Expats Quotes

For me making friends with locals is hard, mostly because my lack of Vietnamese language skills and being retired I have limited access to locals in the work place. Though for me it is hard meeting expats as well, as most expats work here and make friends through their jobs.

Immigration, a lexicon. You're a 'migrant' when you're very poor; 'immigrant' when you're not so poor; and 'expat' when you're rich.

I grew up on a sugar plantation in Trinidad, on an expat estate, and that meant I had no idea about money until a lot later than most children.

For some Chicago expats, food is the medicine that blunts the pain of separation.

Such is the nature of an expatriate life. Stripped of romance, perhaps that's what being an expat is all about: a sense of not wholly belonging. [...] The insider-outsider dichotomy gives life a degree of tension. Not of a needling, negative variety but rather a keep-on-your-toes sort of tension that can plunge or peak with sudden rushes of love or anger. Learning to recognise and interpret cultural behaviour is a vital step forward for expats anywhere, but it doesn't mean that you grow to appreciate all the differences.

Hemingway is a baby when he turns up in Paris, but he's an ambitious baby. And he has the talent. And he's there to stage his breakthrough. So many of the expats who were there at that time were there to do precisely that. It was an ambition-fueled town.