About: mairabay
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Name:mairabay
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- Born in Brazil, then moved to England, then back to Brazil, then to Wales, then Back to Brazil. Now planning on moving to Canada in 2009 (or maybe even 2008!). MSN: mairabay AT hotmail DOT com Skype: mairabay
2007-11-23 21:22:41
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Posts by mairabay:
Write your own “where I’m from” poem
I stumbled across this site some time ago: http://www.georgeellalyon.com/where.html.
It’s a poem where the writer explains where she’s from. Not by saying a name of a city or country, but rather by displaying images, smells, sounds.
Where I’m From
I am from clothespins,
from Clorox and carbon-tetrachloride.
I am from the dirt under the back porch.
(Black, glistening,
it tasted like beets.)
I am from the forsythia bush
the Dutch elm
whose long-gone limbs I remember
as if they were my own.
I’m from fudge and eyeglasses,
from Imogene and Alafair.
I’m from the know-it-alls
and the pass-it-ons,
from Perk up! and Pipe down!
I’m from He restoreth my soul
with a cottonball lamb
and ten verses I can say myself.
I’m from Artemus and Billie’s Branch,
fried corn and strong coffee.
From the finger my grandfather lost
to the auger,
the eye my father shut to keep his sight.
Under my bed was a dress box
spilling old pictures,
a sift of lost faces
to drift beneath my dreams.
I am from those moments–
snapped before I budded –
leaf-fall from the family tree.
I really like this “definition” of “where I’m from”, because it makes sense to us TCKs. We’re not tied to a certain country (like some people expect us to be), we define ourselves in a puzzle/rubick’s cube/tapestry kind of way. We are a collection of experiences, sights, sounds, smells, tastes, etc.
Then in the website she proposes people to write their own “where I’m from” poem. I think this can really help us, because we start to think and explore where we are really from.
I particularly like what she says at the end:
Remember, you are the expert on you. No one else sees the world as you do; no one else has your material to draw on. You don’t have to know where to begin. Just start. Let it flow. Trust the work to find its own form.
So I propose each person writes their own poem and posts it here!
Maira’s Blog - Finally finding a sense of belonging in the “home” country
Yes! After 2 years of repatriating and “killing” many “demons” I’m finally finding a way I can belong in my “home” country without compromising the “world citizen” in me!
For those who don’t know me, I lived in the UK as a child and repatriated to Brazil when I was 7, but always felt depressed, confused, unloved and insecure (because of many things that happened at that time and through the rest of my teen/pre-teen years). I never even realised I felt like that. To me, I was just a problematic person who would never be happy and have a normal life.
When I came back from Canada in 2006 after a 2-month cultural exchange, I felt the pain of repatriation, reverse culture shock, grief (and so many other feelings TCKs know well) in a VERY strong way. It was then that I realised that I had felt like this before, when I was 7. I then had the urge/instinct that I was not going to heal unless I healed the unresolved feelings/pain from when I was 7 - I was finally ready to deal with my hidden and delayed grief.
That’s when I started reading about culture and allowing myself to feel like a stranger in the country where I grew up believing I was ”one of them”. During this research I found out about TCK, and later joined TCKid.
The book and the people in this site have given me the validation of my feelings - something I’ve been needing since way back when I was 7 - because it has healed the feeling I grew up with that ”nobody gets me”. It has also healed many other feelings and wrong beleifs that I developed as a consequence of repatriation. I cannot put in words how helpful it’s been, because it’s something I never even thought was possible.
But for this post, the most important feeling is the security in my identity. After around 1 year of sharing stories and feelings with people here, I can now say “I am a world citizen”. I don’t feel afraid to tell other people and myself that I have lived overseas, I’m not afraid of their judgement anymore. Because even if they say “no you’re not, you’re Brazilian”, I have a bunch of people who agree with me. And I now know who is right. I know my truth and I have people to back me up.
