First Blog Post: what's this nouveau blog?

Another new blog??!! What's this one all about then?



Well, I will start by introducing myself.
I am a 30-something woman born in France from Chinese parents, and have spent the last 10 years of my life in the UK (you know, it's always the same story, you think you will spend 2 years in the UK to add an experience abroad onto your CV, and 5 to 10 years later, you're still here! Good old Blighty!).
I had a Chinese upbringing - has anyone read 'Battlehymn of a Tiger Mother'? -, spent my teens in state secondary education in Paris then in the French elite business school education, and spent my twenties working in the English corporate world.


This means I have lived across several cultures for most of my life, and I still find myself surprised, perplexed, fascinated by how much words, expressions, and behaviours show that how we act and what we say and how we say it derives from a specific culture that we belong to.
Do you know how many French words there are in the culinary lexical field? (a lot!) And how many synonyms of 'drunk' in English? (although in reality the French drink more than the English).


If you have left the country where you grew up for a significant period of time, or if your parents come from a different country, you will probably be able to relate if I say that I have often felt like a black sheep in the middle of a happily grazing beautifully white-wool herd.
But the ability to draw from resources from more than one culture and language brings about a real richness in one's comprehension of the world and ability to communicate with others. (Of course, sometimes things get complicated, and what it does brings about is richness in confusion and frustration!)


This is what I would like to explore in this blog - how we live across several cultures, the surprises and richness that it brings, but also the frustrations and comical situations that you can end up in.


Happy reading!