An Ode To Expatriation

[fruittbatt]

Thank you Dukkha for a thought-provoking post. Yes, reflection does calm the old aggro!

[KhunPadThai]

A very interesting topic. I chose the other way. After graduate school I considered moving to France which attracted me for several reasons. Also, the USA repelled me for its own reasons despite the many undeniably good aspects. In the end I didn't go because I thought that what I would lose was coherence. As it is I understand the US deeply. I get all the cultural allusions. I have thought a lot about our history and how it shapes our current experience. I knew if I went to France I would lose that and never regain it. The US would change and eventually become strange while I would probably never achieve the same grasp of French culture. So, in my case, belonging was not an attraction then and is not now. Being an outsider, and exempt from the rules, is certainly an attraction. But the price of coherence seemed too high to me then.

Anway, that was twenty years ago and now I am studying Thai with a thought to the possibility of retiring there.

[Patex]

how could one think his/her own oddness could be something fruitful??

Because being in a partly outsider position combined with insights, close relationships and bonds formed through years of personal involvement and necessary confrontation with a culture not one's own is a unique condition learn and come to often unexpected and surprising results.

do not overestimate your own oddness...

[Jersey_UK]

One thing that I think has not been mentioned is whether a person comes from a "sh#thole" (Definitions vary!).

Whilst I do recognise many of the descriptions already mentioned (especially the "eyes glaze over" ), it took me quite a while to realise that where I come from is home (for me) and that it is a nice place to live (certainly IMO far better than Thailand will ever be in my lifetime, apart from 24/7 cheap pussy).........and that the one place I couldn't run away from was.............me so I might as well stay somehwere nice.

Oh, and answer for me was to try and build myself a new life here which included finding an answer to those whose "eyes glaze over" of talking less about being away...........and also "moving on" with some of my "freinds". Lot easier to develop a new life in somewhere you physically like, can understand the lingo, the laws make sense (and are implemented as fairly as these things ever are) and share a "history" and culture.

Can't say the urge to b#gger off does not still sometimes creep up on me.......but sitting in Thailand 24/7/365?? <deleted> no!!! A big big world out there!!

But of course I appreciate that experiances vary.

Edited November 12, 2006 by Jersey_UK

[chiang mai]

When I was young I used to travel frequently and I enjoyed it enormously. The joy I found was not in arriving at the destination but in the journey itself. As I grew older I continued to travel but stayed longer in each of my temporary destinations. I went to America and stayed thirteen years, to Europe and stayed five and to China and stayed two years. Now I am in Thailand and have been here for three years and wonder where I will go next. One common thread throughout all the travel is that I always returned home, even though I found early on that I neither liked it nor really enjoyed being there too much. Travel they say is a great educator and if that is the case then I am surely a Phd by now and perhaps more. But I wonder how a person can can use that education and at the end of the day what benefit it really serves?

[Diablo Bob]

Everybody probably has different reasoning on this subject.

Myself, I left the USA at 6 months old and didn't return for 16 years. Then it was military duty which pretty much had me out of the states for another 3 years. By this time, it was apparent that I was just a passport holder from the US, but I would never feel at home there. Proffesionally, add another 20 years away.....................

Moving to Thailand has just been an extension of my upbringing and life, the only difference being I have settled in Thailand, happy in its' chaos.

Whenever I return to the USA, I feel unsettled with the orderliness and the perceived automaton existence of my countryman and start counting the days till my flight takes me back home to Thailand.

[Jai Dee]

The Men That Don't Fit In

by Robert W. Service

<snipped for brevity>

I don't necessarily agree with this "gypsy"interpretation.

I have lived and worked in 6 different countries (excluding my homeland) to date... and have adapted reasonably well to the local lifestyles and cultures.

Each move has been a learning and enriching experience... I feel that my outlook on life is more balanced now as an expat than had I remained at home in the closeted world I had before.