But so far, this is a sense of belonging to a group of people spread all over the world. What this post is about is the sense I have now found with a group of people in my “home” town.
Since I came back from Canada, I’ve been going to this French conversation group (we meet at a bookstore once a week just to chat in French) . Most of the people there have lived in France or some other francophone country. So together with my healing on TCKid, I started realising that I feel more comfortable to talk about my life overseas around those people.
And then, just a few months ago, something very nice happened. A new girl joined the group, and we started talking about the feelings of repatriation and she had many of the feelings I did, and her feelings were as strong as mine! It felt great to finally have someone who understood me in ”real life” (I was definitely NOT a drama queen!). Then in these last weeks, two other girls who’ve recently moved back have also joined the group.
Then one of the girls told me about an English conversation group, similar to the French one. So I started going to this one too. And I was even suprised with myself at how “at ease” I felt when expressing myself and talking to that group. I feel SO comfortable talking in English, it definitely is my 2nd mother tongue. Just having a random everyday conversation in English makes me feel really at home.
So, lately, I’ve been making friends and meeting people that are like me. I can mix languages when I talk to them, I can say how much I miss certain things from certain countries. I can have these conversations just as people talk about the weather, without worrying or refraining from giving my opinion and expressing my true feelings.
This is my sense of belonging. I was thinking about all this one of these days and realised that, there IS a place for me here, there IS a group of people in this country where I belong to. I have my place in this country. Of course I will never belong to the majority (not that I even want to). But the best thing is, I DON’T HAVE to belong to the majority to feel like I belong here. That’s the catch.
That’s the catch I didn’t know about when I was 20 and thought the only way for me to belong was to be like an average Brazilian (and ended up making me go against many of my values, but that’s a story for another day). That’s the catch I didn’t know about when I was 7 and felt ”left out” at school. This feeling kept echoing inside me throughout my life, until now. But now I know that I can be myself and still belong here.
So I’m really really happy that I have finally found my place in the city/country where I grew up thinking that there was no place for me.
I hope this post helps other TCKs out there find their sense of belonging. There IS a place for us in this world! No matter where you are, be strong!
Do mono people like us more than we like them?
This has to do with Connie’s post and someone else’s that was talking about how we feel disconnected to people. I have this impression (despite my childhood “everybody hates me” trauma with Brazilians), that people here like me more than I like them. And I think it’s related to those levels of relationships that the TCK book talks about.
For instance, I had this colleague at work who had lived in France so sometimes we spoke French during work. Which was really fun, but I never shared my TCK-ish feelings with him cause I wasn’t sure he’d understand. And then, out of the blue (at least in my mind), he just invited me to his wedding (which in Brazil is a very expensive party, so you usually only invite a few close friends and the family). I felt very honoured, but also surprised, because *I* didn’t consider him such a close friend. Sure, we connected because we both spoke French and we both knew what it’s like to live in another country, but I don’t feel the same connection with him as I feel with you guys.
So then I started thinking about other people too, that invite me to things or just care about me (in their own Brazilian way, which many times I perceive as being nosy), but that I don’t really connect to. And I started wondering “why?”. Is it because they feel connected to me in the deepest way that they can connect, but for me that is still shallow? Because their connection only goes as deep as say level 3, while for me to really feel connected to someone I need to get to level 5?
The TCK book talks about levels of relationships and how TCKs easily get into the deepest level of conversation. I’ve never been able to talk about the things that we talk here with monocultural people. The way we discuss ourselves, culture, racism, many other subjects is very “deep”imo, something that I know I will NEVER be capable of with the average mono. But I think that for them, they are able to get in their deepest level with me.
This also reminds me of another related idea. They say TCKs are good listeners, because we are tolerant, open-minded, bla bla bla. But who listens to us?
I am one of those good listeners. So maybe that’s why people feel connected to me, because they feel they can open up with me. But I know that I can’t open up with THEM, because they are not as half as open-minded as I am. They wouldn’t be capable of holding this “conversation”. I grew up used to the fact that I have very few people in my life who actually listen to me.
