When we started talking about moving abroad, there was no shortage of information — visas, cost of living, where to go.If anything, we were overwhelmed.
But the questions that mattered most to us as an LGBTQ+ couple were much harder to answer. So began the 20+ open tabs. We had legal resources open in one tab to understand our rights, safety data in another, and surveys on acceptance and belonging somewhere else. To “unwind,” we were watching travel creators, reading Reddit threads, scrolling through Facebook groups, and looking for people who had actually made the move to hear what they had to say.
Then there was the practical side layered on top of all of that: What was healthcare like? Was there a realistic path to residency? Could we learn a new language?
While the information existed, the comparison didn’t. Belong Elsewhere grew out of that search. We wanted one place where the legal, the lived, and the practical could sit side by side — so people could compare destinations not just by whether they can move there, but by whether they could realistically build a life and feel at home there.
Every question behind the BE Index started with a question we asked ourselves first.
