When It’s Time To Go Home …. Or Maybe It’s Not
I can remember it quite clearly. It was sometime in September 2016. We moved to the Gold Coast, Australia in June 2015 after 4 years in Hong Kong and I’d lived in Asia for 13 consecutive years. I turned to my wife and said ‘Why don’t we go back overseas?’. Her simple reply was ‘OK, let’s’. By the end of December, we were living in Singapore. I guess the return to Australia didn’t quite stick. But why not? Wasn’t this my home?
Our family of four left Hong Kong to return to Australia to help the girls settle and to begin their university studies. We couldn’t really afford their combined expenses unless we moved with them and they kept living with us. This was because they were both officially still international students and so were paying international student fees. I’m sure living with your parents when all of your classmates were out on their own wasn’t ideal for them. But they were both grateful just to be there. From day one though, despite the excitement of living in Australia, especially for the girls, it just didn’t feel right for me.
We chose the Gold Coast to be close to my wife’s sister but it was also a place that we had never been before. We wanted this to feel like a new adventure just like every other new country that we had moved to. I guess it was. But it felt more like the way that I felt when I first left Australia and moved to the Philippines in 2002. It was the feeling that everything was different and that all that I knew and was familiar with was gone.
I was also missing the people and the sense of community that comes with working in an international school. It really was a feeling of ‘culture shock’ in my own country.
I had heard of this idea of reverse culture shock. It is often associated with students who move overseas to study and then come back. I was also very familiar with the situation of ‘third-culture kids’ who feel out of place when spending time in their country of birth or nationality that is not their home.
Many of the hundreds of international students that I have taught would be classed as third-culture kids. These are kids who have been raised in a country other than that of their nationality or the country of their parents. Maybe I was feeling just a little bit of what it must be like for them.
So What Changed?
Why do things seem so different when you return after such a long time? I love the quote “We don’t see things as they are, we see them as we are” attributed to the prominent writer Anaïs Nin. After so long away, of course, I had changed. I was older but I was also more worldly, experienced and well-traveled.
I felt that everyone would be interested in my exciting life abroad and that I would have more to offer. I also felt that my teaching experience would be revered and that I would somehow be seen as more valued in my profession. Mmmm, not so much.
Maybe I’d become a bit of a snob. But in a place where still the majority of people have not traveled overseas a great deal and a very small percentage of people had lived overseas, I was probably just seen as being a bit weird. Why would anyone ever want to live anywhere other than ‘God’s country’ as we call it?
People mostly weren’t that interested in the places that I’d been or the strange schools that I’d worked in. I was still asked if I taught English ‘over there’, due to most people not knowing what international schools are.
Another factor worth considering is that friendship groups are often carved in stone and in many cases go right back to high school days. This can mean that making new friends is tough.
In terms of my career, it was also like ‘Well yeah it’s cool that you’ve worked in some different places, but what have you done ‘here’ lately?’ It was initially stressful finding a new job, knowing that savings would run out quickly. I would also find out that the salary that I had become used to overseas just wasn’t going to be possible here.
Back To School
The biggest fear for an international school teacher who returns home is the idea of having to go back to the days when classroom management and discipline were your main priority. I’d barely raised my voice to a student in 13 years. I was more focused on my own proficiency and getting the best results for my hard-working, amazing students.
Could I even be the teacher who must first demand respect and take control of unruly behaviour and be constantly in battles of will with my students? I’m exaggerating of course. I taught some remarkably nice students in my time in Australian schools before leaving. But I had many challenging ones too.
I actually got pretty lucky, to begin with in a short-term job in one school, where students were motivated and easy to manage. I then took a job closer to where we were living for the whole of the 2016 school year. And though it had its moments and the enjoyment was way down on my last overseas school, it wasn’t quite as bad as I thought it was going to be. I survived the year.
That International School Community
Australia is very multicultural. It’s one of the things that I still love about the place. Sure, it’s not perfect and there are always issues. But it filled me with a sense of joy, knowing that there were other well-traveled people from all parts of the world living nearby.
When I was ‘homesick’ for Hong Kong, there was always ‘Chinatown’. We were living in Southport, where there is a kind of Chinatown. The street would close on weekends and I could get my fix for Asian culture for just a little while.
What I really missed though, was the international school community that I was a part of. Every place that I’ve worked overseas had this incredible sense of community that revolved around the school. The expat life can be great for many reasons, but for me, the main thing that I loved was the amount of close connections that grew with colleagues, students and parents who were from all around the globe.
International school communities are tight. They weather storms together (like we had to during the Covid times of 2020-22) . They are also used to the constant movement of people in and out and of the need to help people adjust and to bring them in with arms open. People move on, but they always stay connected like one big family. I was still connected, but I was now lost to that feeling of living in the international school community.
I Wasn’t The Only One
Of course, I wasn’t the first person to move home and struggle to adjust. In fact, quite a few of my friends have done the same. I’m sure most have settled back into their old or new lives and are doing great. But I have visited a few who still miss their old lives overseas.
One of my friends moved back to the US a few years ago. It was sad that I probably wouldn’t see him that much if ever again. In truth, I hadn’t seen much of him for a few years anyway as he was in a different country, but he was near enough that I could visit or maybe run into him at a conference somewhere in Asia.
Two other friends returned home to Australia a few years ago with their two kids and I was able to catch up with them occasionally which was great.
Fast forward a couple of years … My US friend has now moved to Indonesia and my other friends are back in Singapore. It just didn’t stick for them either. In both cases, they were moving back to their home countries with young kids. It would have been assumed that their working abroad days were over, at least for a while.
But something drew them back. It could be money. But I’m sure it’s much more than that. That’s fine with me. Chris from the US recently visited Bangkok and we caught up over some beers. My other two friends are likely to visit Thailand soon as well, and Singapore is an easy short flight or extra-long train ride away. A few weeks ago I visited a former colleague now living in Phuket and in April I’ll catch up with another from a different former school who lives in Chiang Mai. As an international teacher, you have a lot of couches to sleep on.
The Final Return?
So what happens to my friends and I now? Are we destined to be outcasts from our own countries? Will we just stay overseas forever? Retire somewhere exotic and take holidays back home? Or will we give it one last try and end up spending our later years back in ‘God’s country’?
The problem is that like all humans, we crave connection. It’s a connection with communities or families that make us whole and keeps us energised. People live longer, happier lives when they are a part of a community.
I read a book called ‘Ikigai’ which describes how a region of Japan has the oldest and happiest people (many living to over 100) because they have found their ikigai which translates roughly to ‘life purpose’. One of the most significant factors in these people living such long and purposeful lives is that they are a part of a close-knit community and that every day they wake up with purpose and connect with other people. (They also exercise and eat a very healthy diet)
But when international school teachers continually move on and connections become more and more dispersed across the globe, where will we find our community?
As strangers in our home countries, having lost touch with friends from decades ago, finding that sense of community once again could be tough. But of course, these are first-world problems. In all likelihood, I have another 15 years of wonderful work and travel experiences and a few more countries to live in. I’ll just keep living my very fortunate life.
Please feel free to leave a comment below if you wish
In case you’re interested in a brief summary of the last 20 years https://thefootlooseteacher.com/post/oh-the-places-you-ll-go-and-the-places-i-ve-been