So what do you think? Do you feel like people connect to you even though you don’t connect to them? Have you ever realised that people consider you a friend and someone they can open up to, but you know that you can’t truly open up to them?
wo bist du, onkel?
(as you can see, my German is improving 
Where are you, Dan? I haven’t seen you around here for a while…
I have you on MSN and FB but I’m too lazy to call you 
…(that’s so silly right?!) Plus I think I’m getting re-addicted to posting/commenting on tckid
Oh, and I’m also getting addicted to spreading lolcats (oh no, I think I got Brice’s disease!)
There’s a TV show about a TCK!
hey, I was zapping the other day, and yes, I stopped at Boomerang - a TV channel for teens. But I think it’s cool cause they have some shows from Australian TV and that’s like the only chance I get to hear some aussie english.
but back to the point of this post: I was watching the end of another show and then they announced the next one. Something about a girl in Africa. So I thought I’d watch it and see what it was about. If nothing else, I’d at least get to see some african landscape.
The show was actually interesting, and as I was watching it, I suddenly realised: woaaa!! This girl is a TCK! They’re making a TV show about a TCK!
Isn’t that cool??!!!
The name of the show is Scout’s Safari. Has anyone seen it?
<img src=”http://kids.discovery.com/fansites/scoutssafari/photo/gallery/3_h_zm.jpg”>
“The show revolved around Jennifer “Scout” Lauer, a teenage girl who lived the simple life in New York City until her photographer father is sent on year-round trip around the world and is forced to live with her mother (Cheryl) and her new husband (Roger) at a resort in South Africa. While she is there she is exposed to a new world, going to a new school, and reunites with an old friend named Bongani. While still keeping in contact with her old friend Sherna via webcam and has to deal with her stepdad’s bratty young son Tyler. Bongani, who believes strongly in his South African culture, lives with his Uncle C.B., a veterinarian. During the course of the series Scout eventually becomes more comfortable in her new sourroundings.”
Check out these links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scout’s_Safari
http://kids.discovery.com/fansites/scoutssafari/scoutssafari.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=157lOeIo2fk
It’s too bad they don’t have any episodes on her repatriation 
Maira’s Blog - Traveling keeps me healthy
My trip to Chile was awesome!
Here is the link to the photos: http://mairabay.shutterfly.com/
It felt so good to be the Foreigner! I could be whoever I wanted , do whatever I wanted. Nobody had expectations from me. This was SO good. It was such a weight off my shoulders.
And because I didn’t have to worry about other people, I was free to LIVE. To explore the places and enjoy my life! That’s why I say: traveling keeps me healty, sane.
I went to the Atacama desert and it was so cool, because there were tourists from all over the place there. I heard many languages. And because I spoke most of them, I was able to understand many different people: the British, the Aussies, the Americans, the Canadians, the French, the Belgians, the Chileans, the Brazilians… it was so cool to be surrounded by all these people. And many of them spoke 2 (or more) languages too, so I wasn’t the only polyglot there. I felt SO comfortable with all those people around me. It felt really, really good.
You know when monos travel to a very different country and they hear someone speaking their mother tongue and they get all excited? That happened to me with French. I did get happy when I heard English too, but with French, I was much happier, I couldn’t help a smile coming to my face each time I heard it. I felt “at home”. It’s funny because French is my Second Language (I consider Portuguese and English my Mother Tongues).
And when I heard Brazilian Portuguese I had to control myself not to think “yuck…run, run, run away from them!” I did manage to make friends with some Brazilian people. I realised that as long as I don’t talk to them for more than a few minutes it’s ok.
An intersting story is the star-gazing trip I did. There were 2 options of language (Spanish or English) and I chose English (simply because my Spanish is not as good as my English). So the people in my tour were mostly British. The #1 thing I learned was that annoying teenagers are annoying in any language (luckily the group wasn’t made up of only teenagers).
