Finding the American Dream in Slovenia

By Leroy Adams

The American Dream has always been sold as something only attainable in America. Work hard, stay determined, and you can rise—no matter where you start. That’s the promise.

But I was curious: what do Americans think of the “American Dream” in other countries? Do we even know that it exists elsewhere? And if we did, would it shift public opinion about the role of capitalism in our own society?

Additionally, I wanted to know what Slovenians thought of the American Dream. What do they think of life in America? Of Black Americans? Of Black culture?

So, while in Slovenia, I sat in a public park and asked locals those very questions.

My first guest was a 24-year-old music student in Ljubljana. About 6 ft tall, military buzz cut, black shirt, baggy pants with one leg rolled up like LL Cool J had styled him. And I wasn’t far off—he was a fan of Black music, quoting Andre 3000, Wu-Tang, and Mos Def. When I asked why he wanted to visit America, his smile stretched ear to ear:

“Because of the American Dream. Everything is big and amazing there! I’ve had this dream since I was 9 years old and had YouTube.”

That conversation stayed with me. A young man, surrounded by free education, healthcare, and safety, could only see the Dream in America because of how powerfully the U.S. has branded itself as the sole home of opportunity. It made me wonder: what happens when other countries frame their own dreams?

I had already experienced this once before. In 2016, I moved to China to teach English, and it was the first time I heard a nation speak openly about opportunity, happiness, and freedom as something attainable through their own “Dream.”

China and the Dream

The Chinese Dream, popularized by Xi Jinping, is about national rejuvenation—China’s return to global prominence after what the state calls its “century of humiliation” (1840s–1940s). Unlike the American Dream, which centers the individual, the Chinese Dream is about collective revival under the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party.

I lived in China for two years. Here are two realities I experienced:

1. Sacrifice—Privacy.
China is a communist country, socially. By that I mean the government isn’t shy about letting you know they’re watching. WeChat—their all-in-one app for messaging, payments, travel, shopping, and social media—was monitored.

2. Reward—Opportunity.
And yet, I never felt safer or more able to pursue ideas than I did in China. As a Black man especially, I felt free to move and build. I could start an English teaching school, launch a creative events brand (which I did and ran for two years), or open a barbershop, salon, or import/export business—so long as it didn’t disrupt society.

Many of my friends are still there today, raising children, building futures, and fully rooted. They’ve found their “American” Dream in China.

I’ve seen versions of the American Dream across the world. At its heart, the Dream is about opportunity—the belief that with effort and perseverance, you can create a better life. But in every country, it comes with a tradeoff.

• In China: privacy.

• In Thailand: democracy.

• In America: health.

Seeing the Dream in China—and the tradeoffs it demanded—made me curious about how it might look in other countries. When I arrived in Slovenia, I started to notice the same core ideals showing up in everyday life. To make sense of it, I used a familiar framework: the five classic pillars of the American Dream—homeownership, entrepreneurship, freedom of expression, generational progress, and mobility.

And the first one was impossible to miss.

Home Ownership / Housing

On my third day, Negrito—the environmental engineer and nature enthusiast—took us to Bela Krajina (White Carniola), a 90-minute drive south of the capital. While the whole country looks like Middle Earth, Bela Krajina feels like a retreat from city life: rolling meadows, slender white birch trees, emerald green farmland and vineyards stretching for miles, and the warmth of its people. Every local greeted me with open arms, including the family who hosted us for lunch with produce and ingredients from their farmland.

During the drive, Negrito mentioned casually, “The wife has been to Ethiopia like you. She’s also from Chicago, actually.”

I didn’t put two and two together until a Black woman walked out of the cozy, gingerbread-styled home—plucked straight from a fairytale. I was both surprised and overjoyed. I had never met her before, but the happiness radiating from her stride was blinding and beautiful. She was short, petite—made even more striking when she stood beside her tall, slender Slovenian husband, each with a hand resting on her belly, six months pregnant. His mother, who visited often to support her pregnancy, stood nearby. Together, they formed a picture in front of their storybook home, surrounded by farmland stretching as far as the sun settling behind the green hills 100 yards away.

Her husband’s father had passed down the home and land, which the couple now worked together. They stewarded the farmland. Creating a contained water channel for schools of trout, planting crops, and living in harmony with the natural environment around them, while preparing for the arrival of their child.

Inside, the home felt, as my wife likes to say, lived in. Sunlight spilled through tall windows onto polished wood floors, filling the room with a honeyed glow. Exposed beams stretched across the ceiling, strung with fairy lights, lending the space a warmth that felt both lived-in and enchanted. A hand-hewn staircase wound its way upward, its pale oak railing drawing the eye to the loft above, while beneath it, daily life unfolded: stacked books, scattered papers, and a small table draped with a linen cloth. A computer hummed quietly on a sturdy desk nearby, work tucked into the edges of homely clutter. Plants leaned into the light by the stairs, their leaves softening the clean geometry of wood and wall, while from one of the beams hung a black hammock swing, a playful counterpoint to the rustic calm. Beyond, the kitchen glowed with golden cabinetry, counters alive with the traces of recent use, the ordinary rhythm complementing the extraordinary charm of the space.

