EP 15 — Four Months of Belonging

Transcript

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Can you hear them? The birds. That's the sound of my garden here in Glenda Auckland, and it still surprises me that I get to call this place home. Welcome to Almost Local. I'm Maria, your host, and today I'm podcasting from Sunny, super warm Auckland, New Zealand. If you are new here, a warm welcome, almost local is a space where we talk about life abroad. The messy, beautiful, sometimes lonely, always transformative parts of building a home far from where you started. It's about connection, belonging, and the small stories that remind us we are not alone in figuring it all out. And today feels like the right moment to pause and reflect. Because it's been four months since we landed in New Zealand, four months of learning, wandering, and slowly finding my foot in again. Four months ago, I used to listen to the same birds through the phone. I was in the Netherlands talking to a friend who already lived here in New Zealand, and I remember feeling jealous. Not in a bad way of course, but in that deep, aching way when your heart misses a place you love. I could hear the birds through her window and thought One day I'll be there again. And now I am Same Birds, different chapter, and I wanted you to hear them too because they're part of why we chose this place. They remind me to slow down to notice, to be here. It's been four months since we landed, and those first weeks were chaos. The kind of chaos that's exciting and exhausting at the same time. So many unknowns. That constant whisper in my head. Was this the right decision? I was happy to be here, but everything felt uncertain. Even small things. Finding a car, a doctor, a favorite supermarket, felt like tiny battles. I'd catch myself wondering, when will this start to feel like home again? And then something changed. Not suddenly, but quietly. While the questions were still there, life began to take shape around them. I found a group. The Friday Circle. A small community of almost locals like me. We meet every third Friday of the month, and those gatherings have become a rhythm, a reminder that connection doesn't have to wait until you feel settled. Connection. It's what helps you get there. I also made new friends. One of them is Andrea. She's now not only a friend, we started doing small projects together, exploring new workshops about life abroad, reconnecting with what made us fall in love with New Zealand in the first place, and those shared moments. The laughter while we recorded new episodes. The creative energy, the way ideas flow They made this chapter feel real now it's November. And the sun has finally come back stronger than ever. The days are longer, the air feels lighter, and I can finally exhale. I go to the beach most days at lunch. I do yoga in the garden, and I let the birds soundtrack my mornings. These are small things, but they are the difference between living in a place and living with it. You can have all of this around you. The beauty, the warmth, the chance to enjoy, and you can still miss it if you don't pay attention. So I'm trying to notice to appreciate to actually be where my feet are. And with that awareness comes gratitude for the people who've. Being part of this transition. Friends who were waiting for us friends who helped move our things back in the Netherlands and now here when we arrived in New Zealand, those who welcomed us back with big smiles and open arms for the new faces, the ones who didn't know us before, but somehow make it feel like we've always been here. And also gratitude for community, for sunlight, for the rhythm of the waves and the sound of birds that I once missed so deeply. You know, when I think about these four months, it's not that everything suddenly made sense, it's that I stopped fighting the not knowing. Well, because basically there was much that I could do about it, right? I let it be uncertain, and in that space, I started to belong again. Sometimes belonging isn't about understanding everything. Sometimes it's about deciding to stay long enough to find beauty in what you don't yet understand. So maybe. This episode is my November gratitude note for the people, the places, and the sounds that hold us. If you're listening from somewhere new, maybe you've just moved or you're still figuring things out or thinking about your next chapter, your next move, I hope you take a moment to listen to the sounds around you, to the small joys. That remind you why you came and maybe ask yourself, who helped you settle? Who made your new place? Feel like home? Four months in, and I'm still learning, still adapting, but I can finally say I feel my feet on the ground. And. When I sit here in the garden with the sun on my face and the birds singing, I think this is it. This is what almost local feels like. Thank you for listening once again and for being part of this journey. Until next time, this is Maria Learning one small, beautiful sound at a time to feel almost local. And now I'm off to my morning coffee. Until next time.