But the belonging thing was very intersting. At first I felt a bit out of place: even though I told them I had lived in the UK as a kid, my British accent is all gone; and I knew I wasn’t exactly 100% like them, I wasn’t thinking or behaving exactly like them. But in the middle of the trip I got so used to the accent and to “thinking in English”, that I was already pronouncing words in British and feeling like I belonged to the group. It’s funny how this all happened in maybe 1 hour. I realised the chamaleon thing works VERY VERY fast in me.
And again, it was a comfortable position, because I was ”the Brazilian girl who had lived for a while in the UK”, I was not a ”British girl”, I didn’t have to be like one of them. Whoever I was would be ok for them.
So this is my tip for those who are suffering in their “home” country. Try to find a multicultural group or travel to a different nearby country, just find a way to get out of the Hidden Immigrant for a while. It really does wonders for your mental sanity.
About the being alone thing: at first I was a bit sad to be traveling alone, but when I started exploring the city, having fun on my own, it started to go away. I felt even better in the desert where I met many other people who were also traveling alone (and just being in that multi-cultural/multi-lingual environment made me feel so “at home”, and when you’re home you never feel alone :). And many people actually complimented me on “how brave I was” to travel alone, so that boosted my self-confidence too. In the end of the trip I was thinking “those losers who preferred to stay in Floripa missed SO MANY cool things”.
Oh, and I saw some cats there. And since I promised to send the pics to Brice, I thought I’d share them here with the rest of you too:
Maira’s Blog - Travel Anxiety
[warning: this post is totally random disconnected moaning]
I woke up early - on a holiday! - and couldn’t sleep anymore, I think it was insomnia. Now my stomach feels weird (I did eat a big piece of cake though).
It seems like all my health problems are surfacing together.
Ok, nevermind. I’m being too dramatic (as usual :P). I think there’s some PMS too.
I’m pretty screwed up right? can’t even handle a pre-travel anxiety, have all my problems surface at once.
why do I criticize myself so much? why am I so perfectionist?
well, from all of the people in the world (literally) you guys are the ones who get me, who get all of the crap I’ve been through. And many of you have been to similar or even worse things, right? But we all survived. We’re all here and that’s all that matters.
So yesterday I went to meet this TCK, that I found out lives in the same city I do. He found me through this website and recognized the city through my ranting! (lol it’s funny, but I’m glad my ranting was useful for something positive!)
His life was different than mine because he always knew he was different from everyone else (unlike me). And talking to him, I just realized how messed up I am (emotionally) and how lonely I am. Just because of this tiny little detail in my childhood.
And why? why on Earth can’t I just get over it?
So now I realized I need people. I’m traveling alone (which is good in a way) but I wish I was going with friends. But I shut myself from people (thinking “these stupid monos, never got me, treat me like crap, always judging me, etc”) and this is the consequence.
I’m changing this feeling now. I’m realising that monos can be good people, if I stop being so scared of them. The world is nice and people are nice. I just have to believe more in that.
All I know is I’ve got to get myself together. Come on, I went all the way to Canada in 06 by myself, for 2 months. I’ve accomplished so many other things.
The good news is that there are people in Chile. That sounds funny right? But yes, sometimes I forget people exist. I get trapped in my stupid problems.
So hopefully I will meet people, and they will be nice to me 
even if it’s just the people in the hotels, shops, etc.
Ok, I promise you and myself that I will have a good time. I’ll take tons of pictures and post them somewhere.
Just go out there and have fun, girl!
any TCKs in Chile?
hey guys
I’m going to Chile for a short trip, from may 26th to june 2nd. I think it’s going to be pretty cool, to get a break from the Hidden Immigrant box and do what I know to do best: travel! explore!
So, is there anyone in Santiago or San Pedro de Atacama? I don’t know if I’ll have much free time but still I think it would be cool to meet other TCKs.