On the terrace, life slows down. A weathered wooden deck stretches beneath a canopy of beams and climbing ivy, framing the view of green fields just beyond the railing. A hammock, strung loosely between posts, sways gently in the air - a quiet invitation to rest. The space feels like a crossroads between home and nature. A small table, set with a half-finished drink and scattered papers, tells of someone who works here as easily as they dream. A folding chair with a patterned cushion waits nearby, as though a conversation has just been paused.

Nothing about it is staged—the folded blankets, the crate of supplies, the books stacked against the wall—all of it feels lived-in, used, real. And yet, it carries a charm: the kind of place where morning tea lingers into afternoon naps, where the sound of wind in the leaves mixes with the creak of old wood.

All of this confirmed one thing for me: the peace she carried wasn’t an act. This was not Get Out.

Over lunch, her husband talked about how they met in Chicago. He visited often until they eventually returned to Slovenia together. He wasn’t blind to the challenges his wife faced in the U.S. because of her skin color and gender. He couldn’t understand why anyone would choose to treat people that way. I suspect, perhaps in an attempt to make her happy, he considered what it would mean to raise their child in America instead of Slovenia.

I would love to be a fly on the wall for that conversation, because I saw a Black woman walking softly across her family’s land—one foot in front of the other as she strolled, sometimes skipping, rubbing her belly the entire time. I imagine that if he one day shared this idea with her, she would very gently say: We’re good.

Entrepreneurship

The day before, back in Ljubljana, I ducked into Red Eye Monkey, a shop that felt less like retail and more like a cultural wink. Bright digital screens overhead listed out CBD specials and bulk deals with clinical precision, but behind the counter, jars of green buds told a more laid-back story. The young man scooping flowers into glass containers worked with quiet care, like a barista weighing beans for a pour-over—ritual meeting commerce. The space carried a crisp, modern aesthetic: clean white walls, shelves lined with medicinal mushrooms and herbal tinctures you’d expect in a wellness boutique. And then, on one wall, a massive black-and-white portrait of Snoop Dogg smiled back at me, sunglasses tilted, microphone in hand.

The owner, a Slovenian man in his thirties, had been to America a couple of times, Los Angeles his favorite city. But what struck me most was his perspective on life at home. Like many younger Slovenians, he spoke about living in a democratic socialist society with free healthcare and free college, but high taxes. To him, the tradeoff was worth it. “No one should be left to live in poverty,” he said. In Slovenia, tax rates range from 16% to nearly 50% depending on income. The more you earn, the more you contribute. He was fine with that, because it meant access to basic needs and the dignity of stability.

The shop itself mirrored Ljubljana’s duality: old world and new wave, clinical and cool. You could come here to buy something for your joints or your joints, to lean into health or into haze. Either way, the space invited you to pause, look around, and notice how even in the heart of Slovenia, Snoop’s grin could feel right at home.

If Red Eye Monkey reflected how Slovenians balance commerce, culture, and community, the streets outside revealed another layer of the Dream at work. Step beyond the shops and cafés, and you see it written on walls, carved into plazas, and pulsing through public squares—the way youth claim space, speak their truth, and shape the city around them.

Youth & Expression

“Why is there so much graffiti everywhere—on the buildings, sidewalks, and streets?” I asked Martha, a local Slovenian and social media marketer for Luxury Slovenia. Her response was the same as everyone else’s: six words delivered nonchalantly—“I don’t know, it just is.”

That phrase stuck with me as I explored Ljubljana, a city with the charm and vibrant color palette of a Wes Anderson movie set. For three days, I lived in Old Town, where handcrafted boats sailed the Ljubljanica River past outdoor libraries, castle-like buildings, and riverside cafés. The city center was car-free, connected by their famous Dragon Bridge, and alive with people: young skateboarders rolling across plazas, grandparents playing with grandchildren, couples strolling hand in hand under the sun.

Everywhere, youth expression marked the city. On one side of a square, teenagers clustered at the base of a bronze equestrian statue, backpacks at their feet, heads bowed over shared screens, laughter spilling into the air. Not far away, a boy carved long arcs across the stone on his skateboard, his body leaning into turns, arms stretched wide. And then, the walls spoke. Across a pale yellow façade, red letters screamed: STOP BOMBS ON GAZA. This wasn’t art for tourists, but raw protest carved into the city’s skin. Other tags said kill your local rapists or simply carried the signatures of those who needed to be seen. It was messy, urgent, unfiltered. A reminder that even in a postcard-perfect capital, the fractures of the world still find their way onto the walls.

What struck me most was the freedom behind it. No fear of repercussions. As a foreigner, I was even able to set up cameras and microphones in public spaces to interview strangers, no permit required, just a courtesy notice to local law enforcement. Freedom of speech and expression was everywhere, not hidden in galleries or policed into silence. Kids claimed monuments as hangout spots, skateboarders redrew public squares with their wheels, and walls became witnesses to resistance.

