About: Isa
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Name:Isa
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2007-11-15 00:00:09
Posts by Isa:
“Nomadic” writer wins Nobel Prize
*Ahem*… Just a little family promotion here (he’s my relative). Jean- Marie Gustave Le Clézio wo nthe 2008 Nobel Prize for literature. Plus, he’s a TCK! LOL! I have actually never realised that before… Hmmm! They describe him as a “child of all cultures”. I asked him once if he felt more French or Mauritian, and he said “Why do i have to choose? I can be both, because i am both those and more.” Man, he’s made of awesome…
What do you guys think?
To TCKs “For True”??
In the dedication of the TCK book, there is a line there that confuses me: “And to our children who have taught us so much — TCKs “for true.”
I was wondering if you could al lgive me your interpretation of what the “for true” bit means? Does it mean to stay true to our lifestyle? The lessons we have learned?
The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian.
Hi!
I haven’t been around cause ….we moved. And 2 days before the move, my dad broke his ribs. So yeah…no book or movie watching for me!
Until now.
And i bring you….
The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian.
Why TCK’s should check it out?
The director Andrew Adamson is a TCK. Which makes the themes of the book telling if you look at it in a TCK light: themes of alienation, repatriation, inability to ‘fit in’ again into a place that you are meant to. Once you are back in the place you wish to be that things have changed.
In several interviews he has stated that for the Pevensie children going back to Narnia the second time is bittersweet.They have spent all that time longing to go back and then they realise that they can never go back to the Narnia they knew because it has changed.
William Moseley (Peter Pevensie) said that for him, Peter’s journey is both an emotional one as well as a physical. Peter has returned to Narnia, but has to yet again prove himself and that he is unwilling to notice that the place he oved has changed as well as himself.
Other notes:
The Pevensie children are great as per usual. Liam Neeson returns as Aslan. And Eddie Izzard is Reepicheep!
Also, Prince Caspian is played by Ben Barnes, who played Dakin in Alan Bennet’s acclaimed The History Boys stageplay.
Websites:
Official Prince Caspian website (very nicely set out - as a train!).
http://disney.go.com/disneypictures/narnia/
IMDB
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0499448/
Roswell: TV Show Review
Why TCK’s should check it out?
The series deals very well with the universal feelings of finding a home, belonging somewhere, or to someone, and finding and creating your own identity. It would be of interest to TCKs be cause it deals so well with the feeling of ‘home’ and they will be able to relate to feeing different to others in their high school.
On another note: I like seeing Katherine Heigl and Colin Hanks in earlier roles!
Name: Roswell
Director/Creator: Jason Katims
Starring: Shiri Appleby, Jason Behr, Katherine Heigl, Colin Hanks, etc.
Summary:
The series focused on teenage aliens - a brother and sister Max and Isabel and their friend Michael- hiding in plain sight as humans in Roswell, New Mexico. The aliens are survivors of the 1947 UFO crash popularly known as The Roswell Incident.
Quotes:
Isabel : Michael, where are we gonna go? You know, Roswell is home.
Michael : Roswell is not home. It’s not even our solar system.
Max : Well, this is the closest thing we have to home right now.
Michael : The thing I’ve realized is the fact that my life basically sucks is a good thing.
It’s easier. We always have to be able to leave, pack a suitcase, go somewhere else. Maybe 10 years from now, maybe a week from now, maybe tomorrow. So my advice? Don’t get in too deep, Maximillian. It only makes us weaker.
Isabel: And what is home, anyway? Half of me is from there, half of me is from here. What makes one half more important than the other?
Related links:
Roswell at Wikipedia
Roswell at IMDB
Librarian Blogspot Q&A
Hey y’all
So Brice (very nicely) appointed me the “Librarian” of TCKID. And i was wondering if i could get your suggestions/advice?
I had a few suggestions and anted your opinions…
1. I was thinking of reviewing/ commenting upon/bringing to your attention not only books but newspaper articles (of which i have quite a few) and TV shows that relate to TCKs in some way (or being displaced, not belonging etc). or, if i love the book i’ll just review it anyway! Hee. 
2. I was going to review 2 books per month. And i thought of creating a thread per book so that we can discuss it before i put up my final review to incorporate quotes from all of you.
