Why Singapore? UK to Singapore // Soon-to-be-Expats Discuss Reasons for Moving to Singapore
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- čas přidán 6. 09. 2024
- We are due to be moving from the UK to Singapore in July 2020 and so many people have asked us: Why Singapore? So in this vlog, we discuss our reasons for choosing Singapore as our new home and we hope this helps you if you are looking to move East too!
Read our blog on how the Coronavirus has impacted our move: wonderlust.click
Instagram: @wonderlustvlog
Extra footage from our own video library.
#expats #uktosingapore #familytravel #relocation
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Welcome home bro...we need every single born/bred Singaporean back...too few of us.
Thank you! It’s good to be back 😊
But definitely he’s not singapore bred. He doesn’t have singapore accent. Haha
Singapore is really awesome! I was born in Singapore and moved to the US for school and work...miss that city a ton! Remember to go to the hawker centers!!!
Nice one Jay! We LOVE the hawkers!!
nice name
Wonderlust? Thanks 😊 We chose it because we want to actively look for the wonder and positivity in every day life 😁
Welcome home. Enjoy the stay!
Thank you so much Clifford! 😁
It seems that you folks are actually a lot happier living in Singapore than a whole lot of Singaporeans
Oh that’s an interesting observation. I think it can happen any where. There are lots of places in the UK we didn’t go to or see, I guess I thought we’d always ‘go there someday’ trying to get as much out of living here and letting our kids see all of singapore. Thanks for dropping us a comment.
Nice !! Welcome 🙏🏻 to Singapore!
Myself Balinese British...based in Singapore and PR right Now 😁
Nice! Thank you for taking time to comment 😊
thanks for loving singapore.singapore was founded by british.once a british colony.u guys should be feeling home here as singapore and uk is one family.
Thanks 😊 UK and Singapore are very different but we love living in Singapore and totally embrace the culture! 🥰
You are quite a prolific blogger. Thank you for sharing your lives and perspectives with us.
Thank you so much 😊 Thanks for watching our first ever video too!
Singapore is just the best place ever
We think so! Haha! 😊
Welcome Home , Singapore is your home 🏘️
Thank you 😊
Safe, so nice people, great education, clean city, but one thing I don't like is always hot! no snow! ...an expat from Tokyo.
Hello! Thanks so much for messaging us! We have noticed the same - LOVELY people.
Always hot, no snow? Ok, we'll fix that too
Welcome to Red Dot, you have made the right choice. It is safe, green and refreshing. You will be bowl over by the wide variety of food different culture and languages we speak especially Singlish. If you need help, just shout.
Word of advice for this month till 16 Sep (Ghost month) , anything you see on the roadside where there are joss stick, candle and paper burning, take a detour, Never cross over and do not say anything as you walk past.
Take care, have fun and be Cool :)
Hello William! Thank you so much for taking time to drop us a message. Thank you also for the advice on Hungry Ghost - we are aware of the traditions, but your advice is super welcome! Thank you again!!
I am a high school teacher in NYC and considering applying to work at International Schools in Singapore in the future. I would be very interested to hear what it's like working at an international school in Singapore!
Hi Rachel! Please drop us a message at our Instagram, @wonderlustvlog and we’ll let you know!
You will love to teach in Sg. Students here are very respectful toward teachers....
@@francesmatthews8753 yes, sure🥰🥰🥰
You will love the weather(sunny) all year round😄😁, experience the cultures, u will love the varieties of food and many much more.
Welcome anytime🤗🤗🤗
Welcome back to Singapore
Thank you!
Good place but of course some negatives: bit small so few places to unwind, many rules enforced strictly, press is rigidly managed. But despite these still a top choice to live in.
Yes, always positives and negatives, but in our opinion, the positives far outweighs the negatives here! Thank you for watching!
Singapore is a good country to stay for retirement.Our primary to Uni education is very good . England is very expensive to live til old age although food and buying property is cheaper than here. Good choice to come back .
