Parting Shot:
What is your story?
Being a “global nomad” is a fundamental part of our children’s identity. It’s a fact they may not even realise until they move away from “home”, wherever it may be. Often, this journey transitions them to yet another country, possibly even to their motherland. For most of us, our identity encompasses relationships, experiences and opinions about the world from the context of our immediate tribe. For our children, home is where their nuclear family lives rather than their country of passport.
We’ve raised our children on the cusp of four cultures: the one they were born into, and the three countries where we have physically raised them. Young and permeable, as they moved from culture to culture, they observed and accumulated experiences that shaped their lives and views. One of the many benefits about this reality is that they have the opportunity to take the finest parts of each culture they’ve lived in and have a much more open-minded and adaptable perspective than their peers “back home”. Another great advantage is the ability to view their own culture and heritage from an unbiased point of view, unlike the insularity of the vast majority raised in a more restrictive monoculture.
We are British by passport as a family, but we’ve never lived there permanently together. Two of our three children chose to move to the UK for university. For us, being expats means that home isn’t a place we are connected to by bricks and mortar. As our children are used to a transient lifestyle, it can be challenging relating to their local peers who have lived their entire lives with the constant indigenous influences of family, friends, school, media and religious beliefs. This means being rooted in a way that our children are not – and it can prove one of the most confrontational aspects of going to university. Coupled with being away from family and in a different time zone, this experience can be very testing and makes for a tough transition.
Rather than “Where are you from?” the real question is “What is your story?” This is easier to recount and relate to. As they mature, expat children are more likely to discern what specific information or response the questioner is looking for and tailor their answer accordingly.
We chose to live in Singapore for our children’s Middle and High School years and were extremely fortunate to be in a position to fulfil that option. Children who move every couple of years have experienced more separation and loss than most people encounter in a lifetime.
Our children forge friendships in a different way to their non-expat friends. In their experience, there isn’t the luxury of time to gradually build a meaningful friendship, so they often dive in at a deeper level of familiarity beyond the comfort zone of someone who has known a permanent residence and spent their lives building friendships over time.
If you’re an expat family with a child about to leave for university, I strongly recommend that you attend that university’s International Students Day, even if they’re studying in their motherland. These are the people with whom they will share most common ground, and it’s remarkable how they find each other, no matter how crowded the room.