3. Feel free to make suggestions!! It can be anything you’d like me to check out: it doesn’t need to neccessarily be about TCKs specifically — i’m alwas open for new books/cartoons/TV shows/films :-).
So i’m off my soapbox now — the floor’s all yours!
A Thank You to Brice!
I’d just like to invite the TCKID members to share with me in saying a huge THANK YOU to Brice for all the work he has been putting in on the site and for organising not only one but TWO teleconferences. That must have been HUGE!
So if you could all post pics, stories or whatever strikes your fancy about our Brice! 
Loyalty to more than one country?
Hey all
Recently, i met up with an old friend (one who i met when i first came here) but who i have heard things from through my mother (Albert’s parents and my mother are still friends).
In school, we were very close as well as with another mutual friend Ali. Now, Ali and i connected partly because he and i both came ‘from’ America. I had been born there and so had lived there and had never set foot here in Australia before i came depsite my citizenship. He, on the other hand, had dual citizenship, US/Australia and his parents were American, but Ali had never set foot in America before he left when i was 9.
So, i met up with Albert -Ali’s and mine’s mutual friend the other day after ten years of not really having seen him. It was…. strange. Good, but strange.
He asked me if i still spoke in French with my mother… i found that i could not really explain how come i stopped. Well, i still do, but only occasionally. I couldn’t explain how kids here are cruel, and that i had to choose in order to fit in, that i was teased for my accent (a weird mix of Mauritian-French and Californian).
When it came to jobs he asked me what i was planning, and i said that it an ideal world, i wld work for the UN (an international org) or an NGO…but have set my sights on being a diplomat so i was gonna join DFAT(the Dept of Foreign Affair sand Trade in Aus). But that i did not know if i wanted to be ’stuck’ representing one country (or, en if i could). You see, i have the choice to join DFAT and/or the US Foreign Service.
And i don’t know if i could be able to, emotionally, represent just the one, or be able to represent one cuntry my entire life. (Which is, yes, i know, what i do on a daily basis on a personal level, i just don’t know if i could do that consciously on a professional level).
And i tried to explain to him that i felt the need to return to America to live for at least a year…. to face my demons. Because i just left, the umbilical cord was cut, so to speak, and i had no further contact with the States from when i was 6 until i was 12. And he couldn’t understand that.
He was astonished that i had idolised it for so long and that i love LA when he thinks its an shithole.
In repsonse, i tried to explain… that i didn’t particularly like Aus when i came either (read: hated it). But now, i have come to (albeit somewhat grudgeingly i admit) to like it, such as the weather, the humour, and the countryside is very pretty. So are the kangaroos. And the deer. The snakes and spiders? Not so much..
Can anyone understand?
Repatriation/Expatriation
Hey everyone!
I was just wanting to ask your advice: I have not moved around as much as other TCKs and moved to Australia when i was 6-7. Do i repatriated young. So ive lived here for a long time — i’m 19.
And i need to get out of here but i’m also terrified to go. I’m terrified that i won’t like being in France again (went on exchange when i was 15 and my host fam. were not very nice) and that it wil lall turn to crap. But i can’t stay here.
I want to go somewhere that i speak the lang but am “obviously” a foreigner? Can anyone understand this? This way i won’ have to lie or cover up when i don’t know a social cue or whatever, it will be known why i don’t know it.
I do and i don’t want to go back to the USA — i’m scared of “Repatriation” of sorts (citizenship, no familial ties) as i have not lived there and i have no family there. But i feel that i need to go back to LA to… not eally face my demons but to stop myself thinking that i’ll fit in there that its my ‘home’ — because i know that i wont fit in, but it doesn’t stop me from wanting it on some level.
Can anyone relate? Thoughts? Ideas? Song lyrics? Anything?
Rant!
Hey all
I’m sorry but i am just so angry/annoyed that i have to rant about this.
I’m at uni and there is an exchange girl from the US (Pennsylvania) here (i’m in Australia). We get talking about politics — she’s a Democrat who is going to be voting Republican. I asked her (non-judgmentally) how come, why say she’s a Dem if shge’s voting as a Republican… Then she went on to say how Hillary Clinton can’t run a country b/c no one will take her seriously, she’s a woman. Then she went on abt how Obama isn’t really American — he’s African. I said well, technically he’s mum is from Kansas (i think…? at least she’s a white American) and his dad is from Kenya, but he was raised elsewhere as well as the US… so culturally he is more American than African as well as Indonesian(as he did not live in Africa as a child). [I don’t need to go into the details of TCKness here — everyone knows!].
