I have been living in the UK for 6 years. I initially came here for university and now I work a corporate job in accounting.
Other Eastern European men might be able to relate to the below.
Life in the UK is quite good - I have a large network of friends, mostly expats from my home country and other European countries. I am quite happy with the lifestyle that my salary provides, the work-life balance, the career opportunities for low to mid-level positions, the infrastructure, the lack of bureaucracy, etc.
However, there are is one area of concern: Dating. Dating has proven to be incredibly difficult. From my and my friends’ experience, most British women are not interested in anything beyond a hookup or short-term relationship with someone from Eastern Europe.
Also, from my experience, most Romanian women in my age range in London either moved here together with their partners from Romania, or (usually the more educated, cosmopolitan ones) are either looking for a British partner to better integrate into the culture here, or want to try things with other European expats (typically Western / Southern European) to experience other cultures while they are young. Nothing wrong with that, but that means that the dating prospects for people in my position are quite bleak.
Before you comment saying that there might be something wrong with me personally, I must say that I believe that is not the case. Out of my close group of friends (6 guys), only one has been able to find a relationship here post-university, and that is with a girl from South America. Another one came here with his long-term girlfriend from Romania. They broke up a year ago, and the girl got into a relationship with an Italian guy shortly after, while the guy is still single and not having much success. Therefore, I am not alone in this regard.
My perception is that being from Eastern Europe has a series of negative stereotypes associated with one’s origin if the individual in question is a man, especially when interacting with Western Europeans (from my limited experience, this does not really seem to apply to interactions with Americans). However, for women, that does not seem to be the case (or at least not to the same extent).
Having said that, I am not really sure if the solution would be to move back to my home country, or perhaps try somewhere else. I feel like I would do a lot better in terms of dating, but then I would definitely not be enjoying the lifestyle I currently do in the UK (accounting doesn’t pay much back home) + a plethora of reasons why I left initially.
What are your thoughts on the above? I am more than happy to have my views challenged.
My girlfriend is Austrian and she has said the exact same thing as you; that Austrian women generally wouldn’t ever consider Eastern European/Balkan/Turkish guys for dating unless they’re in the same ethnic group.
Yeah I’m in a weird position where I’m half German, half Eastern European, though I grew up in Germany. I also lived in the “bad” part of town even though I’m from a family of academics, so I had/have friends from all those different “worlds”. It got extremely noticeable in secondary school, how native Germans - and especially middle class ones from the suburbs & villages - would generally not socialize with anyone outside of “their” bubble, and definitely wouldn’t date them.
Among working class German people in the city it’s can be a bit more relaxed, perhaps just due to proximity and also the shere amount of ‘non-Germans’/mixed kids in schools would make it more difficult to stay completely separate. But the middle class/rural folk mentioned above would probably call them “Assis” and not consider befriending, let alone dating, them either.
It’s a little different in University where it’s generally more diverse and I guess to some middle class ppl it also feels like the people attending are more…“vetted”, to put it bluntly. It’s expected that these are smart and educated people with decent job prospects and more similar interests. So it’s not as rare that a female student from Germany would date a male student from Romania who just moved there to study medicine or something, especially if his family at home are also educated middle class.
My gf has Balkan roots but she’s in the exact same way as those rural folk you mentioned. She came out different because she has an odd background but she has mentioned it’s sorta the same in Austria. It makes sense since Austria and Germany are super similar (in b4 I have someone named Matias or Lukas yell at me that it isn’t the case lol…)