Bringing Your Suitcase Home

Where is Home?
A Philosophic Question for the Long Term Expat
By Finn Skovgaard

Most people never give it a thought. The concept of "home" has no ambiguity for the majority of us, and "home" is simply the place you return to every day after work. But many expats realise after a few years living abroad that things are not that simple.

A glance in Longman's dictionary reveals that the word "home" covers many different concepts. I've already mentioned that it may be the place where you live. Another meaning is "where you came from or where you belong". You may have lived ten years abroad and still feel that "home" is where your closest family lives. A third definition of "home" is "in the country where you live". Finally, Webster's dictionary also defines "home" as "the abiding place of one's affections". In the beginning of your expat life, it may seem simple: "Home" is the dwelling you just rented during your three-day house-hunting visit, because that's where you return to after work. After a few more moves between countries, you may find yourself longing for home - for where you lived before.

Let me share a little of my story - a Dane who now lives in France and works in Luxembourg.

While visiting an English pub at in international fair in Luxembourg, I suddenly found myself longing back to England and not Denmark! The feeling was so strong that I later re-relocated back "home" to England for a while before moving on to France. Now I find that whenever I set my foot on English ground, I get this warm feeling of visiting "home". I also experience this when I go back "home" to France too. I feel ambiguous.

Visiting my native Denmark is always a special event. The first day, I find it peculiar that so many people around me are talking Danish. And a feeling of "oh look, there's a Danish car" pops to my mind every time I see a Danish registered car. As people around me tend to get bored with this fairly quickly, I have learned to keep this thought to myself. The paradox with Denmark is that part of me feels at home and part of me feels like an invisible alien, or stranger, at the same time. "Invisible" because any Dane watching me would say "he's Danish" if asked, unable to decipher what's going on in my mind. They'd find no explanation as to why I take the time to read the value of the notes and coins before paying. To me, Danish kroner is a foreign currency, but they don't know.

If I travel by car, I again get the feeling of returning "home" when I reach the German border from Denmark - and then yet another time at the border to Luxembourg. On the other hand, on odd days here in France, a sort of "tourist feeling" suddenly creeps up but quickly disappears again like a bursting bubble. For me, walking around in the streets of Paris is an everyday experience, but to most other compatriots, it could be a major life experience.

If the feeling of "home" is playing games with your mind too, then maybe this is because most of us have a basic need to belong somewhere. In my case, it seems as if every place or country where I've lived and felt at home to some degree, has become a permanent "home". In the end, I've accepted this paradox and chosen to turn the confusion into pleasure: I have so many places I can go and feel the warmth of returning "home" when I arrive - home again when I return to where I began. "Home" in a material way is still the house I happen to live in at a given time, but what gives real meaning to me now is what was so eloquently said in Webster's. Home is where my mind has been and keeps returning to.

Finn Skovgaard is a regular contributor to the Weekly Telegraph's noticeboard for expats at www.globalnetwork.co.uk and mentor for France at the same site.

For more information about France, refer to:
www.DutchnDuchess.com.

Finn Skovgaard proposes assistance for expats in France. More at www.skovgaard-europe.com/expix.htm.

(C) Copyright Finn Skovgaard 2002.