{"id":40096,"date":"2020-11-07T05:07:00","date_gmt":"2020-11-07T04:07:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/the-slovenia.com\/?p=40096"},"modified":"2020-11-11T07:20:38","modified_gmt":"2020-11-11T06:20:38","slug":"expats-in-slovenia-ian-middleton","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/the-slovenia.com\/en\/lifestyle\/expats-in-slovenia\/expats-in-slovenia-ian-middleton\/","title":{"rendered":"Expats in Slovenia: Ian Middleton"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ian Middleton is an electronics engineer, teacher, writer and a passionate photographer who moved to Slovenia from England with his wife, whom he met in Spain. <\/strong><\/h2>

COULD YOU TELL US WHERE YOU ARE ORIGINALLY\nFROM? WHAT BROUGHT YOU TO SLOVENIA?<\/strong><\/p>

I am from a\ntown called Andover in southern England. Like many I was brought here by love.\nI met my wife in a little town in southern Spain called Cabo de Gata. You could\nsay destiny ensured I was ready for this because I fully admit that beforehand I\nwas as ignorant as most about Slovenia. I was living in Ireland at the time,\nworking at a backpacker hostel, when I got chatting to two new arrivals. The\nensuing conversation soon came to our respective home countries. When the two\ngirls told me they were from Slovenia, my ignorance was clearly evident. \u201cDo\nyou know where Slovenia is?\u201d they asked in unison. \u201cErr, isn\u2019t it that country\nnext to the Czech Republic?\u201d came my stereotypical response. I got dragged by\nthe ear to a nearby map and shown how Slovenia was next to Italy, Austria and\nCroatia. \u201coh!\u201d<\/p>

A few months\nlater in Spain when a lovely girl asked me the same question, \u201cDo you know\nwhere Slovenia is?\u201d I confidently replied:
\n\u201cOf course, it\u2019s next to Italy, Austria and Croatia!\u201d
\n\u201cOh, you know it!\u201d
\n\u201cYes, I hear it\u2019s very nice.\u201d<\/p>

8 years later\nwe were married.<\/p>

COULD YOU TELL OUR READERS WHAT IS IT THAT YOU\nDO? WHAT IS YOUR CAREER BACKGROUND?<\/strong><\/p>

My background\nis in electronics. I have worked mostly in consumer and medical electronics.\nHowever in 1996 I quit my full time job to go travelling around the world. In\nthe years that followed I worked as a contractor between travels. After a\nfour-month trip around Mexico I began to write about my adventures. I also\ndecided to learn a bit more about photography in order to document my travels\nbetter. It soon became apparent that I enjoyed this and the writing turned into\nseveral books and articles which I illustrated with my own photography. Travelling\nthe world was also the best learning curve for my photography. For years I was\nmostly doing travel photography and selling as stock photos for editorial.\nHowever, after seeing Slovenia I was inspired by the landscape and began to\nfocus my efforts more on landscape photography. At the time I was working as a\nservice engineer, travelling around the UK and visiting Slovenia in-between\njobs. In this time I developed the more artistic side of my photography,\nshooting mountains and lakes in Slovenia and coastal landscapes in the UK. <\/p>

AS A PHOTOGRAPHER AND WRITER DO YOU HAVE ANY\nNEW PROJECTS COMING UP?<\/strong><\/p>

I don\u2019t have\nanything specific in the pipeline at the moment. I recently completed and\npublished my first photography book, A Practical Guide to Photography, which\nactually contains lots of photos from Slovenia. I originally started the book\nas a handout to give students on my photography workshops, but over the years I\ndeveloped it into a complete beginners guide to learning photography. I\u2019ve had\nthe notion of making a book on Slovenia for a long time, but want to find\nsomething different from all the others out there: maybe a book illustrating\nthe beautiful lakes and mountains of Slovenia, versus the beautiful coastline\nof the UK? I have one other idea on the shelf too, but need time and money to realise\nit. Right now I have neither!<\/p>

I\u2019m mostly\nwriting articles for photography magazines these days, along with articles on my\nphotography and travel blogs and SEO articles for websites.<\/p>

My current\nproject is actually a website. I am working with a friend in Ireland and\ntogether we have created a website called Slovenia Adventures.\nSlovenianadventures.com is a tourism directory where businesses or individuals\ncan list their tourism products and services for free. Visitors can search the\ndirectory using keywords, location or browse the map to find tours, activities,\naccommodation or anything else. This was done during the coronavirus lockdown\nand we decided to offer all listings for free initially to try and boost the tourism\nindustry and help struggling businesses get back on their feet. There will\nalways be a free listing option, but once the site grows we\u2019ll likely offer\npremium listings with featured placements and the option to sponsor pages and\narticles on the blog. <\/p>

IN TERMS OF WORKING AND LIVING IN SLOVENIA.\nWHAT IS THE BIGGEST DIFFERENCE FROM YOUR HOME COUNTRY AND SLOVENIA?<\/strong><\/p>

I think\nworking in Slovenia is not much different from the UK. Work is work, wherever\nyou are. But being self-employed is far easier in the UK in the sense that you\ndon\u2019t need to pay such a high fixed amount of social contributions. In the UK\nwe pay around \u00a312 per month fixed, and then 9% on our profits above \u00a39000 per\nyear. I know that in Slovenia you get a lot of benefits for these contributions,\nbut it makes it very difficult for people to startup. It also makes it\nimpossible for someone to have a little part-time business unless you already\nhave a full time job. Here someone who earns 500 per month pays the same as\nsomeone who earns 2000. Under the UK system you pay according to how much you\nearn and for someone in the early years this can make a huge difference. <\/p>

As for\nliving, people often ask me which is better and the truth is that each country\nhas its own appeal. Slovenia has stunning landscape and its compact size makes\nit so easy to get to these places. The alpine mountains and lakes in the north\nare something I could never see in the UK. And the fact that I can drive to\nsome of the most amazing locations and photograph stunning scenes in just 30\nminutes is a huge plus. But while Slovenia has a wonderful coastline which is\nstunning in its own way, for me it doesn\u2019t compare to the British coast. I miss\nthe ruggedness, the myriad of colours, the cliffs, and coves. In the UK there\nis also a big difference between high and low tide. Low tide can reveal a whole\ndifferent world and sections of the coast look totally different. When the tide\nis out you can walk for miles. <\/p>

Another great\nbenefit of living in Slovenia is the low crime rate. It\u2019s a safe place to raise\nyour children. My only concern is that spending too much time here is making me\na bit too complacent about crime.<\/p>

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