[jacquesm]

What countries are you from originally?

Plan a holiday to the US, look things over and then make a budget (emigration is far from cheap), save and then decide to back out or bite the bullet. Don't do anything permanent until your visa is in the bag for you, your spouse and your child. Hollywood and anecdotes are not good inputs to a life determining decision like this, consider it a huge project and devote resources accordingly.

Why is Belgium disappointing you?

The US is definitely not paradise but it may give you chances that are hard to replicate elsewhere. At the same time, I know plenty of people that are successful in the EU. It usually boils down to the people, not the place.

[gcp]

Why is Belgium disappointing you?

Well, given that his wife longs for "finally have some sunshine, lots of affordable fresh food, perhaps live in a house with garden, beautiful nature close enough to actually go camping for the weekends, and friendly and approachable people."

I'm going to guess: high housing prices, population density killing nature & unfriendly people. Given that this is HN, I'd add "government and population actively hostile to entrepreneurship" on top of it.

You should talk to other people who emigrated, though. One of my friends did, and they found for example that they could hardly afford child daycare because that isn't subsidized in the States, unlike Belgium. There are probably multiple such small surprises lurking.

[jacquesm]

When I read that I thought: South of France, Spain, Portugal, Italy. Any one of those would solve the majority of those wishes, and would be a lot easier to get into than the US.

The problem is that no country is perfect. You can't get 'free daycare', 'good weather', 'affordable fresh food', 'beautiful nature close by', 'free healthcare', 'friendly and approachable people', '5 weeks of holiday' and 'free education' all in one serving. (Though I believe strongly that friendly and approachable people can be found anywhere, it's a bit of a reflection on how you are usually.)

I say that as someone that has lived in a lot of different countries. (.nl, .pl, .ca, .ro and a bunch of others besides but too short to consider relevant in this context).

[Morgawr]

>You can't get 'free daycare', 'good weather', 'affordable fresh food', 'beautiful nature close by', 'free healthcare', 'friendly and approachable people', '5 weeks of holiday' and 'free education' all in one serving.

I agree with your general statement but this description actually fits a big chunk of Italy. It's ironic, I don't like my native country (Italy) and I'm an expatriate and yet I can realize how awesome it might sound to people not from it. The description fits everything you're going to find in Italy. However there are huge downsides, mainly the corruption, government, economy, large taxation for small businesses, very backwards tech (especially IT) industry.

If one can get a remote well-paying job, Italy is probably one of the best options to go for that. Downside: the language, Italians are very proud of their language and most of them have a hard time speaking English.

[BSousa]

South of Portugal and Spain fit most if not all of that, except jobs. In Portugal there are some dev jobs in Faro (but then you have either a long commute or live in an apartment in the city and pay is quite low to be a one provider kind of family) and in Spain Malaga does have good dev jobs around (not sure about Java but iOS/Ruby can get a decent salary there) and there are some places around that fit the bill that are within commuting distance to Malaga companies.

For better pay, there is Gibraltar and living in the South side of Spain. Sometimes you have to endure a long border cross, but the pay in Gib compared to cost of living in Spain may be worth it (and there are a few well paid of java/php jobs in Gibraltar in the betting companies)

If you want more info about the area, companies or plan/think moving here, shoot me an email (profile).

[jacquesm]

The good bit for the OP is that he might be able to work remote, and spend local. That's the best of both worlds.

[BSousa]

I agree that would be ideal, but having been through a kind of similar search myself recently, I didn't see many java remote jobs available (a lot of ruby ones), and getting one is hard (unless you are an outstanding well-known candidate, you are competing with the whole world for a remote job, and in most cases, you will get someone from eastern europe or phillipines that is as talented as you, but requiring half of what you require (living in Belgium or event Portugal or Spain).

[danmaz74]

I lived three years in Sardinia and it is almost perfect in those respect, if you don't have to worry about finding a job locally. And it also has very cheap flights with the UK.

[gcp]

I think you mainly missed "good local job market" in the can't have it all list, otherwise I agree that much of southern Europe qualifies.

[danmaz74]

There are many southern EU countries where he would get all those things (sunshine, fresh vegetables, cheap housing, beautiful nature) without having to worry about immigration. I think he could look for a remote job from the UK - should be easy already having connections there - and then move to Southern EU.

[mhurron]

> high housing prices

Yet they want to move to California.

http://www.hsh.com/finance/mortgage/salary-home-buying-25-ci...

I'm in the process of buying a house and am very glad I am not in California.

[larrybolt]

I'm still a student myself, but from the things I've heard and seen about the startup scene here, in Belgium, it's not that big as in the states.

It also seems that education is payed a lot more attention to than some other countries. Don't get me wrong, I understand the value of having a good education, but in the tech-world I cannot believe a certificate/diploma is worth more than visible passion and experience.

[showsover]

I'm from Belgium as well, and in the 3 years I'm working, I've worked for 2 startups, both in Ghent. There are quite a few startups here in this city, and it's not the biggest city in Belgium as well.

My education was a footnote on my CV, a good starter for the talk with recruiters. They generally know you know 'nothing' when you're fresh from school, so they have their expectations set accordingly.

[gcp]

I think your idea of what a "healthy start-up scene" is, is probably lacking quite some perspective. I don't want to write a political essay here, but generally speaking, Belgian law & regulations, infrastructure, politics, language barriers and the size of the country and distribution market are an extremely hostile environment for entrepreneurship, compared to say London or San Francisco.

This doesn't mean some people aren't trying anyway :)

[larrybolt]

This is a very good description, thanks! I reference this quite often lately to people asking about how it's over here.