Julia Ebner, an Austrian in the UK: ‘I no longer feel welcome in this country’

When I woke up to the cheering faces of leave campaigners on my Twitter feed this morning, the Britain that I had known and valued ceased to exist for me. The Brexit vote has deprived the UK of all the values that made it attractive and enriching for continental Europeans such as me.

I left my home country, Austria, two years ago for what I believed to be a more open-minded, multicultural, inclusive and tolerant country. In my head the UK was the most liberal-minded nation I could think of. What I did not know then was that I would eventually find myself in the same environment of narrow-mindedness and anti-immigrant hostility I had tried to escape from.

The only difference is that now I am the immigrant.

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During the past two years, I have fallen more and more in love with this country and even got used to grey summers, crowded tubes and mediocre pastry. I could imagine building a future here and I made a real effort to integrate myself.

Like so many other Europeans, I have given Britain all I could: my tuition fees, my taxes, my time and my trust. Most of my friends in London are British and I have become so used to speaking English that I sometimes get confused with idioms in my mother tongue.

I have even overcome my Germanic directness, have tripled my use of auxiliary verbs such as “may”, “would” and “could” and have adapted to standards of British politeness. My thesaurus has been amended to include “gobsmacked” and “bloody”. I have learnt the rules of cricket and started to watch The Great British Bake Off.

I have done all this to belong in a country that I no longer wish to be part of. I invested all my time, money and energy in a marriage that is now doomed to fail – because no matter what the concrete consequences will be for EU migrants residing in the UK, the atmosphere has changed and I no longer feel welcome here.

The Brexit debate was painful to watch but I still hoped for a positive outcome. I thought most of the anti-immigration talk was rhetorical, to serve political agendas, but the referendum result indicates that concerns were genuine for the majority of British citizens, whose vote has been a clear expression of their anti-EU migrant attitude.

This sentiment is reflected in the streets. On Thursday, I joined in a Brexit debate between a shopkeeper and a customer, supporting the pro-remain vendor. After a while the pro-Brexit customer, who must have noticed my European accent, told me, “You won’t stay here for long anyway. Tomorrow you can pack your suitcase” – without looking me in the eye.

Who thought he would be proved right. I might not pack my suitcase immediately but I feel I should start thinking about it in the current atmosphere. I no longer want to live in a country that has become increasingly racist and that has decided to turn its back on the single most important postwar project of peace, solidarity and tolerance.

This morning, my hopes of a future in this country were wiped out and my illusions of a united, peaceful Europe scattered. I am starting to ask myself where else there is to go.

Not many countries are left today that truly share the liberal, tolerant, European values that I thought I had found in the UK two years ago. Geert Wilders and Marine Le Pen are cheering and call for referendums in the Netherlands and France, while a Donald Trump victory seems more likely than ever.

The choices are becoming narrower. Where else is there to go? I will pack my suitcase later – for now I am just gobsmacked.

Janet Anderson, a Briton in the Netherlands: ‘More than half of those who voted in the referendum don’t understand me’

On the morning that the result of the UK’s vote to leave the EU was announced, one of my employers asked for a copy of my passport. That’s quick, I thought. Am I really no longer welcome here in the Netherlands? It was a coincidence. But it brought home to me the depths of my personal insecurity.

Here I am – a single-person business owner – in the Dutch labour market. I accept the ups and downs of freelance employment, pay my taxes and my VAT, squeeze into rush-hour trains and cycle to and from appointments in this vibrant small geographical area. But I’m not Dutch. I’m British.

Here I am – a mother of a Dutch teenager. I help with homework in Dutch, dole out the pocket money in euros, try to keep up conversation by knowing some famous-in-the-Netherlands star gossip. But I’m not Dutch. I’m British.

Here I am – a cosmopolitan citizen of the world, lived on many continents, speak several languages. I feel at home in most places in the Netherlands. But I’m not Dutch, I’m British.

I have a British passport, a British education and a British identity. I came to live here out of love. But I was joyfully clear that I had the right to live, work and make a life here. On my own terms.

What I’m struggling with now is that more than half of those who voted in the Brexit referendum don’t understand me, my world, my values. They don’t want to welcome others. They don’t get why on employment, security, policing, finance, manufacturing, travel – all kinds of things that impinge on your life and without which you’d be worse off – being European is great. They were represented by those English football hooligans in Marseille who crowed, “We’re voting out” while lobbing missiles at the French police.

I – west country born (my first local authority voted remain), previously London-living (my borough voted remain), actually half-Scottish (voted remain) and a quarter-Irish (voted remain) – just don’t feel British any more.

And with European politicians hunkering down to offer the worst possible deal to the UK – to discourage the others from even considering a referendum of their own – I know my world is going to be poorer in every way. I’ve lost ease and comfort. And I have gained uncertainty.