A few months ago, I found an old high school friend on Facebook, she asked me the question that everyone I know, but haven’t seen in a long time asks me- ‘Where are you now?’
‘Where am I now?’ I sometimes think that people assume that if you are not living your native country, you are out traveling the world, living out of a backpack, sleeping in hostels, eating in restaurants, basically on an extended holiday.
To her, it seemed strange that I had never returned, she’s married, she has children too, but she lives around the corner from her parents.
To me, it seems so strange, I’m married, I have kids, I’m not living out of a backpack.
I’m in Belgium now, I’ve been here for a year and a half, but before that I’d been in Turkey for nine years. Basically I haven’t lived in Canada for ten years. I’m not all over the place, I’ve got a family and a home in these countries.
It’s just a different life.
Why am I an expat?
I honestly have no idea how it started, well, I guess I do. I moved to Turkey right out of university to teach English. I was going to give myself two years, and then go back to Canada and ‘settle down’ (whatever that means).
What happened next is your classic expat story, a met a boy. He was my student. We fell in love, and got married. Now we have two beautiful girls. We have made our home in Turkey (We are here in Belgium is temporarily because of his job).
Living abroad has opened my eyes to so many new, interesting, strange, wonderful experiences, people and moments. I am so blessed to live this life. I wouldn’t change it for the world.
I can say that I became an expat by accident, but I’m so happy I did. Every Tuesday, I will write something about my expat experiences, the good, and the difficult. Some will be about Turkey, some will be about Belgium. I hope that you will enjoy my stories.
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A Family's Life 