This is why expats in the Netherlands never learn Dutch even after years of living there. I know of people who lived in Amsterdam for 10 years and still don’t know any Dutch beyond “Hoe gaat het? Één stroopwafel alsjeblieft” the worst thing is that their kids who have spent most of their lives in the Netherlands don’t speak a lick of Dutch either, because these elitists send their kids to international school.

[–] GregorGizeh@lemmy.zip 17 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

I hate the term expat. It’s completely made up to not be grouped with the not white immigrants. It also goes with the condescending attitude of not really wanting to integrate with their new country, such as your international school and not learning the language examples.

[–] fristislurper@feddit.nl 5 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I think it has its place. There is a clear difference between someone coming to a country for a limited time to do some specialized work with the intention of leaving, compared to someone who has little or no intention of ever returning to their country of origin. Both categories are incompareble in the type of support they need (or want), where they live, whether they need to learn the language, etc. Just ignoring the difference is a bit silly.

Although I agree the term is misused sometimes.

[–] ikka@lemmy.sdf.org 7 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionals-network/2015/mar/13/white-people-expats-immigrants-migration

There is definitely a distinction between expatriate and immigrant, but I have very very rarely seen it used properly. As the previous poster wrote, it really does feel like the main difference between an expat and an immigrant, colloquially, is the color of skin.

[–] AI_toothbrush@lemmy.zip 6 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Lol what? In sweden for example i go to an international school because i dont speak swedish. And when i want to learn it they tell me that i cant attend the lessons because i cant speak swedish. When i try to speak to someone in swedish they notice that im making mistakes and automatically switch to english without even asking me. Its not the immigrants its the native speakers who have an attitude.

[–] kungen@feddit.nu 5 points 3 months ago (1 children)

when i want to learn it they tell me that i cant attend the lessons because i cant speak swedish

What courses exactly? What's your knowledge level? Because you won't be able to join SAS (svenska som andraspråk) classes until you have a good basic comprehension from for example SFI (svenska för invandrare). Depending on your age, your town should have Komvux (adult education) classes for both SFI and SAS.

[–] Successful_Try543@feddit.de 1 points 3 months ago

Or maybe some organisation offers a språkfika.

[–] crispy_kilt@feddit.de 6 points 3 months ago (1 children)

expats

You mean immigrants?

[–] uis@lemm.ee 1 points 3 months ago

Somewhere's emmigrants

[–] ikka@lemmy.sdf.org 3 points 3 months ago

NotJustBikes moment