Check out my yahoo trip plan: http://travel.yahoo.com/trip-view-1620350-chile_2008;_ylt=Apd2U4UzzlReaN_uguqMuA.cItAF
here’s my email in case anyone wants to meet: mairabayATyahooDOTcom (or leave a comment here, duh!)
and yeah, I’ll post the pictures somewhere after the trip so I can share them with you all
Almost 1000 members!!!
guys, did you notice?
we have almost 1000 members!!!
I remember just a while ago we were suprised it was reaching …what 200 or 300 members?
way to go Brice! thanks for creating this site! It is indeed the fastest growing community of TCKs on the net!
Maira’s Blog - Clothes
OK, since you are TCKs, I don’t need to remind you that people dress differently in different parts of the world. But do you notice that even the small things (like jeans and a t-shirt) are different?
I also don’t need to remind you that clothes are part of the cultural identity of a people. But what happens when you are a TCK? What are your clothes? How to they define you?
I bought this fleece pullover yesterday (I think you people have already “heard” me complain of how Brazilian culture is not prepared for cold weather) because I know it warms me, I know it’s a good way to keep me from the cold. Because that’s who I am. If a culture has found a way to solve a problem, why not take it for yourself and use it too? I thought it was a great idea to buy a fleece pullover (north american culture cloth) and not feel cold in the winter here (in south america).
I had to go to a sports shop and pay a not very cheap price for it (but still cheaper than having it shipped from Land’s End). But I was happy enough that they DO sell it here now.
The wierd feeling came to me, though, when I looked at it laying on my chair, in front of the window, palm trees outside. (before anyone says anything: it does get cold in winter here, like 7C - not counting the wind chill - and very humid)
It seemed it didn’t fit in the picture, you know? What is a pullover from north america doing here? It shouted at me. It didn’t belong in the scene.
But the thing is, I feel cold. And I don’t want to wear 3 Brazilian pseudo-winterish layers of cloth just to feel as warm as I would with a fleece pullover.
I guess what really bugged me is that the fleece is a part of me. A part of me that doesn’t belong here. But it IS here - and I WANT it here.
What I am trying to ask in this post is: why did it bother me so much? Why did it feel so wierd, so painful (like the pain of reverse cultural shock/reentry)? Why is it so painful for me to blend my cultures together in just one person? Why do I still think I that I am a collection of separate lives (each time I lived in a country was a different life)? Why is it so hard for me to accept my own multiculturality?
ok, maybe I went a bit too far. I do accept myself. But I still don’t SEE myself like that sometimes. (this is hard to explain)
do you guys ever feel like you have many personalities (like masks) and each one fits only in one country, and you cannot abosolutely wear mask A in country B? as if you’d be arrested or something? do you ever dream people are chasing you?
(ok, whoever reads this will definately think I have serious psychological problems :S)
I’m just sleepy, tired, just wanted somebody to talk. Somebody that would get all this. That would help me understand why on earth did I feel so much pain looking at that piece of cloth (that peice of me?) that does not belong here.
Maybe it’s only me who has the answers to my own questions. But still, does anyone relate?
Good night!
Maira’s Blog - I’m back (sort of)
hey guys, I know I’ve been away for a long time and you must be wondering what happened
so here it is:
I’ve had an RSI (repetitive strain injury - that thing you get when you work too much in the computer) and had to stay away from work and the computer for the last 2 weeks
(I’ve spent the whole time at home, doing physiotherapy everyday, applying ice packs on my wrists twice a day, stretching 3 times a day and sleeping with hand braces - not fun)
I’ve missed you all so much! :~) This site really helps me get in a good mood and sometimes it was hard without it (ok, I’m getting very emotional, I know)
I won’t be spending as much time as before in the computer so I won’t be logging here very often 
at least not till I get 100% better
I have to take care of myself or else this will develop into a chronic condition (according to my doctor)
plus, my home PC broke, so I’ll have to “steal” my brother’s PC
(I’m at work now)
ok, enough drama for today
sorry if this post wasn’t very cheery
I’ll try to catch up with some posts and check the replies to my last blog post now
Maira’s blog - And then I decided to count.