THEN she began saying how in his books it was all about anti-white he was, how he hates whites, he’s a terrorist… I said that i had read ‘Dreams from my Father’ and that i had not found anything of the sort. As i said that she got this look on her face like ‘OMG this chick is so stupid!’. I said, no don’t look at me like that, i read the book to get an idea of his side of the story. You get information so that you can argue a point.
I mean honestly, she would not even consider the fact that Obama wasn’t some psycho-anti-white terrorist. She had not even read the books! Of course i know that it is human nature to write the best about yourself, but saying that he’s ‘African so he can’t run an American country’ without looking at the facts or thinking at several different perspectives really really gets to me.
And yes, even if this arguement had been going on about McCain (or another Republican candidate) i would have still be argueing my point because i beleive in not just lloooking at one point of view.
Question: Do you think that this was a cultural difference or what?
I need some advice guys
Hey
I’m sorry to clutter up the board with my whinges, but i just need some advice from the people who have gone through this or something like it. I’m at a uni here in Australia that is small hours away from my family which is both a plus and a minus.
I’m not happy.
I’ll copy and paste an email i sent to someone…
Hi Clare,
You asked me how university is going? It’s going okay I guess. Two of the classes aren’t very interesting, the other two are ok. I’m doing French 301 – Language Component and French 303 – a Translation course. I enjoy that. There are 8 French girls in that class.
The other day I was speaking to the guy in charge of the International Students at my college. He himself had to go to the head of the College to ask that someone do this. I was shocked that there was no one here to help the International Students. How disgraceful.
Anyway, he was telling me that he didn’t think I was as ‘popular’ as I could be and that I ‘held myself back’ from the rest of the students here and only ever really engaged fully with the International Students(despite language and cultural barriers – they are all Japanese).
That’s because I don’t have anything in common with the Australian students and I do with the Internationals.
So I’m really in-transit right now. I’m waiting for university to end so that I can start my life, just like I waited for high school to end so that I could start university.
I don’t understand what all of you (Papa, you, Cheryl, Anthea, Natasha) mean when you say it was the best time of your lives. University is just the same people I met at school just a different place and with boys. Drunk, racist and close-minded. They think that I am strange because I don’t have much interest in drinking and casual one-night stands. So I got completely drunk (‘blinded’ is a term they use here) last week just to see what it was like and now I have even less interest in any of them.
So I don’t know what to do. I was looking at transferring but to where? They’re all just the same.
Isabelle
—
I’ve tried talking to my Dad but all he keeps on saying is that ‘It’s really the best uni for you.’ And i agree that compared to SydneyUni it is.
But i’ve been waiting since we landed in Australia to go to uni, i thought things would get better. I don’t want to spend my university career in a place where i only have a few moments of happiness. I don’t want to spend my uni career ‘waiting’ to get out. I’ve done enough of that.
I looked up tranferring to UCLA but i really need a car to live in LA… and i can’t drive (ever, due to vision problems). And i don’t really want to go the States for uni.
I don’t know how to talk to my dad about this. I’ve been trying for over 3 months for him to read the TCK book and he seems unwilling.
Any ideas? Advice?
Oh does anyone know of any International Unis or English language unis overseas that are small?
Unrooted Childhoods: Memoirs of Growing Up Global
Hi
This is going to be in several sections so please bare with me.
I went to a book sale at my uni today and i came across the book “Unrooted Childhoods - Memoirs of growing up Global.” It is a book of twenty essays by adults such as Pico Iyer, Isabel Allende and ‘our’ very own “RUTH VAN REKEN!
Naturally, i squealed with delight and picked it up. And i wanted to tell someone who would understand what this meant to me; a book about other TCKs (apart from the TCK book of course). So i thought of you guys. 
1.Of course, this got me thinking. Whenever i think or read something regarding TCKs i become more … conscious of my ‘other-ness’ from the other mono-cultural kids. My culture- hopping is so ingrained in me it comes out in everything i do. The types of music that i listen to — ie. listening to non-English language music pins me as ‘weirds’ here in Australia.
