So why do I write: "I am a foreigner everywhere I go"? It's not like I'm not accepted by others around me or expected to be anything but myself. I am myself and no one leaves me out or rejects me because of it.
And yet... the phrase "I'm not one of them" or "I'm not like them" keeps spinning in my mind as I observe and interact with the people around me. This doesn't happen so much in church as it is literally my family away from family and everyone is so diverse and knows how quirky my family is so don't expect anything less from me. But at school and anywhere else really that's not church, I cannot help but feel distant from the people I am surrounded by.
Being an 'active Christian', as one might say, makes me stand out automatically. My morals and values are mostly, if not entirely, affected by my faith, so I stand out anyway because of that.
Also being a missionary kid, when some asks me why I don't live with my family and I answer, "They live in Ukraine", the unavoidable question, "What are they doing out there?" inevitably follows. "My dad is a pastor. We are missionaries," I respond revealing my identity. People raise their eyebrows and I imagine they are painting pictures in their minds of my mother dressed as a pioneer reading the Bible in her rocking chair praying for the natives. Basically, regardless of who I talk to and what we are talking about my confusing (and interesting, I dare say) background and faith always come up. Also because of my enormous surname (Trokhymenko) people often think that I am actually first and foremost Ukrainian and wonder why my English is so good. I then proceed to explain to them that I have lived longer in England than Ukraine and that I was actually born here. This information shocks everyone I meet. Bottom line, whatever angle I come from: homeschooler, missionary kid, Christian, human being... I always stand out.
I go to school every week like English kids do, like kids of other nationalities do, like exchange students do and yet from what I can see they are having a pretty easy time getting along with people and making friends. I do have 2 great German friends who are exchange students that I hang out with even outside of school, but when it comes to trying to build a relationship with anyone else, English or otherwise, I am lost. I struggle to follow their conversations and involve myself because I don't know people and I don't party.
Everyone listens to different music, have different tastes in food, different attitudes to education, different fashion-sense, different love lives and different family situations compared to me. Yeah, I know everyone in the world is different but these people can at least find someone to relate to within a 3 mile radius and I don't have that! I'm a missionary kid! The people I can relate to live hundreds, and some even thousands of miles away from me. I can't talk them every day or even every month. There are timezones and busy schedueles to keep in mind and it often feels impossible to sit down and simply Skype for one hour.
The point is, I am not capable of blending in or conforming. At school we have a big Nepalese and Czech population and they find consolation within their cultural bubbles. They are TCKs (third-culture kids) but they have become so collectively and therefore have each other to relate to and feel accepted with. Many have also managed to find common ground with the English kids and so float between the two cultural bubbles with ease. One minute they are chatting to us in English about English things and the next they spin round on their chair and shout across the bistro in Nepalese or Czech to their cousin or whatever and momentarily enter their 'other' bubble. I don't really have that. I'm not a TCK like they are.
It's so hard not to get bitter towards those who may seem a bit ignorant to me and treat them like this:
This fate is both the expected and the unexpected. It's excity but scary. It is the norm and yet I still find myself finding my reality so strange. I wait for stability but hardly recognize or know how to deal with it when it comes. Part of me wants to settle down and become rooted in my community and the other, louder part of me wants to pack my bags and get the heck outta here.
I manage to find some kind of common ground with many people and yet I struggle to relate to most people. Will it always be this way? Maybe. Probably. And though I still battle with the facts of my reality, I have learned to accept and embrace it. I am and will always be a foreigner wherever I am, be it England, Ukraine or anywhere else.
I am a nomad and that will never change.
Also being a missionary kid, when some asks me why I don't live with my family and I answer, "They live in Ukraine", the unavoidable question, "What are they doing out there?" inevitably follows. "My dad is a pastor. We are missionaries," I respond revealing my identity. People raise their eyebrows and I imagine they are painting pictures in their minds of my mother dressed as a pioneer reading the Bible in her rocking chair praying for the natives. Basically, regardless of who I talk to and what we are talking about my confusing (and interesting, I dare say) background and faith always come up. Also because of my enormous surname (Trokhymenko) people often think that I am actually first and foremost Ukrainian and wonder why my English is so good. I then proceed to explain to them that I have lived longer in England than Ukraine and that I was actually born here. This information shocks everyone I meet. Bottom line, whatever angle I come from: homeschooler, missionary kid, Christian, human being... I always stand out.
I go to school every week like English kids do, like kids of other nationalities do, like exchange students do and yet from what I can see they are having a pretty easy time getting along with people and making friends. I do have 2 great German friends who are exchange students that I hang out with even outside of school, but when it comes to trying to build a relationship with anyone else, English or otherwise, I am lost. I struggle to follow their conversations and involve myself because I don't know people and I don't party.
Everyone listens to different music, have different tastes in food, different attitudes to education, different fashion-sense, different love lives and different family situations compared to me. Yeah, I know everyone in the world is different but these people can at least find someone to relate to within a 3 mile radius and I don't have that! I'm a missionary kid! The people I can relate to live hundreds, and some even thousands of miles away from me. I can't talk them every day or even every month. There are timezones and busy schedueles to keep in mind and it often feels impossible to sit down and simply Skype for one hour.
The point is, I am not capable of blending in or conforming. At school we have a big Nepalese and Czech population and they find consolation within their cultural bubbles. They are TCKs (third-culture kids) but they have become so collectively and therefore have each other to relate to and feel accepted with. Many have also managed to find common ground with the English kids and so float between the two cultural bubbles with ease. One minute they are chatting to us in English about English things and the next they spin round on their chair and shout across the bistro in Nepalese or Czech to their cousin or whatever and momentarily enter their 'other' bubble. I don't really have that. I'm not a TCK like they are.
It's so hard not to get bitter towards those who may seem a bit ignorant to me and treat them like this:
because I probably appear pretty ignorant to them (like, what does 'shindigs' even mean?).
I don't want to sound whiny or try and make you feel sorry for me (although it probably sounds like I am :/), it's just that I struggle to understand how these kids from other cultures are getting on so well and I am just... well, still in the dark. I cannot adapt to their ways so that they will accept me and let me into their circles - as stated before I am not capable of that, and so I guess this is my rather lonely fate (unless in the company of other TCKs/MKs): to never fit in anywhere, even my 'own' country.
This fate is both the expected and the unexpected. It's excity but scary. It is the norm and yet I still find myself finding my reality so strange. I wait for stability but hardly recognize or know how to deal with it when it comes. Part of me wants to settle down and become rooted in my community and the other, louder part of me wants to pack my bags and get the heck outta here.
I manage to find some kind of common ground with many people and yet I struggle to relate to most people. Will it always be this way? Maybe. Probably. And though I still battle with the facts of my reality, I have learned to accept and embrace it. I am and will always be a foreigner wherever I am, be it England, Ukraine or anywhere else.
I am a nomad and that will never change.
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