Why We Left the USA After 7 Months of Living — Personal Experience

Cool business opportunities and, at the same time, the habit of living on credit; smiles, which often hide hypocrisy; fast food propaganda and cheap cars — Karina Kirillova tells how she and her family moved to the USA and then returned.

The world has been largely deceived by the “warm-up” for moving to the USA.

— My name is Karina Kirillova. I am 31 years old. I'm married, and we have three children. By education, I have a bachelor's degree in theology, which I studied at the Minsk Theological Institute. I am professionally engaged in marketing, targeted advertising, and promotion on Facebook. I have my own school and already have more than a thousand students who have successfully completed their studies and work as freelancers.

In 2020, we decided to move to Poland, where we lived for two years, and then we had the opportunity to fly to America. Since this was my husband’s dream, we went to another location.

— The migration process was quite easy for us: for the first time in our lives, we applied for American visas and received them as a family.

In general, renting a home in the USA for the first time is quite difficult due to the lack of similar experience, taxpayer number, and so on — you need to count on frequent refusals. Therefore, we, as people already experienced in moving, began to look for options in advance — about three months before this significant event. We found and rented a house of 1800 sq. ft. (unfurnished) for $2,260 per month.

However, one more nuance arose: due to the lack of a credit history, we needed to pay 8 months in advance, so the amount was immediately impressive — about $17,000. Also, if you have animals, you need to pay an additional deposit of about one monthly payment in case of any damage upon eviction.

In general, if you compare the cost of living in the USA and Poland, you can safely multiply all amounts by four. This applies to everything, from food to clothing. We often noticed that the price is the same, but here in zlotys and there in dollars. For example, in Poland, we can go to lunch for 100 zlotys (~$25) for two, but in America, it would be 80–100 dollars.

Of course, we know that some people move here without any money at all and somehow survive, but if you want to move and maintain the standard of living to which you are accustomed, it is very expensive. Some have to sell apartments in their previous place of residence in order to afford such a more or less comfortable move. For us, finances were never a problem, so perhaps we immediately saw a completely different America.

So, in June 2023, we flew from Poland to America, namely South Carolina. We quite quickly realized that America is not the limit of our dreams and that the world was largely deceived by the “warm-up” for moving to this country. Most of our friends dream of leaving there, but cannot due to accumulated loans and other circumstances. We are in no way dissuading anyone, and we know that many people really like it here, we just want to share our opinion.

But before we talk about the reasons for our return to Poland, we want to talk about the advantages of living in the USA, which are also certainly enough.

• Roads. We drove around the entire coast from Florida to New York several times, visited many states, and I would like to say that the roads (at least those connecting the cities) are very steep. It feels like a runway. Thanks to this, cars last much longer and wear out less.
• Cheap cars, especially European ones. This is due to the fact that domestic cars are more valued here. Therefore, by buying BMW, Mercedes, etc. here, you can save a lot.
• The climate varies throughout the country, from very hot to very cold. Mountains, ocean, rivers, lakes — everything is at your disposal.
• Opportunity to earn more. Many, for example, working for hire in their country, received $500, but here, with the same efforts, they can already earn $5000. Accordingly, you can get your first loan for your own home quite quickly.
• Smiling and friendliness. Although often this is simply hypocrisy. The fact is that during the Great Depression in the United States, there was an unspoken law that people should smile at each other, even if they feel bad. That is, they were forced to be happy, while in fact they may not have experienced such feelings.
• Love for the holidays. I loved the American approach to holidays — it's such a huge part of the local culture. For them, holidays are a real joy of life, during which they decorate houses, streets, and establishments in a very cool way. In such scenery, you feel like you are in a fairy tale.
• Cleanliness in good villages. Our place was always clean: perfect lawn, even grass, and clean asphalt. And this also applies to the house itself. That is, the amount of garbage, dirt, sand, and dust that I could collect in America during cleaning in a month, I collect in Poland in three days. I don't know what this is connected to. Perhaps because in America, in principle, there are few areas with open ground, and basically everything is sown with grass of very high quality. But this, of course, does not apply to establishments, the inside of which is almost always dirty.
• Cool opportunities for business and making money. There are different forms of ownership and accounting, which allows people to quickly build a profitable model for any business. That is why one of our goals was to open a business in the USA. We opened a company there remotely back in Europe — by the way, anyone can do this, nothing is impossible.

So yes, there are definitely things we liked, but they absolutely did not outweigh all the negatives.

