15 Things Most People Don't Know About Foreign Service Families

Foreign Service families are different than your everyday, run-of-the-mill American family.  While there are lot of perks, like learning languages and traveling to exotic places, there are a lot of downsides too.  Like what, you ask?  Well, we never get to see the Super Bowl in real time.  And we never get to have crawfish boils on Good Friday.  We rarely get to go home for Christmas, and we almost never make weddings and funerals of loved ones.  In fact, there are a lot of things most people don't know about Foreign Service families.  I've made a short list below.

1.  We have culture shock when we go back to America.

When you haven't set foot on American soil for a year or two (or sometimes longer); and you don't have cable TV and American radio and news stations blaring at you on a daily basis, you begin to lose track of what daily American life is like.  Every time one of us goes "home,"  the sheer amount of choices--choices in restaurants, condiments, television shows, types of socks one can buy, etc.--can be shocking.

I am always amazed most when entering a grocery store, for instance.  I'll use beans as an example.  Here in Albania, I'm always thrilled when the grocery store has red kidney beans (black beans don't exist here).  Take that pure joy I feel at buying a can of beans and then imagine going into a store that has red beans, black beans, white beans, baked beans, etc.  Then think about the fact that there are probably five different brands of each kind and they're all prepared different ways!  It's like Christmas!  So take that and multiply it by an entire store filled with five different options for foods we never, ever see while we're overseas.  It can be totally overwhelming to someone.  Even going to the small grocery store in my hometown can be mentally taxing because I just can't decide which beans I want.  And let's not even talk about fresh jalapenos and herbs available year-round.

Seeing how the fashion has changed in a year's time can also be mind-blowing.  Here in Albania, there are two kinds of clothes:  off-the-rack clothes that are horrible quality and shrink with every single wash (usually covered in phrases written in English that don't actually make any sense) and clothes that we'll never be able to afford.  There is nothing in between; so we don't do any kind of clothes shopping here.  So going home and going to somewhere like Target is also a culture shock.  What do you mean there are 10 different options for any particular color of garment??  What do you mean everything I packed is completely out of style now?  Why are you staring at me when I buy $1000 worth of clothes in one shopping trip (and in multiple sizes for my growing boys)?

The radio is always a source of wonder at home.  I mean, sure we have the internet where we live.  And I sometimes listen to Pandora.  But that doesn't mean that I know any of the songs on the Top 40 programs.  If you're not Taylor Swift or someone really famous like that, we've probably never heard of you.  That said, if I've heard of the singer, the chances of me having actually heard their music is slim.

One thing that always catches me off guard is that EVERYONE speaks English back home.  I know, I know (DUH!).  But when you live a life where you're always thinking ahead about how to say something or ask for something in another language; and, suddenly, you don't have to do that, it can be a strange encounter for you.  Add that to how absolutely polite and welcoming everyone is in the South, and you have the perfect recipe for culture shock.

Another shock for those of us who have done (or are in the middle of) tours in third-world countries would be the driving.  I mean, people actually stay in their traffic lane.  They use their blinkers.  Their cars have four wheels.  No one is driving horse-drawn carts.  There are no herds of sheep running down highways.  There are no men in three-piece suits walking cows down the road to be milked.  It's all so civilized (not that Albania isn't) and...boring sometimes.  It all just works like it's supposed to.

Something that's hard to get used to is that we fit in when we're in the States.  We speak the same language and know how the rules work.  The absolute kicker is getting used to people NOT staring at us when we go places.  Our first tour was in Ecuador and now our third one is in Albania (with Canada in between), and it's amazing how often we're just blatantly stared at.  We stick out.  No doubt about it.  We dress different, talk different, even laugh differently than the locals.  So one gets used to walking in a room or restaurant and attracting at least a modicum of attention.  That's absolutely not so when we go home, and it always takes getting used to.

Finally, everything is so easy and convenient in the United States.  There is always something open, no matter the time.  Goods are always readily-available and at every store you go to.  The produce isn't seasonal, and squash actually exists!  If you have a recipe that calls for okra and it's Winter, you can still have okra!  It's almost a novelty sometimes.  Everything comes in single-serving sizes and resealable bags as well.  I love that.  I miss that.  But I sure don't miss the prices that come along with it!


