Boreal Expat

Kent Tankersley: I’m an expatriate American living in Finland, where to my utter surprise, I’ve somehow spent half of the fifty-odd years of my life, so far. Time does have a way of sneaking up on you. As an American and long-time resident in a foreign land, I often feel pulled between two worlds, no longer completely familiar with the land of my birth after so many years and yet not always a full-fledged member of the society where I’ve made my home. Call it the dilemma of the expat. You gain new experiences when you stray far from home and broaden your horizons, but you lose something as well. Finland, an unassuming country on the fringes of Western Europe, is not the most obvious place for someone from a tiny town in North Georgia to find themselves. How the hell did I get here? And why do I stay?

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