Meacham an Expatriate Who Came to U.S. to Pursue her Dream

Top Five Tips for Expatriots to U.S.A.

December, 2014 The Expat World

KEEP CALM

I am

Moving to

U.S.A.

TABLE of

CONTENTS

Letter From the Editor Page 4 An Expatriate Journey from Page 6Korea to U.S.A. Top Five Tips for Expatriates Page 12to U.S.A Immigration Between Mexico Page 14and the United States 3

Letter From the

Editor

Living overseas is not an easy process. It is rewarding, yet it has some challenges. Wel-come to our first issue from the Expat World. My essential goal in creating the Expat World is to help expatriates improve their life overseas. In this publication, expatriate can share their ideas, tips, and strategies not only to adjust to their new life, but also to feel more comfortable, and live a good life abroad. The Expat World is a guide to a new life in a new way.

As you read through The Expat World, in the expat spotlight, you will look at an expat story who came to U.S. to pursue her dream. From personal stories, pictures, to tips for expatiates , there are variety of interesting topics throughout the Expat World.

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Thank you for everyone who is involved in the Expat World including our prospective readers. I wish you a happy Christmas and I am looking forward to hearing from you any comments, suggestions, or thoughts about this publication.

Do not hesitate to contact me on: almuzayr@uni.edu

Enjoy the Issue.Sincerely,

Ruqayah Almuzayn

An Excellent Tip from an Expert Expat

“Beware of moving overseas! It’s tough, confusing, disorienting and ultimately, extremely reward-ing. When you move back home, if you ever do, you’ll be a different person than you were when you first left.”

-Chris Guillebeau5

Story about an Expat Who Came to U.S. to Pursue her DreamSohyun Meacham is an expa-

triate who came to U.S. seven years ago. She is currently a professor in University of Northern Iowa. She is married with two kids a 4- year- old daughter named Sabina and a 2- year- old son named Jimmy.

Meacham is from Korea, she came to U.S. in 2007. She earned both her bachelor and master de-grees in early childhood education. she earned her bachelor degree in a university in Korea , both her mas-ter degree and her doctorate degree in universities in U.S. in U.S.

She chose The United States of America other than other countries because she wanted to learn and use English, be a professor, and look for

In Korea, a professorship is a highly preferred job, so people who would like to be professors should have family support financially or political power. She knew that she was a good ,smart student who was interested in professorship and want-ed to go to graduate school. Mea-cham thought that she can follow her dream in U.S. where there are a lot of opportunities for graduate students to find jobs in the fields which they are interested in.

Meacham explained that she knew about University of Northern Iowa [UNI], when she was back in her country. She read articles and research written by education pro-fessors in UNI. She thinks that UNI professors are well respected scholars not only in The United States, but also in other countries.

To be a professor is not the first thing that Meacham wanted to be when she was a student in school. When she was in high school, she wanted to be an astronomer. Her father advised her not to do so because she might not find a job because some employers prefer males in science fields more than females.

Meacham considers that it is important to have good colleagues as a professor where professors could share their ideas and benefit from each other’s. Meacham knew that applying for a professorship in a university which is known for its strong education college would be competitive, but she decided to give it a try. She was glad that she got the job offer.

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Soh likes to cook homemade dishes for her family, play with her kids, read for them and make E- books as a family.

The first showoff in a graduation ceremony for Soh was in her doctoral gradu-ation ceremony from University of Delaware, feeling proud of her accomplish-ments with the doctoral hooding for PhD in education.

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Then she wanted to be a musician, yet it was expensive to get musical instruments or have a tutor, so she gave up to be a musician. Then she was interested in education, child development, and psychology. She re-alized that being a professor would be the best fit for her and it became one of her dreams. From that moment, she was trying to do anything to follow her dream. Even if it will cost her to be an expatriate and leave her country.

Currently she is teaching two undergraduate classes: multicultural children literacy, and educational technol-ogy and design. She teaches sometimes graduate level courses.

As a professor, other than teaching, research has been one of her favorite activities. Meacham described her experience with international students as good; she have had one notable international student was from an African country. She described him as “genius”, he was working really hard, and his papers were better than the native speakers.

She added that she works with some international doctoral students, and writing is one of the challenges that they encounter. The reason is that English writing is different from writing in other languages.

As an expatriate she explained some of the challenges that she faced.

She started English in middle school, yet it was only in reading. When she came to U.S., she did not know how to use English speaking skills and make conversations. She was quiet, sometimes she did not understand what people were saying due to the fact that they talk really fast. She men-tioned that both listening and speaking was tough.

Another challenge was that some people who do not know how to interact with foreigners, she stated that the issue was not about knowing how, but about the willing to interact with people who are not from this country.

She thinks that many people still have some thoughts about discrimination against minorities. Even if they do not express it directly, it appears in theirs behaviors. She proclaimed that she does not remain quiet but she takes an active role by fight against that by talking to an authority figure who can handle discrimination issues. “This is my wisdom: never be quiet if you feel that you treated unfairly, bring it up somewhere to somebody or to that person, and share your concern,” She said.

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Soh with her students in Educational Technology and Design class

One of the uncomfortable situations that happened to Meacham because she was not familiar with Amer-ican culture in the first year when she came to U.S., was parties here are different from parties in Korea. It was different for her, where people are loud and they talk about random things. Because of the language barriers too every time she cannot understand what people are saying, she thought the idea of going back to her country.

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Soh with her teaching assistance , Nicole Lyons. Nicole has been her teaching assistance since this Fall. She helps professor Soh in answering students ques-tions, lecturing, grading, and keeping track of attendance.