2.  For those of us who have been living abroad for a while, we get traveler's diarrhea when we go home.

Yes, I know it's gross; but it's a fact of life.  The truth is, going home does a complete 180 on our bodies.  Of course, there's airplane food, jet lag, and then an immediate binge session on all our American favorites.  The result?  Ewww!  There's also the water.  While America has super clean water (lucky us), years of living off of bottled and/or distilled water can wreak havoc on our tummies when we switch to tap water.

I know my husband and I get sick every time we go home.  It's not just the water, it's the richness of Louisiana cuisine that does it.  When you've lived on grilled fish and salad for a year and then immediately switch to fried shrimp po-boys and jambalaya over night, there are going to be some effects.  That said, it's still totally worth it.


3.  We plan our lives two to five years in advance.

Bid lists (the list of available jobs around the world) come out about a year before a tour ends.  People research the jobs and the locations of the jobs for several weeks and then "bid" on the a few they want.  The process is tedious and very stressful for both the officers and their spouses, and it's like a vacation when it's finally done.

See, some jobs require that the officer learn a language fluently before they go to that post.  For instance, a job that requires the officer to become fluent in a super hard language like Arabic or Japanese is a job that requires TWO YEARS of language training before the officer is ever sent to post.  Then the length of the posting will be around three years.  Obviously, there are other jobs out there that don't require a language or else require a language like Spanish, which one can become fluent in, in only six months. Those jobs have the quickest turnaround time, so to speak; and it allows officers to move from country to country a little more frequently.

That said, imagine having to plan your entire life two to five years at a time.  You not only have to worry about learning the language and passing the test, whether you'll like post, the job you'll be filling, getting your family settled when you get there, finding employment for your spouse, etc.  Rather, many people also have to worry about planning posts around good high schools (actually being in the same place long enough for their kid to be able to stay in one high school), time spent in training (often living in a small apartment in Virginia for a year at a time), around a spouse leaving a career to join the officer later.

For instance, we leave a year from now.  If my husband requires a year of language, our six- and eight-year-olds will be eight and ten when we get to our next post but be ten and twelve or eleven and thirteen (depending on whether our next post lasts two or three years) when we leave our next post.  We'll have to plan the post after that very carefully to make sure we plan the high school years properly.  Do you realize how crazy it is to have to think about the high school years when my children are only six and eight?  I know it's crazy, but it's a fact of FS life (or maybe it's just me being neurotic).


4.  Our kids have no idea what kids in the States are doing as far as pop culture, fashion, TV, music, etc. They find it really hard to relate to other kids when they go back home.

Foreign Service kids are both amazing and resilient.  They can have a conversation with anyone from a president to a regular Joe and never have an issue.  They don't fear change, because change is a constant.  They don't fear making new friends, going new places, not speaking the language, or moving away from a house and a place they will probably never see again.  All of these things are a part of a Foreign Service kid's life.

Watching an FS kid meet another FS kid is so awesome to see.  It doesn't matter where they meet or under what circumstances.  Some of the first questions they ask are, "Where do you live?", "Where have you lived?", and "What languages do you speak?"  That said, Foreign Service kids are a minority; and, sadly, they can seem off-putting or "weird" to other kids when they go back to the States.

Watching my boys play with their cousins is always fun, but I'm thankful that the fact that they are family, supersedes the "weird" factor.


5.  Home leave and R&Rs are orgies of gluttony and shopping.

Oh, American and Louisiana food, how I miss you.  Southern-style vegetables, I miss you and worship your very existence.  Honestly, fast food, how I miss you too.  I live in one of the last remaining countries in the world that does not have a McDonald's or a Burger King or anything of the sort.  Yes, that means the first thing I do with my kids when we go to any other country in the world is to look for a McDonald's.  And we eat at the Hard Rock Cafe in every country we go to, too.  And, no, it's not good food.  Why do we absolutely run to them when on vacation or when we get to the States?  Because they taste the exact same every time and place we try them.  Sometimes (for some of you, all the time), you just crave a certain taste like McDonald's french fries.  Well, we crave it for months at a time.  Can you even imagine how bad that sucks?  I live in a place where you can only get cilantro like three months out of the year and then only find it about twice in the store during those three months.  It sucks.  I put cilantro in everything.  So I've learned to grow my own.

