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Why Do People From High-Income Countries Call Themselves “Expats”?

Even when they are immigrants

Andrea
A-Culturated
6 min readMay 4, 2024

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man sitting in a private airplane with headphones on
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“I’m spending time with these other expats.”

Said my friend living in Germany.

“What is an expat?”

I asked, truly intrigued.

“Oh, it’s just how Americans who move to Germany call themselves.”

“Oh, you mean other American immigrants in Germany?”

Long Pause

“…. I guess you can call us that too.”

I am an immigrant from Mexico who was brought by her parents to live in the U.S. when I was in my teens—that’s right, it's a tough age to be socially awkward due to cultural and language differences. My experience as an immigrant was considerably privileged, as I became an American citizen through my mother before even arriving here.

Since arriving in the U.S., I went through an identity crisis for about 15 years. As a Latina who does not comport with the expectations that people have of “Latina” and “Mexican” in the U.S., people often told me I was neither and would ask where I was really from.

During my identity crisis, I tried to hide I was an immigrant to avoid getting labeled, but it was bound to come out as I have an accent when I speak…

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A-Culturated
A-Culturated

Published in A-Culturated

For all the readers and writers in between cultures

Andrea
Andrea

Written by Andrea

A multicultural mom, wife, daughter, immigration attorney, lover of mother nature, trying to make a difference one word at a time.

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