The types of things i wrote about for academia. Example: for an English subject at uni i have to write a series of 5 paragraphs, one starting with “The most important day in my life was…”
What do i write about? The move from the USA to Australia. The next paragraph is on “What i find really annoying is…” And i plan to write about racism and how much i deteste it.
2.. I both hate and love aspects of my TCK identity. I love the fact that i have gained the skills to be culturally aware and sensitive. In a matter of months i can learn the customs and adapt fairly well.
But i hate how these mono-kids make me feel ashamed. They make me feel as if i should be ‘normal’. That my only port of call or place of reference should be Australia and the Australian viewpoint. They don’t understand that i categorise my life to what country i was in at the time or what happened in those countries. That my TCK-ness is not something that i can ’switch off’. It is a part of me, wherever i go, whatever i do in life. The mono kids and the adults here make me feel ashamed because i am different but i sound the same and i look the same, it unnerves them i think.I just don’t want to feel ashamed anymore. I had no control over my life. I don’t want to hide this huge chunk of my life, the part that influences everything.
Sorry , i just needed to vent.
To be Sorry or not be
Right now in Australia, people are divided. Some believe that an apology to the ‘Stolen Generation’ is necessary, while others are vehemently against it believing that as a person they themselves were not responsible and so should not apologise.
For those who need a refresher course on the Stolen Generation:
From: http://www.eniar.org/stolengenerations.html
Aboriginal children — as well as those from Torres Strait Islands – between the years of 1910 - 1975 were forcibly taken from their homes. Most were raised on ‘missions’ church or state run institutions. They were forbidden to see their families and letters written by them were destroyed.
why were they taken?
It was Federal and State govt policy to take the Aboriginal kids away from their parents.
- The main motive was to ‘assimilate’ Aboriginal children into European society over one or two generations by denying and destroying their Aboriginality.
- Speaking their languages and practising their ceremonies was forbidden
- They were taken miles from their country, some overseas
- Parents were not told where their children were and could not trace them
- Children were told that they were orphans
- Family visits were discouraged or forbidden; letters were destroyed.
what were the results
The physical and emotional damage to those taken away was profound and lasting:
- Most grew up in a hostile environment without family ties or cultural identity.
- As adults, many suffered insecurity, lack of self esteem, feelings of worthlessness, depression, suicide, violence, delinquency, abuse of alcohol and drugs and inability to trust.
- Lacking a parental model, many had difficulty bringing up their own children.
- The scale of separation also had profound consequences for the whole Aboriginal community - anger, powerlessness and lack of purpose as well as an abiding distrust of Government, police and officials.
what is being done?
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10th anniversary of the |
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‘Sorry Book’ launched in UK |
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A National Inquiry was set up in 1995. Its 1997 Report ‘Bringing them Home’ contained harrowing evidence.
It found that forcible removal of indigenous children was a gross violation of human rights which continued well after Australia had undertaken international human rights commitments.
- It was racially discriminatory, because it only applied to Aboriginal children on that scale, and
- It was an act of genocide contrary to the Convention on Genocide, (which forbids ‘forcibly transferring children of [a] group to another group’ with the intention of destroying the group.)
The Report made 54 recommendations, including opening of records, family tracing and reunion services and the need for reparations’ (including acknowledgement and apology by Governments and institutions concerned, restitution, rehabilitation and compensation).
The previous Liberal/National Coalition Government increased some funding but has refused to apologise or offer compensation. Australia elected a new Government on 24th November 2007 - it’s policy is to make a formal apology to the Stolen generations.
A Senate committee has investigated the Government’s response to the Report.
People of the Stolen Generation have started legal actions for compensation against the Government .
The cases have been hard fought, as Government lawyers are arguing that removal of children was done for their own good.
A statement by the former Aboriginal Affairs Minister John Herron which denied existance of the ‘stolen generations’ caused distress and anger among those affected. Denial has marked much of the commentary.
‘Moving forward: achieving reparations’ is a project conducted in partnership with ATSIC, the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, the National Sorry Day Committee and Northern Territory stolen generation groups.
It’s report ‘Restoring identity‘, proposing a reparations tribunal for the stolen generations, has widespread support by Indigenous people.
Ministers for Aboriginal Affairs in Victoria, Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia issued public statements welcoming the report and detailing their initiatives to implement the recommendations.
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I am sorry.
I do not think the fact that i personally had nothing to do with it has got anything to do with the issue.
