A New Chapter for A Way Abroad

What’s continuing, what’s evolving, and what’s coming next

Last week, Kat said her goodbyes after seven years of building A Way Abroad — nearly 400 articles, 200+ women contributors, and 80+ countries on the map.

That’s a real legacy, and I’m grateful she trusted me to take it forward.

I’m Wei, the new owner. I grew up in the U.S. and I’m currently writing from Hong Kong. I took over AWA because this brand does something genuinely useful: it helps people think through whether, and how, they could actually build a life abroad, not just visit somewhere for a week, but understand what daily life might really feel like.

Mt Fuji from the window seat. Onward.

That’s a corner of the internet I want to spend the next several years building on — and it isn’t an abstract bet for me.

I’ve spent time in 20+ countries and over 100 cities, and the lesson keeps repeating itself: tourism tells you almost nothing about a place. A few months of actually living somewhere — eating where locals eat, building friendships that outlast the trip, learning why things are done the way they are — opens the country up in a way no itinerary ever could. That’s the crossing AWA helps people make.

Before getting into what’s evolving, I want to start with the most important part.

What’s not changing

A Way Abroad, the site itself, will keep doing what it’s been doing.

Same mission. Same women-led contributor pipeline. Same focus on lived experience over tourist gloss.

Kat built an editorial brand that works because readers trust it. My job is not to overwrite that. It’s to protect what already works and build on it thoughtfully.

The contributors you’ve been reading will keep writing. New voices will keep joining. Country pieces, lived-abroad essays, practical guides, personal stories — all of that will continue on A Way Abroad.

So if you’ve been reading AWA for contributor essays and country guides, the site isn’t really changing.

The soul of AWA will stay with the women who have lived these moves and written honestly about them. What I want to add is a more practical decision layer on top: fresher numbers, clearer comparisons, and tools that make the leap feel less abstract.

What this newsletter is becoming

This Substack, specifically, will take on a more focused role.

The site will remain the broad home for AWA’s lived-experience stories. The newsletter will become the practical, data-heavy layer for people actively comparing where to move.

Here’s the honest version: there’s no shortage of expat cost content online. Numbeo, Nomad List, dozens of blogs — you can find a Lisbon cost-of-living post in about ten seconds.

What’s harder to find is cost coverage that’s kept up to date, gets to the neighborhood level instead of relying on city averages, and treats Asia with the same depth as Europe.

That’s the gap this newsletter is going to work in.

Cost teardowns that get refreshed when the numbers move. Neighborhood-level breakdowns when the city is big enough; area-by-area when it’s smaller. Either way, more granular than the city-average numbers most cost guides settle for. And because I’m based in Hong Kong, deeper coverage of places like Thailand, Vietnam, Taiwan, Malaysia, and Japan, including the lesser-known cities that rarely show up in English-language guides.

Concretely, that means:

● City deep-dives with verified cost data, broken out by neighborhood and category

● Decision frameworks for the real questions that come up when choosing between two places

● Refreshed visa coverage based on current government sources

● Later this year, a comparison tool that lets you stack cities side by side as the data accumulates.

● Down the road, tax content developed with the help of a family member who works professionally in expat tax

Along the way: the small places locals actually eat, the cultural texture behind the numbers, the lived-experience knowledge that doesn’t fit in a spreadsheet.

The cadence will be predictable.

Wednesdays will be free: the top-line numbers, the main takeaway, and one useful example.

Saturdays will be paid: the full breakdown, with the spreadsheet-level detail.

Same topic, same week, for three weeks every month — six posts a month, on a predictable rhythm. The free post will help you decide whether the city is relevant to you. The paid post will give you the deeper planning layer.

A note on the paid tier

Almost everything has been behind the paywall until now. I’ll be reviewing the back catalog over the coming months and gradually opening up older posts that make more sense as free reading.

Going forward, paid posts need to earn their place.

The goal is for each paid breakdown to be useful enough that it can genuinely help someone make, or rule out, a real move.

How the numbers get made

Cost data ages fast.

A Lisbon rent figure from 2024 isn’t necessarily what you’re paying in 2026. Most cost-of-living articles online don’t get meaningfully updated after they’re published.

So a few commitments:

Every city teardown will be dated, sourced on the ground from people who actually live there.

The cities I cover most actively will get refreshed at predictable intervals instead of being left to rot.

Where possible, I’ll show you the prices instead of just listing them — apartment listings, market price tags, restaurant menus, transportation costs, and other real-world examples.

The goal is simple: the numbers should be useful enough that you can actually plan around them.

Next post: Taipei

The first city deep-dive lands next week.

We’re starting with Taipei because Taiwan is one of the places I know best personally. I’ve spent a lot of time there, looked closely at what daily life actually costs, and think Taipei deserves a more practical, up-to-date guide than most English-language coverage gives it.

Free post on Wednesday. Paid breakdown on Saturday.

After Taipei: Da Nang, then Lisbon, with Bangkok and reader-requested cities to follow.

After that, we’ll see what you ask for.

One ask

If you have a few seconds, write in the comment section below and tell me the city you’re personally researching for a possible move.

One word is enough.

I’ll be reading every comment, and the cities that come up most will move up the queue.

Thanks for being here. Kat built something real. I’m taking it seriously.

— Wei