Hi Audrey! Thanks so much for commenting! Jonty’s grandparents are in retirement and are being SO well looked after and the honouring culture means local people really take care of them when they are out and about too. 😊
Singapore is a good place to make money but never good for retirement. You can see more old people working in sg than in shanghai. Most of the old people in shanghai are traveling or dancing in the garden. Haha
@@wisetour4ever Because the old people here dont like to dance and exercising.
😁😁😄 perhaps, they also like working to keep their minds clearer n thats what they enjoy doing.
Some tai tai goes high tea but u cant go everyday.
If Singapore weather is coooler, one might see many older people hanging out in the park.
Mate, the famous Zion Road Char just Throw hawker is back after reno. Give it a 'Die Die must try'. Dig in Mate!
Ah thank you for the recommendation!
Lovely vlog guys, can't wait to have Jhonty on my show soon :)
Thanks! He’s looking forward to it!
Lovely. Keep shining.
Ah thank you! 😊😊
The HDB flats are really good. One of the good options if u quality for it.
Yeah we’ve seen some lovely HDB’s! Very happy with where we have now. Thanks for watching.
Great place lived there before, but housing is hellish expensive .
Yes, land is a premium!
brain plumber Great way to rebute these toxic whiners in Singapore. Never really thought abt the 4cents/mth per citizen.... I've lived in Indonesia, China & the US to know what good/bad governance can results in.
Your Grandparents will be thrilled..
Yes, very happy! And we were able to celebrate Grandma’s 91st Birthday together this week!
@@WONDERLUSTworld hi Jonty. Love your videos. I show them to my history students in school (local government school) who learn Singapore history. Many thanks. I may be way wrong on this - and if i am, just ignore it - but is your grandfather one of Harry, Charlie or Robert Tan? He just looks so familiar.....
Hello! Sorry for such a slow reply - YES!! Grandpa was indeed the 3rd brother. How do you know them?!!!
Welcome to Singapore! I'm a born and bred Singaporean. :)
Oh wow! A very old video now 😂 Thank you 😊 I’m glad to be home in Singapore 🇸🇬
@@WONDERLUSTworld I just found your channel lol!! I have been researching on ang kor wat as we are heading there in a few weeks. Your channel is awesome. 🙏👍
Greetings from a fellow CZcamsr. Though my channel is a chaotic mess.
Thank you so much! Will check out your channel 😊
I would fully recommend our guide, Samuth, for your travels. He is seriously good.
Both of you are fortunate
Very - and very grateful too 😊 It’s amazing to look back on the anticipation of moving out here and now living here for nearly 4 years! 😱
I got American friends here who just don't go back anymore ! 👌
Wow - Singapore is a special place for sure!
Hey... Great vid. I'm looking to move to Singapore too in the future. Could you do a video on how to find full time accomadation for me my wife and 2 kids? And other options if i can get some sort of packages and also about tips how to find work! Thanks (i have a degree if that helps) cheers!
Hi Mohib! Absolutely! We have planned to do one of these once we are in our apartment (in about 3 weeks!) thanks for posting!
@@WONDERLUSTworld thank you much appreciated
Our experience is of a welcoming and genuine country. I’m sorry to hear this..
@Tan Tan
Lol,you can choose to hide inside your pigeon hole
@Tan Tan
And you are telling others not to come because blah blah blah?
Contradicting from your statement?
Isn't they have a choice to choose?
Lol
As if they come,you lose part of your body parts 🤣🤣
Do you need to do service in Singapore Arm force when you apply for Singapore Citizenship. ??
Hey - not entirely sure but its not something we are looking into at the moment.
Best of luck!
Thank you 😊
just to remind that singapore has a 3 race which is chinese, indian and malay. so don tell people around the world that singapore is china because people always misunderstand about that
Thanks - we do, don’t worry! And all the sub cultures too, Peranakan, Teochew etc!
@@WONDERLUSTworld yup 😀✌
Welcome home!
Thank you! It’s great to be back 😁❤️🇸🇬
Don't be too bothered by those envious s'porean males commenting here especially who even claim they are dad(s) with the kind of off-putting attitudes they have🤦, when if they are so unhappy here, they can always choose to migrate to their ideal destination but I bet they won't even dare entertain that option themselves.