And the mid-1970s was not ‘back then’. Just because Howard did not implement the Act does not mean that he had to continue implementing it. He would not acknowledge the fact that he was in government at the time when children were still being stolen. And that he could have done something to stop it - or at least draw attention to it.
The act of saying ’sorry’ is in part, an act of *acknowledgment*. An acknowledgment of the pre-meditated idea of destroying a country’s native inhabitants - taking away their land, their language, their culture and their sense of family and belonging.
And then denying that it ever happens (as some of his government have done in the past). Indigenous Australians are asking - as well as the rest of Australia - well, mot - are asking for an apology from the Australian GOVERNMENT not Howard personally, and the fact that Howad took is personally is not very good leadership at all. He had his chance to apologise in 1997, but he didn’t.
Of course i know that an apology is not going to make a magic wand wave and we all to be alright. I know that it is up to Aboriginal Australia to accept the apology when it comes from PM Rudd tomorrow — as is their right.
My God, Australia sickens me sometimes.
——–
This debate is a huge part of what it means to be an ‘Australian’ - whichever side of the fence you all on. And theloss of cultural identity is something we can all sympathise/empathise over.
What i have learnt of Australia is that they feel pride over Gallipoli (where ANZAC and other countries’ troops) battled against the Turks and got annihilated. It said that they were strong and hearty and didn’t back down etc.
But (some) refuse to show guilt or shame or even acknowledge the wrongs Australia has done. You can’t have it both ways. You can’t feel pride over something ‘labelled as ‘great and heroic’ and feel all Australian and not feel shame over the terrible acts European settlement had upon the Indigenous peoples.
I’m sorry its a ‘hot’ topic atm and i just needed to vent.
The French Thread
Hi
Well, as we have a German thread as well as an Italian one, i thought of making a French one.
Also, if/when i write if you would be so kind as to correct my grammar as i suck at it?
Merci.
The TCK ‘Moments’ Thread
Hey
Well, i thought that i would make a thread where we could post about the TCK ‘moments’ that happen in our lives. Random/funny/infuriating things people say. What we say.
For example, i was buying something and paying by credit card and the lady goes “On your visa?” I just look confused and thought “Huh? I’m not travelling overseas yet, i don’t need a visa….” Then i realised that she was gesturing for my card. Whoops!
And i am still laughing over the fact that i thought that passports were given out like birth certificates! I just thought it was a normal thing. You just received it as a child. I just never had any cause to think otherwise.
The War of the Cultures
Hi
Sorry to clog up the board with more of my personal same-issues. But i’m STILL (!) struggling with the concept of possible belonging to three cultures when society pressures you to belong to one.
I was at a foreign language bookshop today with my friends and a friend was saying how her mother (who i think, works for Allicane Français) is looking for young female assistants who speak French and that she could ask her mum to interview me if my French is good enough. She then asked me how it was. I replied by saying that i can walk into a store and hold a conversation and people do not know that i am not French.
Then i shrugged and said “Y’know, just like i can be here in Australia and i can pass off as an Aussie.” I said it without thinking, half concentrating on the conversation and half on the books. There was a silence broken by my exclamation of “Ooohh! Look - Tintin!” And a friend saying “What do you mean you can ‘pass off’ as being an Aussie? I mean — hello!”
And then, there it was again. My three cultures warring inside me. I did not know what to say. I did not have the words, the vocabulary, the means by which to make them *understand* how i can be so conflicted.
I do not *feel* Australian. But i know that when i am overseas i realise that some part of me is culturally Australian. I get the humour, the social cues within the different social classes. I can’t even articulate how i am so different, even to myself.
I don’t feel comfortable enough to say that i am only from Australia, because i always see myself one step behind everyone else. I don’t feel comfortable enough to say that i solely American because my accent will betray me as will my lack of knowledge of one of my ‘hometowns’ - Los Angeles. I hate the fact that the American holidays mean virtually nothing to me.
With Mauritius, my mother always made sure that we spoke French and could speak wih our relations. She fostered a love of the country in me. But i went further. Even at the age of 8 and especially again at 13 i realised that Mauritius has been the one ‘constant’ in my life — which is partly why i feel so connected to it, apart from the fact that my family lives there. Between the moves - from the US to Australia we always returned there.
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I was reading about being a ‘hidden immigrant’ in the TCK book.
