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.
February 6th, 2008 at 3:51 am
I often find myself thinking very hard whether to refer to the Japanese as ‘they’ or ‘we’. I think I have to make a conscious effort to say ‘we’ - usually because their thinking isn’t representative of me and so I will refer to them as ‘they’ just like I do with any other nationality in the world.
I noticed this when I was in Japan and an expat who views all Japaense people as one big group (you know they are mass produced in Toyota factories with gigantic cookie cutters) asked me why I was referring to my own people as ‘they’.
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February 6th, 2008 at 8:05 am
isa! i too thought passports were doled out at birth! i was 11 years old before i ever met anyone without one. we were going on a class trip outside the country and she had to get one for the trip. she had also never left the country which literally FLOORED me! funny thing is, she has turned into a great traveller now and lives in russia i think…
ayako, i dot he I vs WE thing as well.
hm, tck moments…
when i am in my passoprt country i am constantly asked where i am from and met with deibelief when i answer. it doesn’t help that i usually change the way i pronounce my name to make it easier for the pole in whatever country i am in (this is something that sort of happens on its own, i don,t do it intentionally) so that when i go ‘home’ i am pronouncing my name differently.
that is one thign i must say that i LOVE about my passport country. folks can pronounce my name with no effort! it always sounds so good!
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February 6th, 2008 at 8:59 am
I always instinctively use the word “we” regarding… well everyone.
I only started noticing it once a friend pointed out that in the same sentence I said “We Americans” and “We Asians.”
Since then I’ve noticed myself also say “Here in Europe, we…” >.<
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February 6th, 2008 at 10:02 am
In High School, a classmate of mine asked me where Finland was (I get that a lot actually ^^; ) and I said between Sweden and Russia. He actually disagreed with me and was positive that Finland was next to Ukraine. Ha ha! I argued with this kid for an hour, telling him that I SHOULD know the country where I was BORN and visit OFTEN. *sigh* Silly silly boy.
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February 6th, 2008 at 10:09 am
lol…something like that’s happened to me before too. It just beats me why people can sit there arguing about something you know better for….errr, obvious reasons.
I guess some people just like to argue for the sake of arguing?
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February 6th, 2008 at 4:31 pm
Hmmm, I’m always saying “They”…
(What does that say about me?)
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February 7th, 2008 at 5:27 am
Hi guys…
talking about passports!
I have a passport-problem at the moment! Well ist’s rather a page-counting problem! Do you know that?? Have the same porbs?
At the moment I can only think of the next flight, well I even started thinking in flight-numbers… And with all those flights I get new stamps in my passport… I beleive that I`lll need a new one in a year, because mine will be full!!!
How can anybody survive without haveing a passport? That’s incredible!!!
In my passpot-giving-country, that means Germany, there are lot’S of people traveling with their ID-card. And whenever I’m back here, I allways think about “Them” not “us”… The Germans are bad car drivers… The Germans are weird… the Germans are unpolite…
Yeah! At the moment this country is really giving me a hard time! 13 days left untill I can catch my next flight!!! This time, to Dubai…
Toni
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February 8th, 2008 at 9:51 am
hey Toni, I LOVE that expression “my passport-giving-country”
LOL
Warona, I do the name thing too!!! like for english speaking people I tell them to pronounce my name “May-ee-rah”. It would sound wierd to hear my name with the portuguese pronounciation in the middle of an English sentence.
When I think about Brazilians I usually think “them” or “these people”. I try not to talk about these thoughts with them because when I do, I use the word “you”, and they usually they feel offended (and that’s because usually I’m complaning about them! :D).
I do use “us” sometimes, but it’s rare.
Here’s a TCK moment that just happened (or maybe it’s not, I’m not sure, but anyway, here it goes):
I’m at work (lol) and we just got an email from the boss’s secretary with two ugly portuguese spelling errors. So I go “how can she do it? It’s her mother tongue for chirst’s sake!” And people are all ok about it…so now I’m freaking out thinking “how can I be more ‘patriot’ than them?” :S
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February 8th, 2008 at 12:38 pm
Oh boy! I had a TCK moment when I was going through customs in Germany, which also happens to be my passport country, the customs officer looked at my passport like three times over…yes, it’s a bit complicated when you notice my place of birth (the middle east), my permanent residency (the US) and to top it off, a funny name spelled phoentically French all squeezed in that little document. Anyway, needless to say, he was a wee bit confused and asked me in German “where I pay taxes”. At this point, I too was rather confused by that qyestion. I thought “why are you asking me this dumb question.” He must be new to the job, I thought. Anyway, for about half a second, I did’t know what to say and drew a blank-I couldn’t quite remember where I paid taxes. Then, suddenly, without batting an eyelash, I simply said ” taxes, I pay them in Italy (duh!)”. This left the poor man even more confused, and so I just explained to him that that is where I live now and then showed him my Italian residency card. Needless to say, I think he had quite a headache after that and just went, ‘right whatever’.
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February 9th, 2008 at 11:08 am
My parents are from the USA and I carry a USA passport but lived in Vienna until I was 13. Having lived a few other places in between, I now live in Los Angeles. On a recent visit back to Austria, an Austrian friend of mine was saying to me, based on her experience with some exchange students, how stupid Americans are. I said, “So, am I stupid?” She gave me a funny look before replying, “Well, you’re not really American.”
I was both alarmed and amused by the fact that my friend would sooner deny my technical nationality than admit that there could be smart Americans!
This next comment is probably more suited to a different thread, but anti-Americanism is tough for me to deal with as someone with an English name and a USA passport who doesn’t identify very strongly with the USA or mainstream American culture.
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