Because until recently our country (El Salvador) lacked national pride and like other Latin American countries the "malinchismo" (the thought of everything is better somewhere else) is prevalent. We have the same age so growing up the idea was that to truly "be something" you had to study abroad. The tide is changing and now people are proud of what the country has become but it'll take a generation or two to get rid of the way of thinking that got this dude in the situation he's in.