Moving to Ireland

This is the story of how my wife and I moved from Brazil to Ireland in early 2022. It all happened because I accepted an offer to work in Dublin, a city where I lived years before when I was an exchange student.

I received the offer in August 2022. I had pretty good memories from Dublin and I was dreaming about how easy it would be to travel around Europe with my wife. So, I gladly accepted the offer.

A few months later, my wife and I got married. We got engaged in February 2020 and the plan was to have a traditional marriage with party, church, etc. But then, the pandemic started, we were too lazy to organize and think about the party, and we stopped thinking about it. But after our decision to go to Ireland, we decided that we should get married before the travel. So, we got married in October and celebrated it with our families in a fancy steak restaurant.

At that time, I was working as a Software Engineer but I was tired. The job was great, the team was great, everything was great. But I was craving for vacations and more free time. So, the idea of quitting my job was tempting.

But to work in Ireland, you need to wait for your Work Permit and, in the post-pandemic world, this was taking more time than usual. Also, although unlikely, there was always a chance of your permit being rejected. So, I was fighting against my desire to quit my job.

But my desire to have free time was stronger and I quit my job in early November. Two weeks later, my wife and I moved out from our rented apartment.

At that time, we thought that this was a good idea. We wanted to let everything prepared for our trip. So, moving out early was good. It would be one less thing to worry about. But, looking back, I don’t think this was a good idea.

The period between us moving out of our apartment and traveling to Ireland wasn’t very pleasant. I was constantly anxious about how long my Work Permit was taking and about the possibility of it getting rejected. I also learned that the nomad life isn’t for me. I got tired of having to move to a new Airbnb or hotel every two weeks. I also missed the comfort of a desk where I could work on my ideas. And a nice kitchen where I could make my meals instead of depending on food deliveries.

Finally, a few days before Christmas, I received my Work Permit. And, with that, I received the okay to buy our flight tickets (yeah, before that, every time someone asked us when we were moving, we had to say we didn’t know).

A few days after Christmas, I sold my car that had been with me since 2014.

We traveled to Ireland on the 11th of January 2022, I started my new job on January 24th, and I’ve been living here for over a year now.