Yes, when Foreign Service families go on R&R or on home leave in between posts, we eat like animals.  It really is an orgy of food.  We eat out every single meal if we can.  We do not count calories or carbs or fat grams.  We have a short, set amount of time when we have to fulfill every craving (or "envie" as I grew up calling it) that we've had since the last time we were home.  For some of us, that means that we eat shrimp po-boys and boiled crawfish for six weeks straight.  We drink Abita beer and eat blocks of cheddar cheese because we simply cannot get it at home.  We (and I mean "I") gain 5-15 pounds and we simply don't care.  We know it's going to happen every single time.  You can always tell when someone's just come back from R&R because they show up after a few weeks looking fat, oily, and completely unhealthy.  And they make everyone else jealous!

I mentioned earlier that we go home and spend $1000 at Target and people stare at us.  Well, the truth is that we might do that twice or so during each R&R.  See, when you go a year or more without going to your favorite store (or any store you like that actually carries your size at an affordable price), you might go a little loco with the charge card.  It happens to all of us.  But add that to the fact that you haven't been in a year and you won't be back for at least a year, and you get binge shopping.  I use Target as my example, because that is one place where my entire family can find something appropriate and affordable to wear.  But when you plan your life years ahead of time, very often you have to shop years ahead of time too.  Granted, I know that there is online shopping; but I absolutely detest it.  You can't see the real colors (and see if they match those shoes you love) or feel the read fabrics or--God forbid!--try them on.  So I go to Target and I buy boys' jeans in three sizes, socks, underwear, swimsuits, T-shirts, etc. all for the following year.  I buy a size or two up on the clearance racks for next year's seasons.  (See why we're never quite "in style" yet?)

We don't just buy tons of clothes when we go home.  We buy things like snacks, canned food, seasonings, kids' friends' birthday party gifts, wrapping paper, you name it.  We buy anything one would refrain from buying online because they want to see it in person first; we just happen to buy a year or two's worth at a time.


6.  We always miss home but really have no desire to go back for any lengthy period of time.

I absolutely do not speak for all FS families; however, I do know for certain that many of them agree with me on this.  We join this life because of an unquenchable thirst for experiencing new things and a love of travel.  We love experiences over having "things."  We love the rush that comes with learning a new language or learning about a new culture.  This is not something that will ever change.  We'll never be happy living in the States and working a regular 9-5 job and down the street from where we grew up.

So, while we love to go "home" (back to the U.S.), it will probably never feel quite like "home" again.  In fact, we're nomads.  We pick up our entire lives every few years and never look back.  We make incredible friendships that are temporary.  We have no desire to go back and live forever (at least not until retirement).

Personally, we've thought about what it would be like to go back to the States and live and work and give our children "roots."  We've considered it at times.  But there is one thing I know to be absolutely true: we'd still be itching to move around every two or three years.  We'd never stay in one place, not even in our beloved New Orleans.  It's just not who we are.  I think most FS couples are the same way.


7.  We're always scared we're screwing up our kids.

I mentioned earlier that our kids (FS kids) are often considered weird to normal kids who grow up in the States.  By the time they graduate high school, most have lived in six to eight different countries, and most can converse in three or four different languages.  They have seen true poverty and true riches.  They understand the cultural norms in each of the countries in which they're raised.  They understand how the U.S. Department of State and other agencies operate.  They are not scared of anything.  They are very well-rounded and intelligent and, for the most part, most of the them are very articulate.  These kids do not get intimidated.  But see, the thing is, these kids do intimidate others.  Hell, some of them intimidate me!  They're amazing!

And these children, for the most part, have absolutely no roots.  If you ask these kids--even my kids--where they're from, you'll most likely hear the state where they take their home leave.  My kids say different states, the states in which they were born, though neither of them has ever lived in either of those states.  They fight over where "home" is.

