All posts tagged: Claremont McKenna

Expatriate Patriotism

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, …