best friends with her. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yeah. I didn't know if you'd end up saying that one. ⁓ And then, yeah. Yeah, and then...

Chloe (1:37:29)
⁓ Mini, was it Mini Mini Jetsetter? Yeah, yeah, yeah. yeah, yeah. She's good too. She's from Toronto.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:37:43)
Yeah. And then you also came up in Heather is on the podcast this season too. And so we, yeah, we talked about you lots on that one as well. I actually want to do a podcast episode with the 2 of you together.

Chloe (1:37:48)
you

⁓

god, we wouldn't get anything accomplished. No information.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:38:02)
Lots of laughs though. It'll be a happy episode.

Chloe (1:38:03)
Yeah. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:38:06)
All right, back to the speed round. Favourite mode of transportation?

Chloe (1:38:10)
Hmm, ⁓ train.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:38:13)
Cool. ⁓ Planned or spontaneous trips?

Are you an underpacker or overpacker?

Chloe (1:38:22)
⁓ overpacker.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:38:26)
I feel like that changes for people when they become parents. Yeah, uh-huh, uh-huh.

Chloe (1:38:27)
Yeah, like even we went away for the day on

Sunday and like Udit's like why are we bringing so much? I'm like we used it all. We had like my daughter like I had to change her outfit like it like we had they went through so many snacks like it's like you just have to bring a lot for kids. It makes it easier.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:38:35)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. ⁓ definitely. ⁓ Most overrated destination.

Chloe (1:38:48)
Mmm.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:38:55)
Most underrated destination.

Chloe (1:38:58)
Lisbon

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:38:59)
Okay, ⁓ what home comfort do you miss the most when you're away?

Chloe (1:39:06)
say Tim Hortons.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:39:10)
So funny, because when Heather's Instagram story came up from coming home, yeah, you saw it. It's like, way to be greeted by Tim Hortons. Yeah. Yeah. What's the best piece of travel advice you've received?

Chloe (1:39:12)
Yeah.

Yeah, I don't know, it's not even good coffee. It just feels like a whole lot.

that I've received.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:39:30)
Mm-hmm.

Chloe (1:39:37)
I there's like quote, like, go one place a year that you've never been or something. Like, I think always going to like, just even like, if it's not, you know, it doesn't have to be an international trip, but just like, go on some adventure, you know, I think is, it's nice to like, live by, you know, even as I think about going home, like, just, you know, make a point of trying to go somewhere, like, you know, even if it's a little road trip.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:39:42)
Hmm

Right.

Yeah.

Definitely. That's a great piece of advice. I love that. What's the worst piece of travel advice you've received?

Chloe (1:40:09)
⁓

I mean, I guess it's not really travel advice, like, you know, those like, ⁓ places you see on Instagram that like, look beautiful in a picture and are actually like horrible if you go there. I think, you know, people, you know, only going to those big, you know, Instagram spots is probably like, you're just not going to have a good time, like waiting in line for 2 hours to like take a picture. just, it can't be, you know, can't be worth it, I think.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:40:30)
Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. Ugh.

No, definitely not. Would you, okay, this will be interesting because again, things have changed now that you're a parent, but what's your preference between housesitting, couchsurfing, hostels, Airbnbs, hotels?

Chloe (1:40:52)
I think probably Airbnb's would be, I think the idea of Airbnb anyways, like having a kitchen and having, you know, some bedrooms and stuff. I think Airbnb is getting a little, you know, like the prices are close to hotels now, but and like the rules are getting a little out of hand. But so we do often stay like in mostly hotels now. in theory, I think I think like Airbnb is the best one. was

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:41:06)
my god, yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Chloe (1:41:18)
I used to Airbnb my house way back in the day and it was very like, you know, this is what it is. You know, like this is my stuff, my food's in the cupboard. Like it's like it was, know, what it was meant to be when it started there. But now, yeah, I feel like they're a little bit more, you know, too many rules.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:41:23)
It's very cozy!

Yeah. Yep. Yep. And crazy costs. That's a whole other conversation. Yeah. ⁓ window seat or aisle seat.

Chloe (1:41:38)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Hmm, depends. Window at night and aisle during the day.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:41:51)
⁓ yes, good call. Is that for sleeping like window at night? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Describe yourself as a traveller in 3 words.

Chloe (1:41:52)
Mm-hmm.

⁓

I think adventurous, ⁓ appreciative, I think.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:42:11)
Mm-hmm. That's such a good one.

Chloe (1:42:17)
like happy, happy to be in new places.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:42:24)
Cool, cool,

so apt. ⁓ What are 3 characteristics that make a good travel partner? Now that you have 3 of them.

Chloe (1:42:30)
Hmm. yeah.

Well, I think that you're similar-minded in what you want to do.

mean, our kids don't have much say in the matter, but I think like open to new experiences kind of. And flexible. Yeah, because, When you're travelling with multiple people, not everyone gets to do what they want to do, right?

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:42:47)
Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Have you?

Yeah. Have you ever had, this is not part of the speed round, but have you ever, and I always digress somehow, but ⁓ have you ever had like a group or a partner travel experience where it's just been a disaster because people just aren't aligned in what they wanna do or how they travel or things like that?