That being said, there are both good and bad sides to living here as with every other country. It can be hella stressful living here not gonna lie at least from my own personal experience especially due to the faster pace of life but I think it's also a matter of not thinking too much of only the negativity and focusing more on the positives like there is a very low likelihood of any major natural disaster like earthquakes ever disrupting life here. And then the variety of food here, but I mostly like to prepare my own food at home vs eating out, so it all comes down to personal preference and motivation too lol. There's also a Marks n' Spencer british chain of supermarkets (among other supermarket chains here), not sure if your family has tried shopping there. I sometimes window-shop there when I go down to Raffles City, but mostly I tend to frequent 'The Marketplace' supermarket there to get the groceries that the local NTUCs supermarket branch here might not sell.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. Every country and person will have positives and negatives to a particular country. But as you say looking for the good and choosing where to shop and how to live makes a difference. It can seem quite fast paced here, I see our friends who work long hours but lots of them also make specific down time in their weeks.
We don’t shop in marks and spencer as the prices are very high compared to the UK one, which I didn’t shop at either 😆 we prefer to eat and shop local and when we cook at home we cook more local too. We find it saves money too shopping local and at markets.
How was it during covid in Singapore? Many “expats “ complained a lot about covid times in sg.
Hello, we arrived in SG after their lock down so can’t comment on how that was. We did a lockdown in the UK though before we flew here. We feel singapore has been right to be cautious with opening things slowly. Sure things have been frustrating at times but now being on the other side where many, if not most of the previous restrictions have been lifted, we can see why things were how they were. 😊
Welcome back home, we need good foreigners like you couple and not those who come here for a free ride
Thank you 😊
So since u born in Singapore, are you still considered Expatriate?🤔
I became a British citizen at age 12, so officially - yes. I’d say my passport is UK and my heart is SG!
@@WONDERLUSTworld best of both world. When people "hate" expatriate. You tell them u are local. 😆
I find it fascinating that some Singaporean, like your parent, wanted to move to UK for better life yet you move to back here. 🙄
Do call Joyce 86865618 if you need sg property advice. She been a agent for years. 😊
It was the best option for them at the time and our best option now. No need to overthink it. They are proud of their roots. 😊👍🏼
Just curious, u were allowed to renounce ur singapore citizenship at 21 years old without serving national service?
Hi Jo Lim. Jonty renounced as a child, through his parents, at 12 years old. At 21 (already British and no longer Singaporean by passport) he signed a release form as an adult.
thanks for choosing singapore!
Ahh that’s so nice!! Thank you 😊
Welcome back! Home (singapore) is where you belong!
Thank you DC! It sure feels like it!!
Did you do National Service in Singapore?
No, I moved to the UK as a child and became a British citizen at 12 years old - thank you for asking 😁
I met a Christmas Island Born Singaporean. Due to the historical reasons then the British Colonial Gov transferred the island ownership to Australia. She moved to Australia and relocated later to Singapore. haha... somehow she is connected to here in a strange way?
Is she connected to us?? I’m not sure who that is?
Singapore is awesome :)
Have you been? What’s good there?
@@WONDERLUSTworld
Everything is under control in Singapore.
Single-digit community spread for COVID-19
It is all good :)
Take good care and stay safe :)
@@ThewayforwardSG Thank you so much!
@@WONDERLUSTworld
You are most welcome. Take good care and stay safe :)
Singapore is good but for a foreigner to get a pr or citizen its harder. In Singapore you can get lot of foods to eat from all countries, but for kids there is no free education & buying a house or car is expensive. But if your wife is bsc nurse & she get a job in uk , education is free for kids , then buying a house or a car in uk is very less amount money you have to pay .I think uk is 100 % better than Singapore. Even if you want to cancel your citizen in Singapore & you sell your house you will get only 75% of the money . That's the difference between Singapore & uk 😆👍
True, education is free in the UK (with options of private education if you wish), but money isn't everything. I don't think it's healthy to play off one country vs another in terms of what is better or worse - it is easy to always find fault. WONDERLUST is about find the good and the wonder wherever we are! Thank you so much for watching and commenting! I hope you see the wonder in our videos :)
@@WONDERLUSTworld The future is in Asia. If you are willing, enrol your children in local schools and pick up Chinese as a language; a language as beautiful if not more so than European languages. It will be the right choice. Welcome...
