Hope for the Future

It's been busy in the 'hood. We just finished up working on the primary election, Jamba Marimba had its last scheduled gig of the summer, and my first daughter came home for a week. One week. To put the finishing touches on her preparations for her year teaching English overseas. So thoughts of 'home', our lives and the lives of many friends have been swirling around in my head.

For Keara, home is wherever we are. She spent the first 5+ years of her life in California (though my Texas friends will be proud to know she had her REAL beginning in TX). Her K-5 elementary years were spent in Lagos, Nigeria, where she learned and played with kids from 40 different countries. During those years, we visited at least 13 different countries in Europe, Africa and the Middle East. She went off on her own to the UK in 2002 for a 3 week program at Cambridge between soph and junior year in high school. She added several more European countries during her 6 months in Berlin during junior year at Brandeis. After college, she wanted to work, enjoy life in Boston beyond college, and figure out what to do next. A few mundane admin jobs later, she made a choice to get back out in the world for a new adventure, and prepare for what comes next (grad school, perhaps at UT?). Her advisor in college suggested she needed non European experience to reach her career goal of International Student/Study Abroad officer at a university. Asia was one place she hasn't been, so Asia it is.

South Korea, specifically. All her language study has been European, with 5 years of jr-sr high Spanish, a major in German, and exposure to French at school in Nigeria. Why not go someplace and do total immersion????? That's Keara. I am so grateful we had the years in Nigeria to give the kids a broader perspective. Our friend Joel, the admissions counselor at AIS-L, gave a talk on Third Culture Kids that I'll never forget. Kids who live outside their own culture and how the experience transforms them.

I think about our friends Barb and John, whose daughter Kelsey is in The Gambia with her husband in the Peace Corps, both of them fresh out of grad school. Kelsey lived in Indonesia as a kid. Our friends Tom and Mary's son Matt was a junior high student when we came to Nigeria. After law school, Matt went to Rwanda and started up Indego Africa, investing in long term skills for Rwandan women. Most of our overseas friends' kids have done semesters abroad. Tom and Leila's daughter Andrea, already fluent in Spanish, is getting some hospital nursing experience under her belt, and studying French, so she can join one of my favorite charities, MSF (Doctors Without Borders). My friend Hal's wonderful daughter Sara taught English in Egypt for several years. Other former expat friends, like Diana and Scott, have kids in the military serving overseas. I often wonder where all the kids that Keara went to elementary school with have ended up.

Some of our friends NEVER went overseas, but their kids are out there in the world doing good things, like my friend Janet's Kate, who has been working for a health care NGO in Rwanda the last several years. My cousin Steve's daughter Janna, who just finished a year teaching English in, coincidentally, S. Korea. Keara's wonderfully crazy friend Lucy from Louisiana, who just finished a year of working in Australia and traveling all over Asia, and now wants to apply for a job in S. Korea. My friend Avalon's daughter left this week for a 4 year PhD program in Dusseldorf. Others in and graduated from the service academies, all out serving us in the world.

These are only a few examples. There are more. But it gives me great hope during a time when so many Americans have gone so xenophobic that I am embarrassed for our country. We finally have a president, also a Third Culture Kid, who has restored some semblance of respect in the world but ironically, brought out the worst ugliness at home. As a second generation kid myself (my maternal grandparents came from Germany) I get very discouraged. Living in SW Houston neighborhood of 30 plus homes with only 3 Anglo American families, with neighbors from around the world. I worry how they are faring with this nonsense. I am concerned about my wonderful Muslim neighbors, who would invite us to celebrate the end of Ramadan with them. My Chinese neighbors who would bring tea for Chinese New Years. My Vietnamese neighbors who would stop by with freshly made spring rolls. Our house was bought by a Chinese family. There was only one Anglo American family left when we moved. That makes me sad.

Then I think of all these bright young people out there in the world, putting a great face on what Americans are REALLY like. It gives me hope. Have a great year, Keara. Show them what American looks like.