I’m New
Ok, so my name is Patricia and like most people here I’m a TCK. I was born in the US but when I turned a year old my family moved to Japan. I’ve been there for practically my whole childhood. I’m also a Navy brat by the way and I must say it was the best childhood I’ve had the luck to experience. I’ve taken time to go back to the US and I always went to the Philippines for vacation because I’m a Filipina.
However, I’ve also been in China for a bit. Recently…about 3 years ago I moved to the Philippines and I thought it would be fine. How wrong I was. Pretty much I’ve hated my entire stay here (people just don’t understand and the country doesn’t agree with me weather and food wise) and pretty soon I’m going back to the US. I’ve been going through the dark side of being a TCK lately.
The depression and all but I’m glad I had my TCK friends for support even though my family doesn’t understand. The internet is like a blessing and so I found this site and was amazingly surprised. I had no idea there was such a term as TCK before until yesterday and I had no idea this was even considered a sub-culture of sorts.
So, hope to enjoy it here. ^_^ It feels like I’ve stumbled into a wonderful place like Alice’s Wonderland. If my intro sounds awkward it’s cause it is. I was never good at making intros.
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23 Comments to “I’m New”
May 25th, 2008 at 11:43 am
Welcome to the site! =) I just found it myself a few weeks ago, to be honest and only started really contributing last week =)
I’ll introduce myself to ya as well: name’s André, Filipino passport holder, grew up in India and Europe. Spent a considerable amount of time in the US as well. I am currently in France, studying. Going back to the Philippines for a year or so, then coming back =)
Trust me, this site has done a lot for me than I thought it would ever do and I’m glad I found it. I’m sure it’ll help you as well =) Good luck and enjoy!
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May 25th, 2008 at 12:12 pm
Cadpig,
I am so glad you found this website! When I first came here, it was revolutionary for me–the fact that there were people out there who felt the same way I did about many things and I could instantly relate! Whoa~~~ I am sooo happy for you!
Feel free to check out my intro here: http://www.tckid.com/group/little-mints-about-miyon/
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May 25th, 2008 at 12:17 pm
Welcome Cadpig,
I’m almost the opposite of you where I moved from Japan to the Philippines when I was two, going back to Japan on vacation, etc.
It’s always hard to go back to your passport country because people will expect you to be like everyone else and will wonder what’s wrong with you…but take heart…there are lots of us here!
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May 25th, 2008 at 12:48 pm
Hey Cadpig!
Haha, I’m Filipina too, and that’s not the only thing we have in common. I don’t like it much over there either. I mean, for a visit, I would enjoy it, but I’d hate to live there. Like you said, people just don’t understand. Kinda like my cousins over there - we never get along. I mean, I can’t even understand them (I mean I’m fluent in Tagalog but they speak another dialect.. so yeahhhh).
My bestfriend repatriated over there a year ago and she still hasn’t adjusted.. if I moved back, I’d DIE. My dad threatens to send me back down there whenever I screw up, haha.
Well, just hang in there. Make yourself feel at home!
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May 25th, 2008 at 1:08 pm
I had it easier I guess…adjusting to life in the Philippines. I spent my last two years of high school (IB1 and IB2) in the European school so it was like a mix of my usual life with my new life and it made the transition easier.
However, it was when I decided to attend University that I realized how different life is over there. It took me about a year to completely adjust to life there. But I considered it as part of my life’s adventure and I made the most of it!!!
In the beginning though, I was “labeled” as an “ingelesero” because of my Tagalog - which was taught to me by my parents, and hence, old fashioned…by a few decades, hahaha - so I tended to speak more English, a language in which I am fluent. That’s just an example.
What helped me adjust was just immerse myself in the University culture. I joined student clubs and it helped me adjust a lot…I learned the “normal speak” as well as made a lot of friends. My “best friend” in University, however, is someone I met in my first week there. He is a local, born and bred, so he helped me even more to adjust…though he still makes fun of me sometimes!!! Hahaha. I know we’ll never completely understand each other’s mindsets but that’s ok!!!
