Justin van der Westhuizen

Justin van der Westhuizen and his wife Natasha lives in the Netherlands since August 2021. Justin wrote something about his first impressions.

Justin, why did you emigrate to the Netherlands?
My wife and I are expecting a child and I did not feel that there was a future for my daughter in South Africa.

Can you tell us something how you do like the Netherlands?
We have thus far enjoyed our time here, although it is not a walk in the park. You feel very far from home and isolated since everyone around you is speaking a language you don’t understand. I know you can understand Dutch if someone speaks slowly and you are Afrikaans, but in reality the day to day Dutch people do not talk slow and clear. English is for the most part fine when you need to talk to anyone. When using public transport, you should prepare yourself for quite long travel time if you are not working close to where you are staying. There are many positives of course, with people going out of there way to try and make our transition as easy as possible. The community of South Africans living in Barneveld have gone above and beyond! A big difference is of course you feel a lot safer overall. The Netherlands is a beautiful country full of amazing foods and culture and we have enjoyed seeing the different towns.

Please tell us something about the projects you are currently working on.
I am currently working for a Christian ministry and it has been very enjoyable thus far. My colleagues are very welcoming and I am busy working on a new internal processes web app.

Did the process of emigration go smoothly?
For the most part everything went smoothly. If you use a third party company to help with all documentation need from the SA home affairs, then everything goes quite easy. Any issues we had was quickly resolved by the summit developers team, thus we have no complaints. Flying was no problem as long as you have your covid test at hand and we took the direct flight thus it was very simple.

Can you explain to the South Africans who are considering to go overseas how you did experience the support from us?
The support has been really good! They will always help wherever they can.