going home ( ok , in this instance home = U.K. ) next week got me thinking about this...

When you are home do you notice that your friends and or family will introduce you to people as "This is so and so, he's from Switzerland" ( despite the fact that you are probably at that point a few miles from your place of birth )

I've got a couple of friends that always seem to do that. Mrs. G and I have talked about it and we think it's some sort of bragging by association.

No, actually not. But maybe I haven't gotten to the age where you're introduced with name, occupation and place of residence.

Doesn't beat my mother presenting me to her friends:

"This is my daughter... She has a Swiss bank account!"

oh no... occupation is never mentioned.. they all think I'm a secret agent.

I often get '...and this is my son-in-law, he's from Australia' from OH's mum. Cue dodgy Aussie accents and enquiries about Paul Hogan and koalas...

At my Dad's 70th. "This is NAT, he just flew in from Switzerland".

Do you turn up like this?

now, I have to kill you.

My mother used to introduce me with my work title. Apparently it is cool. Now she tells them where I am living and where I lived before that. Plus telling them how many languages I speak.

Embarrassing

Being brown I was used to being ask where I'm really from when I was growing up.

I'm really from Scotland. We have brown people too ya know

Me too! Being a olive skin they always ask me if I am really from Canada. And my parents? Etc..

Well, we weren't in Canada 400 years ago, so maybe it count?

I stopped telling people that I live in Switzerland, I got tired of them turning around and yelling over to a friend, "hey, check this out, this dude lives in Sweden..!!"

I have some friends that always introduce me as "Tom from New Jersey" just to annoy me, as I am NOT from New Jersey, nor have I ever lived there!

Tom

Plus it's called "jeuyhsey" anyways..

Be careful about who you're taking on.

Pffffffffffffftt...

I got a lot of "No, really, where are you from?" when I told my colleagues in Finnland I'm Portuguese.

Apparently they think Portuguese (and Spanish) are as dark skinned as "arabs". I couldn't possibly be Portuguese being that white...

It's actually quite useful if people mention that you aren't living in your home country any more because it lets you off the hook when you're talking with a local accent yet looking completely WTF-blank when people are discussing issues like "the plans for a new bypass" or "Hospital X's A & E department diverting various emergencies to Hospital Y".

Mums are always proud of their kids carving out a new niche for themselves abroad, learning a new language, and generally being the clever-clogs they can brag about at their weekly coffee mornings. However, I think with more people of my generation upping sticks and moving around the world it's not such a biggy any more.

Yup. We have some "we're off to see our friends in Switzerland this weekend"

I also have an old family friend (i.e. 80 years old, childhood friend of my parents) who on every occassion I see him, never fails to comment on the blingy Swiss watch that I wear... "that's a fine looking Swiss watch you have there...".

Nevermind that it is a common cheap Swatch watch - albeit metal, but with no blingyness at all...

............