Living in Namibia

Life in Namibia: windhoek is slow paced and quiet i hear expats complaining that there's not much to do in Windhoek, they are lonely and things like that.
It's not particularly hard to settle down it depends where do you come from if you're from a fast paced city then yes. Houses for rent are becoming expensive for locals and expats. But if you are well off then accomodation will not be a problem it depends on the area.
Jobs are hard to find for locals because of the lack of experience and qualifications. If you are an expat as long as you have experience you should be fine but again jobs are scarce. If you wanna start a business here consider tourism because there's a great potential here and it's a field that nobody really explored.

YEs it's hard to make friends here the locals can be friendly sometimes but still you won't get that cosy feeling. I don't remember walking into store and get a warm welcome and a genuine smile.My neighbors don't even greet me or try to know who i am. MOST of the locals just socialize among them. You may find some expats married to locals or dating but in these cases either they met overseas or the locals just got genuine interest.

The locas value their mother language so much. Everywhere you turn your head you will hear people talking in their mother language so there's a language barrier to some extent. Most of the people don't speak english very well. I was forced to speak slowly and to use plain english.

Yes, these commends are true. And how lucky you can be to stay and work in Windhoek ! Outside this city it's much more worse! Namibians (especially the whites) are totally unsocial. Their understatement is on the base of the European 1875. I work here in between Otjiwarongo and Tsumeb sinde 2 1/2 years now. And I am full of that. The work is nice (mostly with Ovambo), but the Bure.... What a kind of stupid tribe. Most of them are not able to speak a complete sentence at all, most of them are totaly unsocial, most of them are lying, most of them are only friendly to you, if they need something from you and the worse thing is: They think, they are the most clever ones in the world (special mark for extremely stupid people!). And: You can die beside them and they would laugh about that. This is NOt overdrawn !
My first work in Namibia was in 1987. That time, I worked in the North (Ovamboland) to support a Mission Hospital. During the war. I came from Joh'burg and I enjoyed the time with these nice tribe Ovambo very much. Namibia has changed very much. Lying is common and I could never imagine, that I could understand the SWAPO movement. Now, I know it. With these Bure, you can not live together. They are still racists through and through. Every day. They have not gotten the change over more than 30 years, because they don't want to see the change which has happend already. They don't have a culture. A few Namibians have German roots. They are much more "up to date", but don't believe anybody here in this country. Everybody is lying, trying to get their personal profit. And Bure can be sooooo sweet, if they want something from you. I am really happy, when I will sit inside the plane to leave this country. Namibia had been a nice country. Mr. Zuma will take it over one day, because these people here are not able to work together for one goal. But for a Holiday, this country could be nice. Come in, enjoy, leave. Bye bye.

Hi  thisislife,

Thank you for sharing these information and your experiences, But there might surely be some positive hints that you could share with us, which might be helpful for the other members pls. Thank you!

Regards,

David.

Expat-blog team.