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A very personal perspective on experiencing life
as an internationally mobile kid |
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Where are you from? That's the question that plagues every third culture kid (TCK). Third culture kids are individuals who spend a significant portion of their developmental years in a country other than their parents' home country. The 'third culture' is therefore a weird mixture of both.
I was born in the United States, my parents and my passport are Canadian, I spent a majority of my childhood in the Philippines, and I moved over 20 times before I turned 20 years old. As a third culture kid, my answer to the initial question changes as many times as I am asked it.
I've moved to Canada four or five times now (I can't even keep track of all our moves), but the first time we came back to Canada for a year-long 'home assignment' I did not think of this country as home. It bothered me that people would welcome me ?home' to Canada and act as if it was such a relief to be away from the Philippines, when I loved and missed the Philippines dearly.
When I moved back to Canada last, it was for an indefinite amount of time. What a great experience of loss that move was for me, because, with that move, an identity was taken from me. I had never felt comfortable calling myself Filipino, but now I felt like I could no longer even legitimately call the Philippines my home.
And I certainly did not feel like I fit in with Canadian culture. What I experienced is called reverse culture shock, which is the difficult process of re-acclimating to the culture with which one is supposed to be familiar.
The period of adjusting to Canadian culture was troublesome for me: shaking hands instead of hugging and kissing, using words that I thought were English but embarrassingly found out otherwise, experiencing shock at what I saw as aggressive behaviour by people whom I had always heard characterized as polite.
Matters were not helped by the fact that I looked like I belonged. A reoccurring wish I had was for my outside physical appearance to mirror my inner identity, not that I even knew what that would look like.
I wanted to be a visual minority so that people would be less surprised about the fact that I did not belong. I felt like I did not belong anywhere, and was restless like I had never known.
I sought after ways to leave Canada: teaching ESL in Japan, doing a missions internship in Ecuador and Peru, taking an educational travel class to Ethiopia, Israel, and Jordan, and visiting friends in the Philippines. It was in these ?escapes,' as well as in friendships with other third culture kids and welcoming Canadians that I have become more comfortable with living in Canada.
There was a time in my life where the biggest struggle I had with God was whether or not I could stay in Canada my whole life if that was what he asked me to do. I had an interest in serving God overseas in some capacity, but I was concerned that I only had that desire because I wanted to leave Canada. Through much prayer, the counsel of wiser Christians than me, and a long-overdue surrender to God of my future global location, I was able to find peace about living in Canada.
