Haha, I used that title with a twinkle in my eye and slight smirk on my face…
Its all in the wording really, isn’t it?
All us ‘western, white folk’ could and would perhaps always use the term ‘Expat’, whereas someone who may really ‘need’ to move to a different country from their birthland for either work, peace or both, would and could be called an ‘Immigrant’.. To be honest, I’m not sure what exactly differentiates either term. What makes you an ‘expat’ as opposed to an ‘immigrant?’.
Since 1993 I have been an ‘Expat’ … AND, I guess an immigrant into three countries that are not my country of birth.
Its a processes that is both exasperating and exhausting in equal measure, and really, moving countries is just not for the faint hearted. You definitely need to be committed. Its a process that is similar in all countries but different AND revolves around ‘paperwork’. The endless, needless, pointless supply of paperwork in all manner of things, but, all must be ‘in your name’. *sigh. (Just for an example, it was 130 documents over a 5 year period last time, I know !!! OMG ! - who even keeps that shit ?)
The amount of times I’ve had to ‘prove’ who I was, been finger printed, probed and photographed, you’d think I was on some sort of world famous, most wanted list - NOT! The reality? - I’m just your average, everyday, midlife, peri or almost - yikes! :( menopausal, mother and housewife. I just keep thinking, there absolutely must be some sort of ‘Nicole Marina’ file up there in the cosmos of the internet, where surely all these procedural documents must come together. Where the next person who wants to ‘verify’ WHO I am can just hook up too ( I won’t say - fuck off to… ) and get my full stats in a perfect download…. Surely, it must exist - somewhere!
My first ‘expat’ country was of course, Japan. Which was in 1993. I wrote a post about that previously. An amazing cultural opportunity that I don’t think I quite realised and appreciated at the time, being only 21. It was a year of a language I didn’t know, a city (Tokyo) and Country I didn’t know, meeting new people that I previously didn’t know and a time I really remember fondly. I went back to Sydney, Australia, but then moved again, up North this time, to Brisbane for 18 months - another new city, although this time, it was a language (and accent) I knew, oh so well. :)
My second ‘expat’ country was Romania. In 2006, I moved to Bucharest. In the early 2000’s Romania was like the wild west. Anything and everything was going. Having been previously a communist Country up until 1989 ( the year I finished High School :0 ), it had been on a slow boil through the 90’s, so by the early 2000’s, it was Romania’s coming of age into the 21st Century. It seemed like the whole of Europe was flooding in, from supermarket chains to fast and flash cars, internet providers with new tech, all hopping on the train of wanting the sell to a population that had gone ‘without’ for a very long time. And the Romanians were ripe and ready. It was a very interesting place coming from the well controlled and policed Australian lifestyle. Just as a simple example parking. ‘Car’ parking in downtown Bucharest, where basically you could park on the curb, off the curb (or a mix of both), UNPAID, where ever you wanted, as opposed to parking in Sydney, where all ‘spaces’ were counted and accounted for, ‘paid’ for by either meter and/or sticker. I can remember being seated at a café in Dorobanti’ in Bucharest with a bunch of newly arrived fellow Aussies. A cop car drives slowly past. All of us went to jump for our car keys, naturally thinking, ‘Oh shit, I’ve parked on the curb, or wherever, - first thought - how or where did we park?… but then, all easing back into our seats remembering - ‘Oh, yeah, I’m in Bucharest’ - it doesn’t matter. Haha… its the little things. :)
It was a wild time..
I will definitely write some future posts just on Bucharest. It was a place and time that truly does deserve some lime light all on its own. My kids remember Bucharest as a time of pure freedom. I home schooled my older kids, so it was a time of no timetables, lots of friends, lots of family outings, culture shocks, with some crazy weather thrown into the mix. (Full snow in winter, ranging from 1-5 metres in height, while Summer could be up to 40 degrees in heat).
Third ‘expat’ Country is the UK. Interestingly, I’ve encountered some lovely people here that have said, why don’t you go back to where you came from. And no - this wasn’t intended to be a nice comment… *sigh… But! To return the sentiment, my response has now grown to be … ‘Well, how far back do you want me to go?, because, in actual fact - being an ‘Aussie’ I AM back to the place where I came from’… haha. - always gives me my little chuckle moment. Surprisingly *wink - not! - My ancestors ARE ‘English and Irish’.
The UK has been, well, a funny old place. The weather is everyone’s ‘go to’ topic of conversation and is actually as bad as everyone wants to say it is. The grey can set in from November right until the end of April. Almost 6 months of the year is grey, overcast, cool/cold! and/or rainy. *bruh….
The kids have gone to school, the timetable and structure, well and truly back in place and life went on. Its been 12 years now ! - gasp.. It was only just last year that I managed to get back home to Australia for a visit after 17 long years…
UK life has been relatively easy, as, English is my first language, obviously. Friends have been made easily enough (although, haha, an ‘Aussie’ answer to a - how are you? is completely different to an ‘English’ answer of, how are you?..) but, I must say, the friendships born out of a place where you ‘need’ to make contacts to get things done, or just survive, or to make connections for your English speaking kids, are the one’s that truly become life changing and life lasting. The friendships I made in Tokyo or Bucharest particularly, are still with me. These are the people that still check in on me. The one’s I’d go so far to say are my ‘Family’.
So - back to my original point… I started at a comment about ‘wording’.. The term ‘Expat’ over ‘Immigrant’. To be honest, these words to me are exactly the same. A person living in a country that is not their birth country. And that is all it should be. There should be no malice towards someone for having the guts, courage and determination to do such a thing. It takes a lot, and I mean A LOT to move countries. Its not an easy feat and in actual fact, its not something someone does just for the sake of it. A lot of ‘work’ goes into doing it, the least part getting on whatever vehicle brings them to their new place of life. A car, a boat, a plane. Once at the destination, that’s where all the hard work starts and where, in actual fact, I’m not sure you ever call ‘home’ really, because, there is always a part of you that’s left behind in the place you were born. Always… There’s the place you ‘live’ and then there’s the place you call ‘home’
I am an Australian in my heart and a nomad/wanderer/traveller in my Soul…. *Person of the Planet, Nicole Marina - with downloadable file, floating somewhere around by satellite in the internet Cosmos.
Quote - by Buzz Lightyear - ‘To infinity and beyond’. :)
I guess the world delineates the terms this way:
Expat - You are white and have money
Immigrant - You are non-white and need a job
Alien - I want to other you so I don’t feel any obligation toward you