Hi JC! Thanks so much for taking the time to comment! Our kids are indeed learning mandarin and we hope to learn some from them too! They have lessons every day 🙂
@@WONDERLUSTworld Nice...
Not to rush but an off branch of Mandarin are the dialects. Do you know which dialect group/s your parents hail from ? FYI... Mandarin is but one of the many dialects in China. As understood when it was put to a vote as to which dialect will become the defacto language to unite the whole of China - Mandarin had beaten Cantonese by 1 vote....
Just like the UK that is choke full of dialects, so is the Chinese culture. Its the rhymes that each dialect brings that makes it unique. It is also precisely the unique-ness that each dialect possesses that makes it endearing... I truly wish your children will grow up to benefit the best of both worlds...
Ask around and you will be surprised (pleasantly i hope) how each dialect choose to pronounce "lizard"...the most elegant sounding being...teochew...
No worries and no rush, there is plenty of time for all these ....All the best .
Thank you! Jonty’s parents are Teochew and Peranakan 😊
Singaporean parents generally do not see the importance of having their kids regularly play outdoors......
We have noticed that - definitely in comparison to the U.K., but the many play parks are regularly filled with kids, so I guess it’s changing!
nice i didnt know u could give up singapore citizenship to skip national service, then come back to apply for citzenship again
Thanks for commenting. I feel you have a very wrong opinion of my reasons behind giving up citizenship. I would like to help you understand, if you would like to know the truth. I was born here in Singapore and my parents moved to the U.K. for studies when I was very young. They found work in the U.K. and, eventually, the new life abroad made them believe they would not return back to SG to live. So we became British citizens. Singapore did not allow dual citizenship so we needed to renounce. Britain treated us well and continues to. But my parents brought us up with many of the wonderful values of Singapore and this never left me. As an adult (actually in my late 20s), I returned to Singapore and fell in love with it. My wife who is English also loves it here. We have no plans to apply for citizenship as we are unsure how long we will be here. But we choose to enjoy every day and to love our lives wherever we are. We happen to be loving life here now 😊 sorry for the long response but your comment suggested a dishonest reason for my departure as a 2 year old and my return as an adult and I feel honesty is the best policy. I hope this helps and I would humbly ask you to reconsider your opinion, now that you have a few facts. Thank you for taking time to comment and for watching our journey so far. 🙂
Thank you for the welcome. With respect, my parents reasons for moving to the U.K. was not to do with them being unhappy here at all. My dad chose a line of study that was rare here back then - mainly due to Singapore’s size. They came back to live here about 7 years ago. I appreciate your opinions but please don’t make assumptions. Take care 👍🏼😊
Gen Info You don't even know why his parents left Singapore. Stop being a whiner.... Singapore will have a great future without citizens like you.
@@WONDERLUSTworld what a classy response to a crass question, kudos
Are you planning to do
Your duty for Singapore
National Service
Hi Brendan! Jonty is no longer a Singapore citizen and so is unable to do National Service. Thanks for asking and watching!
Wow.. Best for your stay ..here
Welcome to Singapore
Guys
Thank you! 😊
@@WONDERLUSTworld this is the reason why my boss came back in Ireland because of a national service since they are PR for a very long year's yet they decided to comeback for good. Yet Singapore is awesome place compare here in island. It's hardly difficult because of the transportation is not accessible shop is not convenient, mall is far if thier is, is not the same as Singapore. I miss Singapore and the food. I'm looking forward to visit Singapore .
Why do you call yourself "expats" ?
Hi avoca8! It’s what we’ve been referred to... I guess it’s a phrase of association and indentification... rather than identity! Heheh.
unless you like crowed place and indoor activities and expensive, dont move to SG.....trust me lived there over 10 plus years.