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May 26th, 2008 at 12:50 am
That’s a nice example of integration, Andre.
It’s always easier when you become friends with someone who’s ‘local, born and bred’ because they will instinctively know all the unwritten and written rules of the community.
So far the only place I’ve failed to do that is in Spain but then again Malaga isn’t the best place for meeting people in general even if you speak Spanish perfectly well. Seems my Italian friends who do, have trouble making friends here… When I attended a company party of some friends of mine in Madrid I have to say the conversation was far more stimulating and interesting (where we kept reverting from Spanish to English to Spanish etc)
Malaga is quite provincial so a lot of conversation centers around different types of ‘gossip’…which I frankly find bores the ********* out of me.
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May 26th, 2008 at 2:03 am
Thanks for the warm welcome!O_O Still tryin’ to adjust to the “familiarity shock”. It’s like someone is reading my mind. Haha, I’ve gotten local born friends and we understand eachother. We speak the same dialect but sometimes they still make fun of the accent. I don’t understand Tagalog at all.^_^;
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May 26th, 2008 at 2:33 am
Cadpig welcome to tckid! you are going to love it here, still seems like you had the right mindset on what to do, i did the same thing. Like Ayako said “they will instinctively know all the unwritten and written rules of the community.
“.
I too have different accent(s) from my friends here in the States and wow do they make me know it. You know accents at times just shows where you been and that who have some global experience, and may I say it helps alot in a very social setting, use what you got indeed!:D
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May 26th, 2008 at 6:17 am
Haha, don’t worry about it Patricia! I got the whole accent treatment as well. It’s not just that, it was the vocabulary too!! And of course, there are a lot of words I couldn’t pronounce properly - because I think Filipino is a sort of syllabic (is that the right term??) language as well, right? I mean the word “basa” can have to different meanings, depending on which syllable the stress is on! =)
You’ll get the hang of it and I’m sure you’ll be ok!! Where do you live in the Philippines then? I moved back to the Philippines in 2003 and I left last year but I’m going back again by August/September!! =)
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May 26th, 2008 at 6:55 am
I’m living in the Visayas specifically in Negros Oriental. True about the syllables. I’m leaving soon though and most likely before October.
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May 26th, 2008 at 7:11 pm
Ooh my bestfriend lives in visayas! In cebu. I was born up north, so yeah, i speak tagalog (although i do get made fun of because i speak faster than i can actually pronounce - if that makes sense - and i tend to blab nonsense). But yeah, if i went there and tried talking to people, i’d be like you, speaking in english (or inglesera as you said), cause i’m more comfortable with that.
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May 26th, 2008 at 11:00 pm
Haha, I’ve noticed that about me too sometimes even in English! Speaking faster but my sentences get all jumbled!xD It’s hilarious but then I gotta take a deep breath and continue cause then my local friends all go: Hoy, calma Chai…calma, maka recover ka ani.
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May 27th, 2008 at 1:54 pm
Haha…no worries guys!! I think the language should be the least of your problems!! =)
I always end up loving the place where I live, wherever I am, simply because each place has its own charm and you always feel a certain attachment to it.
I just have a question Kristine: why do you treat a “return to the Philippines” as a sort of death sentence? =)
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May 27th, 2008 at 7:32 pm
… Andre, i’m not really sure why i don’t wanna go back. I mean, i’d LOVE to visit every now and then, i just couldn’t live there anymore. I guess i never really agreed much with the filipino culture as a whole, despite the fact that i lived there till i was 8. I think it’s the whole belonging thing. I was always the kid that wanted out, the one more interested about the whole world rather than just the country i was in. Cause i look up to my dad, and he travels a lot and i wanna be like him. I was a kid, obviously, i’d idolize my dad, hahaha. The whole tck in me even before i actually became one. And some cousins too, i don’t like them. Or at least my oldest cousin (he’s a year older). We always argue. And the way we argue is funny. We’d start arguing in tagalog and i’d start insulting him in arabic, and he’d insult me in bicolano (his dialect which i barely understood) and i’d retort with french and he would answer back in chinese (he went to a chinese school for quite a bit) and trust me, whatever happens after that is not pleasant. Even my grandpa would laugh at how silly we are. Silly! I think not. I find it a serious matter. Haha. But yeah, i can’t get along with him.