One of the embarrassing situations that Meacham stills remember was when she said something differ-ent in terms of pronunciation than native speaker do. She said, “sheet of paper, it seemed like “shit of paper” when I spoke fast and people started laughing.” She mentioned that she did not realize why people were laughing until one of them pointed out. The degree of embarrassment depends on the environment as Meacham said.

Meacham wishes that she can go back to her country once a year, but the airplane tickets are too expensive to frequently travel back and forth. Meacham visited her country four times in seven years. She mentioned that she respects her American family tradition to celebrate Americans holidays including her American husband and her two kids and she usually does not celebrate Korean holidays.

“I like to be more expressive than conforming,” she said. Her favorite thing about Iowa is the reason-able price for renting middle size houses with back yard. Missing family and friends is the thing that Meacham likes least about being in U.S. She added that however, hanging out with some Koreans twice a year and speak in Korean make her feel better about missing her family.

“Be yourself, speak up if you see inequality issues, try to interact with local people and get more exposed not only in your comfort zone”

Meacham said that her two kids have been exposed to the Korean culture; they like to dance on Korean songs, and they like some Korean food. In the aspect of language they know that their mom speaks another lan-guage beside English, but they cannot really understand a lot of Korean. She added that whenever she has an opportunity, she teaches them some Korean words.

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She clarified that her focus now is commu-nication in the first place, and then language learning could come later when they grow up and they would like to learn Korean.

The thing that she likes most about U.S. in general is the life style, and the ability to say her own opinion, and still be respected.

This was the first time for the Meacham family to go to the Pumpkin Parade, Jimmy and Sabina had fun doing some farm activities.

She said that she feels that United States is her country because she lived here for many years. She added that it was exciting to visit Korea this year, but she realized that it is not her home she used to live in, not the food that she likes to eat, and not the lifestyle that she prefers anymore.

One of her advice to expatriate to U.S. is “Be your-self, speak up if you see inequality issues, try to interact with local people and get more exposed not only in your comfort zone” She added learn about the culture the one’s going to live with and trying to teach others about his/her own culture is an important advice to expatriate. “The more you mingle with them, the more you can make the society better for your own cultural heritage,” she said. She mentioned that her focus was not to have citizenship; she wanted something to make her stay legal to work and to be with her family, so she got a green card.

“Be yourself, speak up if you see inequality issues, try to interact with local people and get more exposed not only in your comfort zone”

“The more you mingle with them, the more you can make the society better for your own cultural heri-tage,”

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Celebrating Sabina’s first birthday with her parents, grandmothers, aunts,and cousins wearing “ Hanbok” which is a Korean traditional dress.

keep an open mind

Get out and experience as much as you can. Eat food you have nev-er tried before, visit attractions and most importantly do things outside

Top Five Tips For Expatriates to U.S.A.

Research while you are in your home country

Understand your goals for moving overseas and then de-cide what you are willing to give up to meet your goals. Try to know some aspects of the daily life such as banking ,taxes, transportation, and schools in the country that you are moving to.

Speak with the locals

Always smile, and whenever you have a chance, talk with strangers in the grocery stores, trains, and in restaurants. It is an opportunity to

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Top Five Tips For Expatriates to U.S.A.

Be Patient Be prepared to deal with culture

shock, and experience different kinds of stress: job pressures,

Research while you are in your home country

Understand your goals for moving overseas and then de-cide what you are willing to give up to meet your goals. Try to know some aspects of the daily life such as banking ,taxes, transportation, and schools in the country that you are moving to.

Know the Legal issues

Try to know what is legal and what is not to avoid being in trou-bles and pay high amount of fine.

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Immigration Between Mexico and

the United States

Undocumented people disembark after crossing into Mexico from Guatemala at the Suchiate River on August 1, 2013 in Talisman, Mexico

An indigenous family walks from Guatemala into Talisman, Mexico, after illegally crossing the border at the Suchiate River, on August 1, 2013

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The Mexican flag as seen through the U.S.-Mexico border fence in San Luis, Arizona.

People cross into Mexico, rafting across the Suchiate River from Guatemala, on August 2, 2013 in Ciudad Hidalgo, Chiapas, Mexico. Thousands of undocumented Central Americans pass illegally through Mexico, many of them immigrants on the first leg of their long and perilous journey north to the United States. 15

Immigrants listen as Catholic Father Alejandro Solalinde Guerra warns them of the dangers in their journey to the United States, while at the Hermanos en el Camino (Brothers on the Road) shelter on August 4, 2013 in Ixtepec, Mexico. The shelter, founded by Solalinde in 2007, houses and feeds immigrants, mostly from Central America, during a stop on their train route through Mexico towards the U.S. border

Central American immigrants check a map of Mexico before boarding a freight train headed north on August 3, 2013 from Arriaga, Mexico.

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Immigrants listen as Catholic Father Alejandro Solalinde Guerra warns them of the dangers in their journey to the United States, while at the Hermanos en el Camino (Brothers on the Road) shelter on August 4, 2013 in Ixtepec, Mexico. The shelter, founded by Solalinde in 2007, houses and feeds immigrants, mostly from Central America, during a stop on their train route through Mexico towards the U.S. border

Central American immigrants arrive on top of a freight train to the Hermanos en el Camino im-migrant shelter in Ixtepec, on August 6, 2013. The sign outside reads "Welcome Migrants."

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“Friendship Park,” on the border between Mexico and Arizona, a state whose immigration Policies have led to widespread protests, especially from its 30 percent Hispanic population.

Foot traffic across the border in San Luis. Many such people live “sin fronteras,” working, shopping and visiting family on both sides.

Central American immigrant rides atop a freight train on August 6, 2013 through Juchitlan, Mexico

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Standing in front of a mural at Belén Posada del Migrante shelter, Martín, from Honduras, takes a break from studying English.

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