After nearly four years of retirement in the Philippines, a 71-year-old American decided it was time to move back to the United States and be closer to her family.
She thought she was going home. A few months later, she began wondering if she had made one of the biggest mistakes of her retirement.
She had missed familiar roads, American stores, cooler weather, old friends, and most of all, her daughter and grandchildren. But after rebuilding her life in America—renting an apartment, buying a car, and settling back into familiar routines—something didn’t feel the way she expected.
The America she remembered was still familiar.
But the life she remembered had moved on.
This is a first-person story about retirement, family, homesickness, loneliness, living abroad, and discovering that “home” can become more complicated after you’ve built a life somewhere else.
Was moving back to America the wrong decision? Or did she need to return before she could finally understand what she really wanted?
Watch until the end and tell us what you would have done.
Would you stay close to family in America, or return to the everyday life you had built in the Philippines?
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#Philippines #Retirement #livingabroad
Footage Attribution: Portions of the video footage used in this production are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license. The original footage has been edited, color graded, trimmed, or combined with additional footage, and paired with original narration and storytelling to create a new transformative work. Credit for all original creators is provided below in accordance with the CC BY license.
Video Credit: JAKOSALEM STREET, CEBU CITY, PHILIPPINES | WALKING TOUR by AJE VLOG TV
Channel: UCQu_JLV6QekOuVJeGyr7Pdg
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1oRoQc99S7w&t=1s
Video Credit: A.C. Cortez Avenue, Mandaue City to Plaza Indepedencia, Cebu City, Philippines by AJE VLOG TV
Channel: UCQu_JLV6QekOuVJeGyr7Pdg
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fF0uOJULOSE
Video Credit: SM SEASIDE CITY CEBU, CEBU CITY, PHILIPPINES I VIRTUAL WALK by AJE VLOG TV
Channel: UCQu_JLV6QekOuVJeGyr7Pdg
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t01UoGxwsW0
00:00 I Think I Made a Mistake
05:16 How I Ended Up in the Philippines
08:48 Four Years Later
15:24 I Decided to Go Home
20:09 America Felt Right—At First
21:43 Then Came an Ordinary Tuesday
29:18 My Daughter Asked Me This
34:58 What I Was Really Missing
37:10 A Six-Week Test
38:57 Back in the Philippines
45:50 The Decision After Six Weeks
49:18 Leaving America Again
53:35 What I Finally Learned
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