All posts tagged: TCK

Faces at FIGT – Deniz: “Make TCKs known to French people too”

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Deniz Gyger Gaspoz, 33, is a PhD researcher at the Institute of Psychology and Education at University of Neuchatel. She’s picked a pretty specific course of study: French-speaking, teen Third Culture Kids. During a brief chat at the Families in Global Transition (FIGT) conference, I picked her brain on what she had discovered so far. Deniz, a daughter of Swiss diplomats, speaks French fluently and has lived in Iran, France, Germany, Switzerland, Senegal and India. What do you say when someone asks you, “Where are you from?” If I’m here in Houston, I can say without a problem “Switzerland.” I’ve lived there for more than 8 years. But if Swiss people ask me where I am from, I will have difficulties to answer. I’ll say “Geneva” because I lived there and my family is there. Then sometimes I say Neuchatel [Switzerland] because I study in Neuchatel and I used to live there. And sometimes I say Biel [Switzerland] because I’m living there with my husband. Why does your research focus on French-speaking teenagers? I found …

Faces at FIGT – Josh: “Both an outsider and an insider.”

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I started Denizen because I firmly believe that TCKs deserve a support network. Josh Sandoz, 32, is out there doing exactly that. Working toward licensure as a mental health therapist in Washington state, he is currently Interaction International’s (a TCK group) director of child support services, and serves as a therapist in multiple capacities at a local psychiatric hospital and graduate school in Seattle. As part of Interaction International, Sandoz recently started a resource of mental health experts familiar with the TCK and expat experience. What’s your answer to “Where are you from?” It depends where I am, and who is asking me, and what I think they want to know. But usually I’ll re-frame the question and say I was born and raised in Seoul, South Korea. How has learning the language of “TCK” helped you embrace your own experience? Words are really powerful. All words, in a way, are metaphors for trying to understand our own experiences. …I liken it to the myth around the Inuit population, to how they have all these …

Faces at FIGT – Reiko: “I’m a reverse TCK”

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Have you ever heard of a “reverse TCK?” I hadn’t either, but after meeting Reiko Baumgarten, 24, at the FIGT conference, I’ve decided that I am one, too. A reverse TCK is someone who has grown up with the expat community, even though he or she has not moved a lot. Hit me. “Where are you from?” I was born and raised in Japan for 19 years. I’m actually the reverse role of most TCKs. I didn’t move around, everybody else around me moved around. My experience was everybody moving. Why was everyone moving around you? My father is retired military, and we went to a military school [in Japan]. Everybody else was in military school — all the military brats that moved around to different places. So… do you “get” what it means to be a TCK? Oh yeah, definitely. Coming to FIGT, everything opened my eyes. …I feel what most TCKs feel, just from my experience coming abroad as well — since I lived in Japan, coming here [to the U.S.], the culture …

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 …

A TCK reaches out for help. What would you have said?

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I recently got this email in our Denizen inbox the other day. What advice would you have given to this TCK? “i’m 15 just moved back from malaysia. i’m 100% american but i lived there for so long it’s home. coming back to the u.s. which some people would refer to as “my home” i now don’t know where home really is. i’ve always been familiar with that term and almost hated it because i don’t want to be labeled. but i went to a “tck” camp this summer, and meeting 20+ kids that were “just like me” was 1) completely lame and cheesy and 2) amazingly identifying hmm thats not the right word, well it was amazing and i truly FOUND myself in those people. ever since then i have been chatting and texting whenever i can with the ones that are still here but i just started at a public school. i hate it, i feel invisible there, more than i ever have in my life. i know so much about all the …