A question for ATCKs with kids
As a TCK who is currently trying to look towards the future and figuring out where things will end up, one question that is at the back of my mind is:
How did you decide how you are going to raise your kids?
I know there are some ATCKs that settled down and others that continue their global nomadic lifestyle. I myself am very attracted to settling down but at the same time I will continue traveling just not moving and living. However, I also want my kids to be knowledgeable of a TCK lifestyle. My boyfriend is a non-TCK (although I sometimes think he has some TCK characteristic) and there is a likelihood he may not want to move - I don’t have a problem with that. But the kids’ lifestyle is what I am more concerned about.
For ATCKs that settled down and have kids, how did you go about introducing the TCK lifestyle to the kids?
January 11th, 2008 at 8:33 am
Bart, interesting story!
This still happens today unfortunately. I saw a girl who was shocked to see a Black man for the first time and asked “Why are your feet so dark and burnt?…”. She was in her 20s. And American.
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January 11th, 2008 at 8:42 am
In the early 1960’s it was unlikely that Japanese kids had seen white or black people.
The first time I was on an airplane on the way to the Philippines - flying first class - I was 2 years old and had never seen people of other races.
There was this man with really hairy arms sitting near us (he was white).
I said (in Japanese): Mom! There’s a gorilla on this airplane! < —I was fascinated by animals as a kid so I guess I was thrilled :p
My mother was mortified and glad this guy didn’t seem to understand what I said…lol
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March 24th, 2008 at 3:20 pm
I found that there was & still is a double standard depending on the surname for multi-racial kids. For example, in the N. America, John Smith is more “acceptable” than John Chan, for the simple fact that his TCKness - for lack of a better word - is not in your face. In Asia again, John Smith is more acceptable than John Chan, but for a different reason; it advertizes his TCKness up front and so it neatly categorizes him. The purpose & end result are the same: non-TCKs can avoid embarassing themselves.
This is the root of the whole “how to fit in” debate & is the main reason why TCKs don’t fit in/aren’t accepted. TCKs just naturally & unintentionally show-up everyone else!
The best way to deal with this is as lielie suggests. Teach your kids that this is how we do things at home & to respect that. It is also important to teach them that people are ruled by their emotions even though they sometimes don’t realize it & that when they get a negative reaction from someone, it’s most likely because that person simply doesn’t understand and may not be able to understand. Once your kids learn to take a step back and understand how ignorance, fear and the unknown are at the root of a lot of the gut-reactions of others, they won’t feel so hurt.
It’s all tied into the whole social debate about ignorance + fear = prejudice + hate.
What I’m most worried about is that my BF is non-TCK and his family is very WASPy & would influence any future kids we may have to prefer ignorance and fear over TCK qualities.
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April 26th, 2008 at 5:09 pm
Our kids are now 6 and 8. It’s what LieLie wrote above - everyone’s ways are different and they are chosen/preferred because they work (not because it’s wrong or right). We tell them and show them that rigid right and wrong thinking is largely based on fear of the unknown and fear of change. We tell them and show them that being afraid is okay, that we can respect other peoples’ ways even if their ways don’t work for us. We tell them and show them that it’s important to own your own uniqueness and be at peace with it, and that will add to the richness of the child’s world, whether they grow up traveling or not.
Our rules are based on the principles of safety and health and cooperation (making it work for everyone). In that we attempt to make our children aware of owning their behaviour, their responses to their environment and in that, increasing their awareness of the world at large.
We tend to supplement any statements they come home with from school or friends’ houses with additional experiences. Kids’ judgments aren’t ingrained yet and are easily transmuted into a wider perspective. It just goes into the mix since they are little sponges.
We tend to focus on the individual aspects of differences, rather than “group” them again and thereby setting up boundaries between culture x and culture y. Grouping tends to bring about more divisiveness, more us versus them, and more bad versus good thinking. For us it doesn’t matter WHY someone has a different belief - what matters is THAT they have a different belief and that is just as valid as our belief so we respect it.