The reasons why we left America and could not live there

— We left the USA after 7 months of living there. And that's why:

• Insecurity and child theft. There are a lot of disadvantaged people around, even though we lived in a very expensive area. Here, you literally cannot take your eyes off the child. You constantly receive notifications on your phone about thefts of children in the area - you are simply in constant worry about them. Plus, due to the lack of public transport, you have to constantly be a taxi driver for your children; and even in cities where there is public transport, no one would even think of sending a child on it, because it is dangerous.
• High loyalty to the use of prohibited substances. It makes you wonder repeatedly if this is the place to live. Especially when there are children.
• Gender education. We, of course, have heard about a lot of things, but you start to think seriously when you come across something like this personally. Of course, the situation varies from state to state, but even living in a conservative Republican state, you have to choose a private or Christian school for your children if you don’t want them to be told that they can be anything regardless of their gender — girl, boy, or even a cat. We have friends from democratic states who tell us that they put a cat litter box in school toilets and say that if you consider yourself a cat or a dog, you can come up and relieve yourself without any problems; and during lessons they are allowed to lick their paws — this is normal because they consider themselves a cat. Also, every day you can hear news like “the teacher wrote an official letter to all parents that now she is not a woman, but a man, and asks to call her from now on Mr. ...”
• Low level of service. 90% of establishments are dirty, shoes stick to the floor, as if cola had recently been spilled on it. We have been to many establishments and more than one state. And even in very expensive establishments, the service staff does not do their job particularly well. I think this is partly due to the fact that tips are already included in the ration, so waiters don't have to try to please guests.
• Untidy people. This is not about brands or anything like that, but about basic neatness and personal hygiene. They write to us in the comments that this is their culture, but we believe that this is its absence under the guise of “I want it this way,” “I express myself this way,” “I like it this way.” Here, in our opinion, the concept of freedom is greatly distorted: that is, if a person walks around poorly dressed and smelling, this is his freedom, but I no longer have the right to express my opinion regarding this. I believe that freedom should end where the freedom of other people begins.
• False smiles and duplicity. This is the other side of that same smiling. That is, it creates the impression of a plastic society in some sense. It’s a completely common situation when they greet you to your face and ask how you are, and then they go around the corner and call the police on you. Our family has personally experienced this several times. For example, when we rented a trailer and drove up to our own house for literally 20 minutes to unload large furniture, the neighbors had already called a tow truck. By the way, this is what children are taught from school — to complain. The rule here is: “whoever complains first is right.” We don't understand this.
• Fast food propaganda. We do not like the promotion of unhealthy eating in the USA, since, in fact, fast food is the national food of Americans. When this surrounds you everywhere, a person with already formed eating habits, willy-nilly, begins to reach for cola, hamburgers, pizza, and so on. Moreover, all this is sold in huge packages, and accordingly, a lot of food is thrown away. I still need to talk about the fact that in the USA, food is divided into “organic” and "inorganic.”. And of course, “organic” costs many times more. This is despite the fact that you still cannot fully know how and where it was actually grown.
• The habit of living on credit. People here do not take out loans because of poverty; here it is simply vital to have a line of credit, the so-called credit score. Otherwise, they will be suspicious of you and will not be able to sell you much, considering you're insolvent. And it’s also interesting that getting such a credit card when you come here is also not an easy task — we didn’t manage to do it in six months. Why? Because we have no credit history. And to have it, you need a credit card. It's a vicious circle. And what is most surprising is that in some stores, even grocery stores, they only accept credit cards, that is, in principle, it is impossible to pay with a debit card. When you want to buy, for example, a refrigerator and try to pay in cash, they look at you with distrust, because such things are usually taken out on credit.
• “Conservativeness” of organizational structures. It was a shock to me that very often at checkouts I had to deal with Apple Pay not working. In the country where the iPhone was invented. What’s also disappointing is the amount of paper that is used for any reason—stacks of paper letters are constantly arriving at your home address, whereas there has been email for a long time.
• Complex medical system. Any physical movement in the USA equals a lot of money: an ambulance call costs $900, and, an ultrasound — from $1000. A good friend of mine had her appendix removed for $30,000; friends had an accident, after which they received a bill of 9 thousand dollars for an examination (insurance did not cover it). The cheaper the insurance, the higher the risk of “getting money.” And many don’t have it at all.
• Feeling lonely due to lack of time for deep and lasting relationships. Firstly, people here are forced to work too much just to survive and pay off their loans; secondly, mentality also plays a role: they are more closed, they do not particularly like to receive guests, and it is necessary to arrange a meeting with them in advance. That is, they have their own house, plot, garage, and they feel comfortable locking themselves in there and spending their free time that way.

Of course, I don’t want to do any kind of anti-advertising for America under any circumstances. This is our experience, and we are incredibly grateful for it. Perhaps you will like this rhythm of life; you will find your groove and friends, and everything will be fine with you.

Our family always adheres to the main rule: if you don’t like it, change it. Actually, now we live in Poland again — this is a place that suits us completely and responds in all respects. We also completely reconsidered our surroundings and began to appreciate the incredibly open and kind people around us.