This is one of the deepest pillars of the American Dream: the freedom to express yourself, to become whoever you want to be, hold your elected leaders accountable, to lend your voice—through art, music, dance—to the issues that matter. Ljubljana hums with that energy, it makes you slow down, look closer, and realize: that part of the Dream is alive here too.

If graffiti was the language of Slovenia’s youth, then wine was the inheritance of its elders. A slower, steadier way of leaving a mark on the world.

Generational Progress

A few days later, I met Six-Time Slovenian Wine Champion, Jožef Prus, at the Prus farm near Metlika. The estate radiated a serene pace of life, where four generations lived under one roof, bound by the family’s winemaking tradition. Stone walls and wooden balconies bloomed with flower boxes; banners welcomed guests while awards draped proudly across the balcony. It was at once a farmhouse, a vineyard, and a home. The grapes ripen in the wine hills of Krmačina, Repica, Vidošiči, Kamenica, and other sunlit slopes of Bela Krajina. At Prus Farm, quality was the measure of success. They produced it all—sparkling wines, orange wines, still wines, late harvest and ice wines, strawberry selections, and their specialty: straw wine made from dried grapes. The cellar was renowned for its predicate wines, earning the family recognition across the region.

Generational progress—the idea that you can build something lasting and pass it down to your children—is at the center of the American Dream. Jožef and his family were living proof, four generations into winemaking excellence. As he led us through the vineyard and cellar, his 14-year-old grandson followed quietly behind, no doubt absorbing the lessons for the day he might, if he chose, take the reins himself. When I asked about expansion, Jožef’s look of confusion said it all. Why would he need to? Every restaurant and hotel in the region already bought his wine. Just up the road, he contributed to a community winery where families stored bottles to share as needed. The rule was simple: replace what you take with an extra 50%, which then funded support for families in need at year’s end.

Jožef had everything he needed: a successful family business, children and grandchildren close by, and a community sustained by mutual care. More money from international markets might have been possible, but at what cost to his product, his health, or his neighbors? Even the details of the farm carried this ethos. In a dark wooden cabinet, jars of honey gleamed like amber, each labeled with the Prus name—a mark of lineage as much as ownership. Above them, a hand-carved bee hovered over hexagons etched with the family crest, a reminder of hard work and inheritance.

Down in the cellar, enormous oak barrels lined the stone walls, each stamped with the same name. Jožef rested his hand on one as though greeting an old friend. His voice carried pride and patience: wine made not for haste, but for history. For him, legacy wasn’t measured in scale or global reach. It lived in bees, barrels, and community —the inheritance he would one day leave behind.

If generational progress showed me how Slovenians think about legacy, then freedom of movement revealed how they think about life in the present, how to live fully, openly, and without fear.

FREEDOM OF MOVEMENT

The freedom to travel or move freely is what makes the American Dream visceral. As Elizabeth Pryor writes in her book Colored Travelers: Mobility and the Fight for Citizenship Before the Civil War, “colored travelers well understood that the freedom to travel was a core American value, and since the 1810s they have protested segregation as a fundamental violation of their equal rights.”

In Slovenia, I discovered a society where this kind of movement was not only protected but expected. Over 60% of the land is designated as public, meaning you can roam forests and fields—even on private property—so long as you respect the balance between recreation and ownership. The right to move here is about leisure and  built into the culture of wellbeing.

I witnessed a rhythm of life that encouraged crossing boundaries—between neighborhoods, cities, even nations. As I hopped from Ljubljana to nearby towns, Slovenians spoke of their easy access to green spaces: “Even private land is open to use, so long as we respect it.” Hiking, backpacking, and road-tripping were as normal as grocery shopping. Croatia, Venice, Italy, regular visits- all within two hours—felt like extensions of home. What struck me most was that despite paying high taxes—anywhere from 16% to 50%—people still had the means and the mindset to travel widely. There was no fear of police intervention if you crossed a neighbor’s lawn, no suspicion if you walked into a different neighborhood.

Even my first interviewee, the 24-year-old music student, embodied this. He was Serbian, studying in Slovenia, a living example of how fluid borders and opportunities can be.

My Theory

The American Dream is not exclusive to America. Perhaps it never was. I’ve seen its core ideas—opportunity, security, freedom, generational progress—alive and well in places like China, Thailand, and now Slovenia.

What struck me most in Slovenia was that people didn’t have to trade off their health, safety, or dignity to chase stability. They didn’t have to swallow the contradictions of “freedom” that leaves some over-policed, uninsured, or locked out of opportunity. Instead, the Dream showed up in everyday ways: a family home passed down through generations, a young entrepreneur building a business while trusting in social safety nets, a graffiti artist shouting truth on a wall without fear, grandparents and children sharing the same public square.

My theory is this: the American Dream isn’t a destination, it’s a framework. The more exposed we are to how other countries interpret and live out this framework might be the external push we need to stop settling for less. We might demand a society where the Dream is not just possible for the few who can outwork the system, but for everyone.

The real Dream isn’t about the house, the car, or the upward climb. It’s about creating a life where your children inherit not just your ambition, but your joy, your freedom, and your safety.