I decided to count how many days I’d go with (or later I decided it was easier to count the days without) going through these cultural shocks like the one I described on my other blog post
So it’s been 2 weeks, and the count so far is …. *surprise*: 0. (I realised something that I already thought was true) I don’t go ONE SINGLE DAY in this country without feeling out of place
without feeling like people around me are different than me
without feeling like my opinion diverges from everyone else’s so I’d better keep them to myself or else people will keep pushing their thoughts against me “everyone thinks X and you think Y, it’s obvious that YOU are wrong” (I HATE when they do that)
without feeling a conflict of cultures each time I try to cross the street or simply look around me
without realising that I’m so much more open-minded than other people that they wouldn’t get my point of view even if I tried to explain it, so (once again) I’d better stay quiet and keep my ideas to myself
without not getting jokes people make, or worse, feeling offended by them
without making a joke that no one understands - but it made sense to me, I swear!
without having people say to me “you are so naive!”
without having people look at me funny, or stare at me (and I have no idea why - or maybe I do: for me, I’m dressed normally, but for them, who knows?!)
without thinking “I don’t get these people”
without realising how my values are different from theirs
without feeling judged by their looks
without feeling a ‘wierdo’ because I don’t have a life like theirs, because I’m not buying an appartment and/or getting married (the “normal” thing for people my age here), or because I’m not going to nightclubs and getting drunk as much as I possibly can (also something “normal” here)
…
The list could go on forever - do you guys feel like that in your “home” country too?
I think I’m realising what that Hong-Kong TCK girl (see the ‘videos’ post) said in her video: You never stop feeling uncomfortable in your “home” country, you just learn to cope.
The only place where I feel 100% comfortable is in this site, where I “talk” with the people that think and feel like me.
I thought I could maybe one day feel this way here in Brazil, but maybe I’m wrong. Maybe that’s what being a TCK is about.
It feels wierd because this is what I’ve been chasing my whole life: to “belong” here, and now I realise that it’s just not possible. Period.
So that’s it: maybe I should stop chasing. This could be my next goal in life, to stop trying to belong here. Sounds new and wierd but makes sense. Right?
Maira’s blog - yet more cultural shock
Ok, I think it’s about time I start a blog here. Not that I promise to keep it. Yeah, like other people who’ve started a blog on this site, I’m not very good at comitting. But I’ll try.
So here it goes (I thought about posting it on the “TCK moments” thread, but figured it wasn’t exactly one, so I decided to start my blog with it):
For those who don’t know, I’ve been living (or shall I say surviving) in my “home” country for (ugh!) 18 years now. In 2006 I went to Canada for 2 months and had a terrible reverse cultural shock and it’s how I ended up finding out about TCK.
We’re in 2008 so one would think the cultural shock should have been gone by now. But I just found out it hasn’t. And probably never will. Sigh!
So I was in sailing class and my teacher was talking about another classmate “yeah, Chris started the classes but then he went to live in Germany [at this point I thought “oh cool”]. But he stayed there for some time and realised that it’s not his thing, that Brazil is the best place to live and our city is the best city in the country.”
At this point my thoughts were pretty mature and I thought “oh, good for him, he figured out where he wants to live and where he belongs.”
But then, the most shocking thing happened!
One of the other classmates went in a jokingly tone “what? he had to go all the way to Germany to find out that HERE is the best place to live?” [as if it were obvious to him and the whole world that this city and Brazil is the best place to live in the WHOLE WIDE WORLD]. If it were another moment, I’d totally freak out with the guy. But I just said calmly “well, some people sometimes have to go all the way around the world to figure out where they want to live.”
