TCKs are different from child migrants (as categorized in this book) in one important way. Whereas ‘child migrant’ generally refers to children of economic migrants, TCKs are children of Expats or ‘adventurers.’ Polluck and Van Reken (2009) define TCKs as ‘a person who has spent a significant part of his/her developmental years outside the parents’ culture, building relationships to all cultures, while not having full ownership in any...’ (2009: 19). Mobility is normal for TCKs, and it is often expected that TCKs will repatriate. In addition, TCKs are characterized by a privileged lifestyle often with systems of logical support (such as commissary for military families, embassy or missionary compounds), and often are directly conscious of representing something greater than themselves, be it their government, their company or God (Polluck & Van Reken, 2009). Of all the participants in this study, only one fits this description (although not all of the characteristics of a TCK apply to her). Here is her story.

Emma: United States → Japan → (and repeat, many times)

Emma’s migration is not linear, and she has spent most of her young life switching between the US and Japan. As a young child, she often left the United States in the summers and stayed in Japan for one or two months. However, when she was 10, her parents divorced, so she returned to Japan with her mom. It was no problem to get a Japanese family visa because her blood relatives are Japanese. The flight from LA to Narita was ten and a half hours long, and then they took an overnight train to her home in Japan (another 12-hour journey). For the first few months, Emma and her mother lived with her grandmother until they could get enough money to rent a house of their own, which they did several months later. This was the first time in which Emma was really living in Japan, unlike the other times when she had been a visitor.