Hi Karl - we are in Singapore now and having a wonderful time. Thanks for taking time to comment.
Love safety in Sg....
huge mistake moving to sg as you will eventually realize. I won't say why. you be OK when young but hit age 45 as expats you will be done. I hope you have an exit route. sounds like you have UK property and are expat mindset so might be OK. everyone needs exit strategy from Asia.
I’d be interested to hear your reasons. Two and a half years on and we’re very happy living in Singapore. Perhaps if you have time you can catch our other videos and see what it is we love about Singapore so much.
Our long term plan is to stay here actually. We feel very much at home here. We’re saving our finances wisely and preparing for the future and taking into account rising costs etc The UK has also had prices increased for fuel and rising housing bills. Each country has its issues I guess but we’re loving what Singapore offers us.
sure just discovered your channel.. I've been sg 25 years. I agree it's so exciting initially. Having kids is good. many good things including the stability and even government policies.
But... eventually you will become irrelevant in SG due to age and culture and skills as new cheaper migrant talents is the only constant. The only survival is self employment eventually. Aging family is another thing if one has them overseas.
more trivial you might tire of the food if one likes western as I've done and miss the fantastic produce in UK.
The big one though is freedoms of thought and actions one has to assimilate totally to survive and finding like minded people can be hard if one values the freedoms in the west and having and expressing opinions. You will find you either embraces it or reject it.
And the costs are stupidly high for basics, much like London so one will have to find a way to halve expenses at times of no income. There is no social support or financial support from the govt it's via not for profits. And whatever happens don't go near the mental health or court system. It's backward thanks to societal ignorance and women's charter. Things are changing slowly eg 377a repeal but then...
Economic viability is also tied to social standing and your job, the city is about jobs, making money and greed. Then comes church for networking and then comes family. Could be worse of course but life is more than work? Infact the inefficiencies of UK is one of its benefits people have interests and hobbies.
It's a deeply Asian city on the inside with a western facade meaning hugely conservative, religious, traditional majority and sentiment pretty much like the 1950s mindset on many moral and societal issues. Even thought English is the local language thanks to a lot of foresight the only deeper way to connect with people is via other languages, so one has to either embrsce it or not.
That said the youth are hope and things will change in terms of loosening centralized control of people's lives, as the old guard moved on.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
no problem and we are also effected by our life circumstances yeah so environment is one factor. If you can sort out the big issues and plan ahead many of pitfalls can be avoided.
Things have improved over the last decade in many of the areas I mentioned. aive had a rough ride.
But still employment and economic viability might be an issue as anywhere jsut there is no safety net.
Freedoms of speech the other, but if you were brought up in SG you know how to not rock the boat.
Social normals and sentiment change with new generations.
This guy is showing SG youth how to siam National Service. If you are Singaporean male 12 yrs old or younger, pls ask video creator how to go about getting foreign citizenship.
Then come back around his age no need serve 2yrs + 10 cycles reservist! Shiok!
Hi Boss, thank you for commenting. At 2 years old, it was not my choice to leave Singapore. It was just my choice to return here to work. There was no deliberate move to siam NS - and we wouldn’t encourage this either. Thanks for watching 🙂
@WONDERLUST
On behalf of Singaporeans, I apologise for the twats who don't think before they speak.
I am a Singaporean living in the UK who loves home!
Welcome to Singapore and hope you enjoy life there!
P.S. Does that mean you left your parents behind in Blighty lol?
Thanks Gwen, they all have their reasons 😊 Yes, parents are back in the U.K.!
@@GwenL You didn't even serve the country as I have, and have left the country you supposedly love. Why hijack my comment and insult me?
As a soon to be Singaporean father, OP's video has given me hope that my future son may not need to serve NS if I follow as his parents did. What's wrong with that...
@brain plumber I'm just stating my views on NS. I proudly served NS and have a few more cycles left. I just want my future son to have a choice on NS.
No need to smear young people or get political Uncle. Hope we can have nice clean debate without all that. I work 2 jobs all day, 7 days a week, i work hard to provide for my family. I don't think I am pretentious and rude.