But the teacher went “yeah, everyone wants to move here [I do live in a city where lots of tourists come in the summer and fall in love and decide to move here (and they buy properties and real estate is sky rocketing)], and the guy goes to Germany!”. And the other classmate was like “yeah, this place is a paradise”. (btw both of these classmates are from other cities of Brazil and probably moved here the way I just said)
At this point I was burning inside. But since long ago I’ve learned to keep my mouth shut and keep my opinions for myself when I see that everyone else around me will diverge. So I stayed quiet.
But it kinda freaked me out a little. I mean, these are cool people. We go sailing together and we learn together. We never talk too much, but they always seemed like nice open-minded people (who are doing a different sport, because I live in a beach town and EVERYBODY surfs here - meaning of course that I grew up hating surfers because I wouldn’t/didn’t want to allow myself to belong here).
But anyway, they seemed like nice people to whom I could relate to in some way, because we enjoy the same sport. But apparently that’s where it ends. That’s all I can relate to.
It felt like a cultural shock to me. Like I had just found out that the people that I considered “my own” in some way, weren’t.
It’s terrible. It’s the (reverse?) cultural shock still going on. I put “reverse” in parenthesis because, well, this isn’t 100% my home country and city.
It just feels so strange. How I suddenly find out that they’re so different from me. I don’t belong here I never did (ok, maybe when I was 3 before I ever left this country I did) and I never will.
It’s complicated because it’s a mixed feeling. Of wanting and not wanting to belong. Maybe it’s not really a “wanting to belong” but more of a sadness for not belonging, to the place that I’m supposed to belong. But I don’t. I just don’t. And I’ve already tried belonging and it went against my values, so “thanks, but no thanks”. But it just feels wierd.
Maybe it’s also the pressure, because everyone loves this city so much, how could I not enjoy even one tiny bit of it? (this is what made me start these sailing classes in the first the place - and I AM actually enjoying sailing). But I just have to conform that I’ll never be able to love this place 100% like everyone else does, because my values aren’t all here, because I’ve seen so much of the world that I can’t say there is ONE best city to live in, because I know that every city has it’s good and it’s bad part, because I know that everyone has a different life story and thus will feel more or less comfortable in one place or another. I’m sorry Brazil, I just can’t.
ok, drama session over…I just wanted to get this off my chest
Cat things! A present for TCKid =D
Hey everyone!
When I realised how much Brice liked cats I thought about taking
and posting the pictures of some cat things I have because I love cats too.
So here goes my xmas present for all of you:
Hi Everyone, I’m Maira
Hi everyone
Here is my introduction:
I was born in Brazil and moved to London (England) when I was 3. Then I moved back to Brazil when I was 4 and then moved to Cardiff (Wales) when I was 6. And then moved back to Brazil when I was 7.
I went abroad because my dad went to these places to take his Master’s degree and a Diploma. So I’m not the most usual kind of TCK (diplomat, missionary, etc) .
It doesn’t seem like that much moving compared to some of you guys, but believe me, comming back to a small-minded town at 7 years old was enough to mess up my life. I obviously didn’t fit in and my school classmates would laugh at me and play jokes on me all the time. So I grew up hating those people (I went to the same school with them until I was 15) and spent my whole teenage being as anti-social as I possibly could. Then in university I realized that I couldn’t hide from social relationships forever, so I started opening up. Because I didn’t know about the TCK thing, I thought that I had to be like everyone else, like “normal” people, and do what all the other average teens my age were doing. I never felt 100% comfortable doing that, but I thought there was no other way.
So my whole life has been this huge identity crysis, and now it seems like finally I’m going in the right direction! I finally know who I really am, and I don’t have to hide this from myself nor from other people anymore! Hooray for Pollock and the others who identified and reasearched this whole TCK thing!
Even though I went through all of this, I thank my parents every day for taking me with them when they lived abroad. I know how open-minded it made me. I actually joke with my mom that the only thing they did wrong was to bring me back to Brazil!
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