I was wondering if it is possible to be one both inside and outside your passport/home countries? For example, i identify with other cultures when i am in Australia but when i am outside of Australia i dentify partly with Australian culture?
Any comments? Thoughts? Shared experiences?
Multilingualism: what it really means
Hi
I was up late last night and got to thinking about what does it really mean to be bi- or multi-lingual?
How does one go about saying in all honesty that they are multilingual?
In my experience, different people think that being fluent in multiple languages means different things.
One person may say that you are only truly bilingual or multi-lingual if you are ‘fluent’ in the langiuage — written, spoken, slang etc. Another may say that you are only truly multi-lingual if you *understand consciously or sub-consciously* the nuances of the language and all its aspects: the things that one picks up from the culture un-knowingly. As well as being fluent in the lang.
For myself, i tend to say that i am bilingual (or that i was once upon a time) when speaking to others as a way of differentiating myself from other French-language learners. For me, the way i see it, is that French is NOT a foreign language — i understand the nuances of the language subconsciously when i am in my ‘French language mode’.(This, i know now has a name: it is called ‘priming’ — thanks Tess!) My knowledge of the language is NOT typical of the average person who learnt French at high school.
But at the same time, i feel … dishonest for saying that, because whilst i have the nuances down, my grammar and written language skills are worse than that of the average high schooler. But i know that when i spend a year there that i will be okay, i just fnd it extremely difficult to learn grammar from a book, i learn more by ear.
I am sorry that i only really delved into bilingualism in French, but i stick to what i know.
Sorry if y’all are sick of my posts! I was just wondering what other people thought.
The Literature Thread
As many of us fly regularly, we may also read regularly on those flights (or elsewhere). So i thought i’d create a Lit Thread.
The lit here doesn’t have to be about TCKs it can be the book you are reading atm, or one you’ve just finished. Or even a place to ask about long loved but forgotten books. Any genre is welcome!
If the book is one of fiction, please provide a synopsis as well as author and title.
I’ll start:
I have recently read “The Queen’s Fool” by Phillipa Gregory.
Synopsis:
A young woman caught in the rivalry between Queen Mary and her half sister, Elizabeth, must find her true destiny amid treason, poisonous rivalries, loss of faith, and unrequited love.
It is winter, 1553. Pursued by the Inquisition, Hannah Green, a fourteen-year-old Jewish girl, is forced to flee Spain with her father. But Hannah is no ordinary refugee. Her gift of “Sight,” the ability to foresee the future, is priceless in the troubled times
of the Tudor court. Hannah is adopted by the glamorous Robert Dudley, the charismatic son of King Edward’s protector, who brings her to court as a “holy fool” for Queen Mary and, ultimately, Queen Elizabeth. Hired as a fool but working as a spy; promised in wedlock but in love with her master; endangered by the laws against heresy, treason, and witchcraft, Hannah must choose between the safe life of a commoner and the dangerous intrigues of the royal family that are inextricably bound up in her own yearnings and desires.
From me: Hannah is a TCK — she often speaks of how she misses Spain, how she is sick and tired of moving countries. Others comment upon her dark skin and eyes and her Spanish accent.
A book that i am trying to find:
I have long been searching for a book set in World War Two in America. I remember details. The protagonist is a young girl (in her early teens) named Frances who is English and has been evacuated to America for the duration of the war. She stays with a rich family who do not care that there is a war happening as it does not affect them. Frances is scared for her brother who is serving in the armed forces and wishes to be back home. She cannot understand why these people have no empathy for others’ suffering. In the end, her brother dies and Frances grows to learn that not all Americans are bad — she is given a necklace with both the British and American flags.
See? I can remeber all that but i can’t remember the author’s name!
Explaining the TCK experience to others
Hey
I was at a lunch the other day with my karate group and it was one of the first times that i had met one of the new instructors, Chris.
We get to talking and it turns to “Where are you from?” I say that i was born in LA, raised there til i was about 6, then moved here to Sydney, but i spoke French as my first language. And the poor guy just didn’t understand. I tried to spare him by saying at the beggining that “It’s a really long story… you sure you want to hear it?”. He had this tight, polite smile on his face, and obviously looked unconfortable, so, thinking that i was being rude by talking about myself, i asked him if he had ever been anywhere, and he looked even more uncomfortable and said “No”.
