All posts filed under: commentary

A global nomad’s perspective.

Olympics: American family competes under Japanese and Georgian flags

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Olympic contenders Allison, Cathy and Chris Reed are all siblings — but they are competing for two different countries. The Reed children were born in Kalamazoo, Michigan, to a Japanese mother and a Nebraskan father. They all have dual-citizenships: United States and Japan. None of them are competing for the U.S. Olympic team. Allison, 15, found an ice dancing partner in Otar Japaridze, 22, a Georgian athlete. For them to compete, the Georgian government quickly ushered her citizenship application through. This February, she marched as a Georgian athlete in the Olympic Opening Ceremonies. She has never been to Georgia. For Allison’s siblings Cathy, 22, and Chris, 20, qualifying for the U.S. Olympic Team for ice dancing would’ve been very difficult. Instead, the two nabbed a spot on the Japanese Olympic team. According the New York Times, the siblings speak little Japanese, and their mother translates conversations between them and the Japanese skating federation. Making citizenship “work for you” is not uncommon in sports. I’ve seen Singapore poach athletes from other countries to have them win …

Massachusetts Senate race: Do TCKs vote?

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Massachusetts Democrats are in danger of losing late Sen. Ted Kennedy’s seat to the GOP on Tuesday, thereby surrendering their 60-seat Senate majority and jeopardizing health care reform plans. It’s not looking good for the Dems. Democratic candidate Martha Coakley is 7 points behind Republican Scott Brown, and with President Barack Obama dropping in on the campaign trail — it is critical that voters turn out Tuesday. Which leads me to wonder: do TCKs vote? Fellow Denizen writer Suzanne Leung has previously tackled the concept of expatriate patriotism. But, are TCKs apathetic about their home countries because they have never lived there? Or, are apathetic about their host countries because they are not citizens and cannot vote? Or, are they wildly motivated about political causes because of their international experiences? In 2008, I volunteered on the Obama campaign even though I couldn’t vote. It was an incredible learning experience for me, since I had never been involved in anything political before. Do you, as a TCK, vote? Do you participate in political movements around the …

Haiti earthquake: why should citizenship matter?

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In the wake of the Haiti earthquake crisis, the American Red Cross posted information about the U.S. State Department’s efforts in finding loved ones in the disaster zone. That’s where I saw this sentence: “Unfortunately at this time, inquiries to search for non-U.S. Citizens missing in Haiti are not being accepted.” I understand that with limited resources, it makes perfect sense for people to “help their own.” However, this statement is frustrating because I firmly believe that “citizenship” is a flawed way of defining a person’s identity or national ties, and should not used as a segregator — whether in disaster relief aid or other situations. “Citizenship” is a legal status that is easily manipulated. It is not an identity, it does not define a human being, and it should not be misconstrued as such. “What’s your citizenship?” as a substitute for “Who are you?” As TCKs, we know that equating citizenship with a person’s identity is flawed. Every day, people greet TCKs with questions such as “Where are you from?” or “What’s your citizenship?” …

Today’s Zaman features Third Culture Kid family

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It’s always exciting to see Third Culture Kids featured in mainstream press because of how rarely it happens. For years, the only coverage I ever saw was in the International Herald Tribune, which is a newspaper with a predominately expatriate audience. But even they only wrote about TCKs a few times a year, if that. Today’s Zaman is one of the main English language newspapers in Turkey — and they wrote a profile about a mother-daughter TCK pair, Brigitte and Mira. Since I wrote a piece about TCKs raising TCK children, I was really interested in what Brigitte had to say about raising her 4-year-old. From the article: “Both my husband and I are working to equip her with the skills to deal with a global world,” Brigitte emphasized, adding, “Mira’s already aware of different languages and cultures as we go to Germany to visit relatives and visit a lot of other places, too.” Read the full story at Today’s Zaman.

What TCKs can learn from ‘Mean Girls’

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Mean Girls won’t win any Oscars, but peel away the glossy angst, and it is sociologically brilliant. The movie follows Cady Heron (played by Lindsay Lohan) as she starts her first day at an American high school. We quickly learn that Cady, a child of research zoologists, spent 12 years growing up in Africa. “P.S., Cady is a TCK” should have gone into the credits. “I had a great life [in Africa]” Cady narrates. “And then… my mom was offered tenure at Northwestern University. And it was goodbye Africa, hello high school.” Sound familiar? The sudden move from one culture to another provides a slew of Third Culture Kid moments, visible from just the first 10 minutes of the movie. On her first day of school in Illinois, Cady’s American parents are thoroughly unaware of how difficult the cultural transition could be for her. Walking up to the African-American students, Cady says “Jambo” in Swahili. She also deals with comments like, “So, if you’re from Africa – why are you white?” (“Oh my god Karen,” …

Global nomads arts project needs your help

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Artist and dancer Alaine Handa is working on a  multi-disciplinary arts project about global nomads, third culture kids and cross-cultural kids. It will incorporate visual art, short film, live music, spoken word/monologue, poetry, photography, animation, dance pieces that tell stories about individual TCKs. The project will be presented in New York City by University Settlement and A.H. Dance Company in spring 2010, and they are hoping to tour the project globally. But, she needs your help — she needs to find ever-elusive TCKs to interview. Here are instructions from Alaine. You can always contact her at ahdancecompany@gmail.com, or check out the project’s blog: I have been interviewing NYC-based TCKs lately and want to extend my invite to the rest of you. The video is for the documentary film I am currently putting together. Everyone will be credited in the film and programs of course! If you live in the NYC area, I would love to set up a time to interview you in person. In person interviews are much more efficient b/c I also ask …

Stimulus contains visa restrictions

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Just when you thought the quota, the lottery system, the very expensive application costs, and the uber-confusing legal procedures made getting an H-1B visa difficult enough—now there’s more. The recently-passed economic stimulus bill now contains restrictions aimed at deterring companies that receive bailout money from hiring H-1B workers.  Bottom line: it’s going to take a hell of a lot more luck for non-Americans to get a job here. As the country’s unemployment rate steadily increases, the government is becoming more and more protective of its national workforce, and, as a result, more wary of foreign workers.  In fact, the initial proposal, by Senators Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), planned to bar companies that receive bailout funds from hiring any H-1B workers.  The current amendment is a little softer—it just makes it very difficult to hire them.  Supporters of the bill insist that, with the current plethora of laid-off workers, companies should be able to easily find the kind of talent they’d find in foreign workers.  Opponents, however, like the American Immigration Lawyers Association …

Expatriate Patriotism

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So Chinese-born superstar Gong Li recently became a Singaporean citizen—and people in China are completely freaking out.  Even though her husband is Singaporean, and she’s lived abroad for years, her decision has sparked an onslaught of heated protest on popular online portals like sohu.com and sina.com. “Traitors like this don’t even love their own country,” one Netizen wrote, translated by The Times. “These people were only fake countrymen of ours. Let them slink off to other countries and die!” “All traitors will be nailed to history’s mast of shame,” wrote another. “We should resolutely reject any further contact with such people.” Um, seriously? Geez. Calm down, people. That’s psycho ex-boyfriend talk. Maybe it’s just me.  I don’t think Third Culture Kids (TCKs) ever really “get” the whole patriotism thing.  Even my British National Overseas (BNO) passport triggers confused questions that I don’t quite know how to answer: “Oh, you’re British?” “No, it’s a Hong Kong passport that just looks like a British passport.  You know, it was a British colony…” “Weren’t you born in England, …