About: nick

Name:nick
2007-12-08 11:42:13
http://thatplacecalledhome.wordpress.com
Profile
Born in the US to Swiss and British parents (giving me three passports), I've lived in the US, China, India, Egypt, England, Switzerland, Belgium and France.

Posts by nick:

Blasé attitude to cultural differences?

I have a blog I write on about my TCK thoughts/experiences/reflections/whatever crosses my mind and, at Brice’s (very good) suggestion, I thought I’d start posting some of my posts that are possibly slightly more relevant to other (A)TCKs on here.

Something that I’ve been thinking about recently is our attitude to multiculturalism/cultural differences. I spent the last 5 months or so in Belgium, with other international students. The key word is international students - not TCKs. In other words they all had their home culture to which they could identify (all European - Spanish, German, English, Italian, etc.) and to which they felt like they belonged. I obviously don’t have that, but to me it was a TCK-ish setting, because like me they were all living in a host country and we were all learning about Belgian culture. But what struck me was that they seemed to pick up on some cultural differences more than I did, or at least more quickly.

I got to wondering why this was the case - whether they were simply more apt at picking up the differences, or if there was a reason for it as a result of our backgrounds. I won’t re-type my entire post though, for those of you who are interested the link is: http://www.wanderlusttck.blogspot.com/

I just wondered if anyone else on here had experienced the same thing and even if you haven’t, if you have any thoughts or comments on it.

Having said that though, and as I mention in another post on my blog, I found it fascinating watching these non-TCKs I was with discuss the Belgian culture as well as comparing their own cultures, i.e. comparing Spanish and English and German Christmas traditions. It was like watching TCKs being formed, just not in their developmental years like us!

January 5, 2008 | Filed Under General Forum | 12 Comments 

Introducing… Nick

Hi everyone,

I joined a couple of days ago and thought I’d introduce myself…

My name is Nick, I’m 21 years old and a TCK. I was born in Texas (therefore I have an American passport) to a Swiss father (hence a Swiss passport) and an English mother (hence a British passport).  I lived in Texas for the first 8 years of my life, then I moved to China for 3 years, then to India for 3 years, then Egypt for 1.5 years.  After that my parents moved to Switzerland (to the ‘family home’) and I went to a boarding school in England.

I am now studying for a degree in Mechanical Engineering with French in England.  Although as part of that, I have to do an internship in a French speaking country, so I’ve spent the last half year living in Belgium.  I’m going to see my parents in Switzerland for Christmas, but after that I’m going to live in France to do another internship.  I also semi-lived (and worked) in Switzerland last summer.

I’ve spent 4.5 years living in England (one of my ‘home’ countries) and have rarely felt so un-at-home!  When I moved to England from Egypt, my Dad’s company gave us very very short notice (three weeks after they told us I was in a boarding school).  I was also 16 at the time, hardly the best age to tell me what to do. :P  Anyway, I ended up feeling really lost/alone and am slowly getting back on my feet and figuring out what I want to do with my life.  Also like many TCKs it seems, I’m most comfortable with other TCKs.

So that’s my life and my issues in a nutshell!

December 13, 2007 | Filed Under Introduction | 8 Comments