Repatriation: Going Home Is Not Easy

If you are a repatriate, you will know that going home is not an easy transition. In addition to the physical requirements of setting up a new home and settling children into new schools (if applicable), repatriation can stir up a pot-full of mixed emotions - especially if it was not your choice to return home.

Repats need to re-establish their support networks at 'home', adapt (read: usually downgrade) their lifestyle and habits, re-shape their language to try to fit back into the typically more domestic-centered mind-set of the people that they meet, accept career changes , re-mould their identity and more.

If you are a repatriate, you may be interested in two women that I talked to in this past week:

The first is Kirsten Terndrup Hammarkvist, the founder of The Repatriation Network of Denmark and the Coming Home Network. (Note: These sites are in Danish.) Kirsten lived in California, US, for 8 years, before returning 14 years ago to Denmark. She recounted to me the struggles that she went through, thinking at times "What was wrong with me?", which led her to follow her passion and set up a network for repatriates in Denmark.

Several years on, some media articles and even a TV feature in Denmark, and Kirsten now has 262 members on the network's mailing list, who not only identify with her vision, but want to connect. Hats off to Kirsten!

If you are Danish and would like to get involved, or if you are a repat elsewhere and would like to talk to Kirsten about her experience setting up a network for repatriates, please contact Kirsten here.

The second woman is Madeleine Dobson. Madeleine is a PhD student in the UK at Royal Holloway, University of London. She was an expat in Singapore when her family moved there in the mid-nineties. When her family moved back to the UK she became interested in what it is really like to repatriate and how people negotiate this and the challenges and opportunities it presents. To avoid simply focussing on the economic ‘lead’ migrant, she is looking for households including dependent children who might be willing to take part in her research.

Madeleine is primarily interested in UK citizens who have lived at some point in Singapore as expats. If you can help her with her research, please visit her website and/or email her via this address. Thanks.

If anyone else is doing similar repatriate research work and/or managing repatriation networks, feel free to drop me a line - I would love to hear what you are up to.

Thanks and best wishes, Andrea.