For many expatriates, it’s time for that anticipated yet often touchy subject: home leave or relocation. It is filled with hopeful eagerness and yearning; fraught with debate and emotion; and marked by packing, anxiety, anticipation, hubbub, disagreements, flying, eating, spending and repeat.
It may include fantasies of being with welcoming family members with no emotional strings attached. With the prospect of travel and today’s technology, home leave is not the once-a-year standard of the past. People who have the opportunity to live outside their own country may see the world differently, so it can still be challenging.
Spouses may disagree how time should be divided. Discuss your boundaries before you go – and reconfirm along the way. If you’re traveling alone with children, perhaps you’ll be with family who may not be helpful nor relate to your overseas life. Staying with family may sound tempting, but beware idealizing people and situations that actually annoy you. You may struggle to have privacy, surrounded by luggage, unable to sleep, culture shocked and running out of things to say – after only a few days.
An unwritten rule of home leave is that everyone wants to see you, but few may want to hear you. There the overlapping gushing “It’s so good to see you!! Tell me everything!”. You begin to share about your life abroad. Seconds later they may interrupt to share their local happenings.
The obvious cost to home leave is money. Benefits packages vary, but even if you spend little on airfare, consumer consumption costs can run high. Heads may turn when you buy everything you need, think you need, or don’t need at all. There’s food, perhaps rental cars, hotels or maintenance on your own home.
Your tolerance may wane as your stay progresses; you may respond politely or just keep quiet. Develop automatic talking points and be able to give digest or full-length dialogue on your host culture. Just remember: nobody wants to hear anything negative. Don’t be surprised to hear “So why don’t you come home?”
Physical exhaustion of traveling makes dealing with emotional issues harder to handle. You may feel alienated from people who mean a lot to you. You may experience some reverse culture shock, particularly confusing in your home country, and temporarily lose your balance. It’s nobody’s fault. Ease into it.
The smartest thing you can do is have your own neutral space where you can schedule visiting hours or hold an open reception for people you want to see. You are the one traveling thousands of miles and living out of suitcases. If you are traveling with children, staying in one place is better for their routines and everyone’s mental health. Insomuch as possible, do not go out of your exhausted way to visit those who could easily visit you. Do something fun to balance obligatory visits.
The purpose of home leave is to lead a reasonably normal life in your home culture and become reacquainted with family and friends. Don’t fill your time with hyperactivity trying to please everyone or do everything. Learn to say no. Deal with issues best done in person. Do some historical sightseeing to help your children learn about their home culture.
Enjoy the things you miss, and though you’ll expend energy walking dazed through shopping centers and with the frenzy of family burnout, eat wisely. Keep your sense of self steadfastly in mind.
When returning from leave, allow transition time in order to decompress and get some last-minute relaxation.
For expatriates, home leave is part of our life cycle, the urge to see people we love, to return to the culture which shaped us. It pays to keep perspective about what to expect –and what not to expect. Appreciate the experiences, hang onto your sense of humor, and remember the best anecdotes sometimes come from situations when events are less than perfect.