We don’t affirm/confirm things that they learn here in Canada, we include them into a larger image. A relatively inconspicuous example is ‘normal food’. We don’t do normal food… we do food (normal is a cycle on the washer). Our favourite foods are favourites because we like them, not because they’re ‘normal’ or ‘traditional’.
We state explicitly to the children that something is the way it is done in this particular house, in this particular culture or in this particular country, emphasizing that traditions, beliefs, norms and values are not static and global. We emphasize it by stories of our own experiences, and where possible we support the boys in getting a taste of that experience. But we don’t treat it any differently than we’d treat house rules. In some homes it’s required to take off shoes; in others it isn’t. In some homes you cannot jump on the couch, in others it’s not an issue. In some homes people eat vegetarian; in others they don’t. In some homes people close the bathroom door when the bathroom is not in use, in others they leave the bathroom door open when it’s not in use. And the list goes on.
Both my husband and I are grateful that we live on a different continent than our families of origin. Becoming a parent is stressful enough, let alone when your opinions, beliefs and needs differ from the closest network around you. It’s been an interesting journey for my husband and I to find our own comfort levels and to figure out what works for us - and it’s hard enough to “defend” that when our families visit and tell us why it’s wrong or that it just isn’t done or whatever. So while doing the parenting thing without the extended family around has been hard in some ways, it’s also been much easier for us to find our footing within ourselves and our parenting with them being far far far away.
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June 20th, 2008 at 10:24 am
I am an ATCK originally from the States, but grew up in Africa. I have settled down, but travel a lot with the option of emigrating while my children would most benefit. I have 2 daughters and I have unintentionally imposed my TCKness on to them although they have never lived abroad (which to me is a good thing - the TCK part, not the abroad part).
They are 7 and 9 and have moved 8 times and already have (at least) 2 more moves on the horizon.
They are ethnic minorities and are often the only children of their race in any given situation, which has allowed them to adapt easily, but they still deal with the ‘being different’ issues when around children of their own race (They are culturally different than most of their peers of any race).
They eat different food from their American friends (I can’t/don’t cook western style food)
They gravitate towards TCK when making friends
They are very good at telling the country/language of origin for most people
They adapt well to many social situations
They unfortunately give up friends rather easily (which I’m trying to reverse)
They easily get on a plane , but are afraid of buses
Love couscous and rice, but hate potatoes…..the list goes on
To answer your question - I am an ATCK who has raised TCKs/CCKs without emigrating - at least not yet
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June 20th, 2008 at 7:51 pm
I’ve been pondering this question too, and I’m only a CCK because my parents. After moving to the US, decided to stay in one place so I didn’t have to deal with moving every two years, like we would have. I only found out about this a little while ago, when I started university. In a way, I almost would have “wanted” to move around a lot, that way I possibly wouldn’t have been teased so much growing up because I was different. I guess it would have been worse if we would have moved around a lot… In another way, I’m glad that I stayed in one place. I have friends there, my family, I have ROOTS there. And usually when I think of home, I think of the house I grew up in. (though now it’s in addition to the city I go to school in. I have two homes!)
I’m really glad that my parents always spoke to me in Finnish, and I’m so glad that they sent me to Finland every summer. They didn’t let me forget where I came from, but yet we assimilated a bit into US culture. I grew up “American”…but yet not “American.”
So this has lead me to think about when the day comes to raise my kids. (I’m only 20 so I have time to think about it!) Since both of my whole family is Finnish, they both spoke to me in Finnish. When I was a kid, I dreamt of marrying a Finnish man, so that we could speak Finnish to our kids together, since my Finnish isn’t perfect. Though now, I’m beginning to think that I could deal with marrying an American or someone of another culture, though I am a bit worried about my Finnish skills. I don’t want to teach my kids “bad” Finnish, you know?
However, the man I DO end up marrying, TCK or not, I would want him to have/want to have international experience. Since I grew up between these two cultures, I want to share that with my kids. I’ve learned so much about the world, and my world view is so much more expanded than some of my friends who have never even left the Midwest US before. I don’t know if I’d want to put my kids through the difficulties of being a CCK/TCK, but yet I want them to have a broader world view and to have them enjoy that the world is so full of interesting and lovely places/people/cultures. And I want them to be better for that.
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