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May 28th, 2008 at 4:26 am
Same here…which is why I’m glad my 3 years here is coming to an end. It’s amazing how much everything changes when you stay in a place you’re “supposed to belong in” when I was little coming here on vacations was fine but now that I’ve lived here it’s so different.
My extended family treats me like an object in the background. Like “oh, she’s the cousin from abroad” and they’re like “oh, that one.” Then they go on about how they pity me because my world view is something that only brings trouble. I even got into a fight with my grandparents because I didn’t agree with their racist view on Muslims.>.>
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May 28th, 2008 at 8:23 pm
Well my dad’s the oldest son in his side of the family so he brings both his parents and my mom’s parents, let em see the world and all. But sometimes, they can’t help but criticise how you’re not traditional enough or whatever. And like patricia said, i’m always gonna be the cousin from abroad, the supposedly lucky one that’s never seen some of her cousins, let alone know their names. Eh.
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May 28th, 2008 at 9:07 pm
Haha, for my whole family i’m “the cousin from abroad”. I hate it but you just have to get used to it at the end of the day…. “ohhhh but you’re AMERICAN”…um, actually, no not really….thanks tho jerk, way to make me feel like part of the family.
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May 29th, 2008 at 12:56 am
While family hasn’t criticized me for not being “American” enough (they’re immigrants themselves) and I don’t often get not “Vietnamese” enough…
I have to really agree with the difference between going to visit and living. I had, and still have, no problems visiting the US. Usually when I visit I’m with family, which is its own little bubble against the rest of the culture.
When you’re living there, you’re relatively independent and therefore subject to all the cultural waves of pushing and pulling.
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May 29th, 2008 at 11:15 pm
Ok. I completely understand how you both feel. As I said, since I made the decision to stay in the Philippines for college, I had to commit myself to adjust to my “new” surroundings. My parents wanted me to go to college in Europe but I really, really had this somewhat unconscious feeling of wanting to go to the Philippines, to go and discover this culture that I hadn’t experienced in 10 years.
It took me a while to readjust to talking in Filipino and all. I have to admit that it helps that I am quite a talkative person. Hehehe. So my language problems just had to be dealt with.
As for the culture, well, there are still days when I just go “what the f…” when people do stuff here. People jump lines and are impatient (though I have to say that here in France, it’s not so different)and I hate this cos I came from Germany where everyone is patient and are the most law-abiding citizens I have ever seen!!! I almost never watch TV shows here cos I cannot seem to like it…lol
My parents did a pretty good job in reminding me of my roots as a Filipino and they constantly have to tell me, even until now, that I am a Filipino. What can I say to that since I cannot deny it?
I’m just not sure if my parents understand completely the fact that I sometimes do not feel Filipino at all…
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June 3rd, 2008 at 4:25 pm
Cadpig, I placed this page under “Introduction” so more people can respond to you! This page will still remain under “Forum” where you posted it for your convenience.
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June 7th, 2008 at 4:28 pm
hahaahh… I feel just like you with regards to Brazil (my “home” country), I think they are the most law-breaking people in the world!!!
And yes, I refuse to watch Brazilian soap operas cause I really don’t understand their point and the way they portray relationships and values… it just makes no sense to me.
I don’t relate at all to the most popular TV channel here (TV Globo), I never watch it.
And sometimes that gets me into trouble (cause I never know about the latest development in the story of soap opera X that everyone is gossiping about).
But I couldn’t care less, I just keep on watching my TV5 and DW-TV…
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June 7th, 2008 at 4:36 pm
hello Patricia! Welcome to our site!
I love the “alice in wonderland” idea…it’s funny
I don’t know if we’ve stopped giving lolcats or people here just forgot…but I miss doing it, so here’s a funny cat picture to welcome you:
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June 15th, 2008 at 2:23 am
Aww, thanks for the lol cat!x3 I hear ya with the soap operas. Do not understand at all!xD
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