Chloe (1:43:06)
Mm-hmm

not really. I would say I haven't travelled in a lot of big groups for that reason. I think it's hard. Like, I think that's like sort of as a choice, you know, big girls trips where like, people are just not on the same page, you know, as people. Like, I mean, even you came to my bachelorette party, right? Like, think, or like giving people the freedom to like separate and do things, right? Like, it's like, if you want to like,

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:43:27)
Mm.

Yeah.

Right.

Chloe (1:43:46)
If you want to go here, if you want to do like a historical tour, if you want to go like day drinking, if you want to sleep in, like everyone do what they want, but like, we're not going to, like try and get everyone on the same page because then no one's going to be doing what they want. Right. So I think a lot of my trips have been, I mean, now with family, but previously were like one or 2 people where you know that you're sort of like-minded and like.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:43:52)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Right. Although I will say that trip we went on for your graduation when we went back to Dublin, that was such a fun trip. We went with your parents and then there was what 3 or 4 of us friends plus you. And I didn't really.

Chloe (1:44:17)
Mm-hmm.

Mm hmm. Yeah, 3 friends and

yeah, and then me. Yeah, 6 total.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:44:27)
Yeah.

Yeah. And I didn't really know your friends and I kind of knew your parents at that point. And that was such a fant- That was a fun trip. That was a great trip. Yeah.

Chloe (1:44:32)
Yeah, exactly. That was a great trip. Yeah. So I think people that are like just happy

to, you know, there's like the planners, like I think what was more us in that trip and then like people that are happy to go with the flow, right? And like, like it's okay to have different personalities as long as like, you know, no one's trying to force, you know, anything, something that's, that people don't want to do. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:44:44)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, so

true. Yeah, what's the best part of travel for you?

Chloe (1:44:58)
I think just seeing how other people live, yeah, gives you an appreciation for, you know, where we come from and, and, just for the world.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:45:01)
Mmm.

Yeah, and the worst part of travel?

Chloe (1:45:12)
Hmm.

I mean, it's expensive.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:45:18)
Yeah.

Chloe (1:45:20)
like, I mean, just delays, you know, things that don't go, don't go to plan, I think.

You know, difficult, I guess.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:45:27)
Yeah.

What's the best travel app for you that you go to?

Chloe (1:45:30)
I don't know that I really use that many. think like...

Yeah, I would say that I don't use a lot of travel apps other than like Google Maps.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:45:40)
Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

What about a favourite travel book or movie? And I want to say that like it doesn't have to do with travel. It could just be set in another place as well.

Chloe (1:45:50)
Hmm.

The first thing that came to my mind was like, Eat, Pray, Love. think that was like, you know, it was such a good like, I don't know, just like a woman like, you know, doing doing her own thing. I think that was like, I remember at the time thinking like, you could just move to Italy. Like, you know, it was that like dolce far niente like, you know, just like, like she goes and really like starts appreciating things. think, ⁓ you know, I'm sure there's a million, a million others. I mean, now there's so many like on Netflix, there's so many interesting like

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:45:58)
No.

Right.

Chloe (1:46:23)
documentaries on food or like, sort of get a snapshot of the, I think that's nice, like it gives you a snapshot of the culture that's not just like, a single post, you know, it's like a, like a little bit more, more, more in-depth. So I would say, probably, I don't watch too many things on Netflix. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:46:33)
rate.

Yeah.

Yeah,

And best gift for a traveller.

Chloe (1:46:45)
Mmm.

Hmm.

I mean, I've always liked the like, just having a notebook, a notebook to travel with, think, like, or I mean, even giving recommendations in a notebook, like, yeah. like, I'm not really much of like a journal writer, but having some, some history of like, okay, I this place on this, you know, you know, on this day or like, you know, here's where, here's where we stayed. always like have often.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:47:02)
Yeah.

Chloe (1:47:14)
know, taking notes in that way, like if people, you know, ask you about it years later, you sort of can pull it out and, you know, have those memories and then like the making scrapbooks out of them.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:47:15)
Yeah, document.

Yeah, so true. Well, you made it through the speed route. Good job.

Chloe (1:47:28)
I don't know if

I was speedy enough.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:47:33)
You were great. I took us off track more than you did. No,

that was awesome. Thank you so much for coming on the podcast. I selfishly, I was so looking forward to this because it meant that we got to chat and catch up. But I think that people will take a lot from your different experiences abroad over your life and moving abroad as a family and that you can do it and that, you know, so much is possible if you're interested in making it happen.

Chloe (1:47:40)
Happy truth.

Happy too. Saudade Yes, I know. my gosh. Yeah.

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:48:02)
Yeah, thank you very much for coming on. I appreciate you. I love you. I miss you. And we'll see you soon. Yeah.

Is there anything that you want to leave people with? Any thoughts or any ⁓ tips or anything like that?

Chloe (1:48:18)
No, I think just, you know, take the chance to go with you, you know, if you can, I think make a point to see cultures that are different than your own. ⁓

Tara (Travel With TMc) (1:48:29)
Yeah, awesome. Perfect. Well, have a great day. Hugs to your family over there and ⁓ enjoy Europe. We'll talk soon. Bye.

Chloe (1:48:30)
Hehehe.

Thank you. Yay! Bye!