I mean, i read the situation well enough and gave him plenty of outs, to move the conversation along….
I felt bad and i’m not quite sure why. Was it that he felt somehow threataned by the fact that i have more overseas experience? That i am bilingual.
I just wanted to say “I’m a third culture kid, you wouldn’t understand.”
I mean, having been born elsewhere is a HUGE part of my life… it IS my life. I don’t see why i should be made to feel…. bad about it. If i don’t have my experiences then i am nothing.
Being from an expat family makes up my identity, and as do my experiences outside of this island. Even if i haven’t moved coutries as much as all of you, i’ve moved houses and schools.
Attatchment et al.
Hey y’all,
[By the way - if this is incooherent or full of mistakes, its because its late and i really should be alseep!]
1. I was wondering if anyone else has trouble with forming attachments to people/places/things for fear of losing them or, when the itch to move comes, to not have the strength to make the ‘necessary’ move?
That is the reason that i don’t really want to have a boyfriend at uni because i know that it will be short-term — once i leave, i don’t see myself coming back for long periods of time. As someone here (or on the FB group) said “Passpoirt countries are for visiting and nostalgia, not for living in.”
When i say ‘necessary’ i mean in the instance where you are just not happy there anymore. I have had the urge to move from Australia from the moment i set foot here when i was a youngu’un. I hated the place for YEARS. There are still aspects of it that i detest, but others that i love.
2. Even though i do not fully conform to Australian culture nor values nor activities, i realise when i leave the country that i *am* culturally, Australian more than i am American. But i do have the added ‘bonus’ of being half-Mauritian. They are different to the French, as Australians are different to Brits. Linguistically(French/English) mostly similar, with some of the same cultural aspects but mainly not.
3. Does anyone else use ‘excuses’ of being a TCK? For example when i don’t know some Aussie cultural thing i excuse myself and say it was because i was not living here, or when someone finds out i’m by birth an American, and say some historical reference i don’t get i say it was because i neve rlearnt American history the way they did (in the American school system). I went to a French Lycee in LA.
4. Does anyone else feel that if they only say that they are from ONE county that they are disowning the others or the effect that these countries have had upon you and your sense of self? When i say i’m Australian, or someone introduces me as an Australian, i feel obligated to say that i was born in LA and raised there for the first few years of my life but that we spoke French at home and at school.
I do not fully understand WHY i do this.
Its just that the fact that i was born in LA means a lot to me — and i don’t fully know WHY as i have no cultural attachment to it. I have never lived in Mauritius for any length of time apart from a few months/six months when i was a kid and holidays but i feel an attachment culturally because it is where my mother came from and where my extended family gather.
Australia is where i have lived throughout my pre-teen and teen-years and where my father is from. So in thought patterns i know that i am Australian — but also Franco-Mauritian.
It’s confusing! I am sorry if i am not explaing myself coherently or succinctly enough, feel free to ask questins and i’ll answer!
Introducing Isa
Hey everyone!
I am so doing this for a LOLCat…
I was wondering if i really was a TCK or not. I haven’t moved around as much as others’ here have.
I was born in LA and lived there for the first seven years of my life, then we relocated to Australia. My dad is Australian, and my mother is Mauritian so we spoke French at home. Also, in LA we( my brother and i) went to the Lycée français of Los Angeles, and not a ‘regular’ public school. So we were outsiders there too.
I didn’t want to leave, because i felt that i had no connection to Australia even though i hold dual citizenship between the Us and Oz. So i built up LA as a dream place to live, because it was where i had been happy. It was what i knew. In Australia, in the playgrounds and schools, i was an outsider because i had not been born there and my main language was French.
Through the years (i’m 19 now) all i wanted to do was leave because it was always easiest to me to be a stranger in a strange land then to be one in a country where i was supposed to call my own. We also lived in Mauritius for a few months when we first moved to Australia which further confused me.
I’ve often felt rootless and have no real identity. I do not feel American nor do i feel particularly Australian, nor Franco-Mauritian. I’ve had the term “Third Culture Kid” thrown at me by certain people throughout my life, my old tutor who is an Los Angeles expat himself, and several psychologists over the years.
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I am still unsure if i ‘fit the bill’ of being a TCK… i haven’t moved countries as much as you but i have moved houses and schools many times in Australia.
I think i’ll just take Brice’s stand and say that i’m an islander at heart.
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