TCK friendships
Hiii,
I am a TCK and am currently writing my final year dissertation on the topic!
I would be really grateful if anyone could offer me some insight on a few points…
Some of the TCK literature suggests that if fellow TCKs are in the same place they tend to stick together, or enjoy spending time together more than with thier non-TCK friends. Would you say this applies to you?
Furthermore, several authors suggest that TCKs may often feel that they cannot relate/connect to Non TCKs because they do not share the same cultural awareness as them. As a result of this TCKs often find this frustration to be a point of familiarity with thier TCK friends. Is this the case for any of you?
I would be really grateful if any you could offer any thougths and feelings about this!
Steff
April 14th, 2008 at 10:00 pm
I get along better with TCKs. Although I do like having non-tck friends as well. I’m one of those floaters who sifts between groups of people who have little to nothing in common. Also, activities and especially discusions with TCKs v. non-TCKs, in my experience, tend to be very different so I guess I just hang out with certain people depending on my mood. But in terms of understanding people I think I “get” other tcks better.
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April 15th, 2008 at 12:24 am
Well, I generally am able to stick with the most diverse group.
I’ve been in international schools for a majority of my life, so I never had too much of a problem fitting in there. In Malaysia, I had no problems fitting into my international school, but when I joined a local choir, I did find it a bit hard to mix with the ones who were very open minded. Luckily the choir I joined was well known for travelling, so it wasn’t so bad, they HAD experienced other cultures as well.
When I moved to Africa and Australia, however, I think it got a little trickier to make friends. There are quite a few people moving to South Africa, and they all attempt to be as South African as they possibly can, and I don’t mx with them. The people I mixed with had incredibly diverse and open minds. My group wasn’t just white, or just black. In fact, my group was known as the ‘Rainbow Nation’ because we had quite a nice mix of people. Mind you, they weren’t actually TCKs though- some of my mates couldn’t afford to travel out of the state.
In Australia- it’s a similar situation. A lot of the foreigners just tried their hardest to fit in and forgot about everything else, so I don’t really mix with them. The group I hang out with is also very culturally diverse. Again, not everyone in my group are TCKs, but are merely very open minded.
So in conclusion, I guess you could say I get along with people who have a predominantly TCK mentality. =)
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November 29th, 2008 at 10:27 pm
My Non-TCKs friends tend to be well traveled, mixed race, immigrants, or cross cultural. It’s actually hard for me to find real “monocultural” people in my neighborbood, and I’m not complaining!
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