It's during conversations such as these that my husband and I wonder if we're screwing our kids up by not giving them those roots.  They absolutely thrive when we go to Louisiana or Alabama and they see their cousins, grandparents, and aunts and uncles; and they absolutely thrive.  And they ask a hundred questions about how they're related to these people because they don't know them.  They don't realize which one is my sibling and which one is the in-law or what the makeup of the family is.  They don't know which kids belong to which adults.  My children know they love these people and that they are loved by these people, but they do not "know" these people.  And that's difficult.

My husband and I often wonder if we're giving our kids truly amazing opportunities to thrive in this world or every reason to end up hiding from it.  That said, we truly believe it's the former rather than the latter.  But we still wonder.  And we've sworn an oath to one another that if this lifestyle ever starts to impact our children's well-being in a negative way, we're out.  We quit.


8.  We are some of the most patriotic people you'll ever meet, even though we don't actually live in our own country for years and/or decades at a time.

We bleed red, white, and blue.  We never get a break other than home leave or R&R; rather, we're always "on duty."  This does not mean that we work 24 hours per day.  What it means is that even when we're grocery shopping, we are representatives of the United States of America.  It comes with the job.  Sometimes, it's really easy to be an American overseas.  I live in the most pro-American country in the world.  Our friends and colleagues who serve in other countries aren't always as lucky, but they still serve with pride.  We all do.


9.  We change cars a lot.

We tend to change cars every tour or so.  It's true.  Sometimes, it's because one's next post requires a right-hand drive.  Other times, it's because countries won't allow a car over a certain age to be imported.  Other times, it's because we're offered over market value just because that particular car isn't available for sale in *blank country.*  Why not?


10.  We are usually VERY tight-knit communities.

I'm not going to tell a bold-faced lie and say that every person in every post likes each other.  I'll be honest enough to say that some of us down right hate each other.  That's what happens when you work together, live on top of each other, socialize together, etc.  But if it hits the fan, we're all we've got.  We may not agree; we may not associate; but we've all got each other's backs.  No one knows what it's like to be in this life like a fellow colleague does.  Sometimes, you're going to get into trouble;  and you might need to call someone you really don't like to help get you out of it.  It's part of the life we've chosen.


11.  Even small children in the FS know what jet lag is and what to prepare themselves for.

Kids, even kids four and six, do not forget their first case of jet lag.  I find it really cool that I can talk to my boys about things like that, and they know exactly what I'm talking about.  We've got rock star kids when it comes to traveling.  Each time we leave Albania for a trip back to the States, we have to wake our kids up at 1:00 AM for a trip to the airport.  They know that they have to stay up until the 10:00 AM flight leaves for the States so that they will sleep deeply and their jet lag won't be as bad.  They do it every time, and they never complain or act ugly at the airport.  FS kids are some of the best travelers I have ever seen.


12.  We hoard food.

It's true.  We absolutely hoard food, and we're shameless about it.  When you haven't seen black beans in a year and then find them, you will absolutely buy all 25 cans you find.  I am not above dropping $100 on black beans or even Oatmeal Creme Pies if necessary.  I personally hoard food from Amazon, the grocery store, wherever I can find it.  You might as well go big or go home.  What's the point of ordering two boxes of oatmeal per month when you can order 12 boxes and be done with it for six months?  I'd rather buy it all at once and have it than always be waiting on it to come in.

Food is not the only thing we hoard.  Every FS family has those things they can't do without.  Whether it's lotion or makeup or toilet paper, we have stockpiles of it.  Why, you ask?  It can take over a month to get something in the mail.  We'd rather not have to do without.  Razors are a huge deal for me; so I always pack tons of those.  It just depends on the family, where they're going, etc.

When we were preparing for our first tour, I bought two years worth of toilet paper because our sponsors told us the quality at post was bad.  Could I have gotten toilet paper at post? Yes!  Did I want to have to deal with trying 10 kinds to find the right one?  No!  So we made an epic trip to Target and filled up an SUV with toilet paper.  People stared and probably thought we were going to TP someone's house.  We didn't care.  We ended up buying enough to get us through 22 months of a 24-month tour.  Pretty good math, if I do say so myself.


13.  Our lives revolve around weight.

Even if a FS family member had hoarding urges, they could never be allowed to really act on them.  Why?  Well, we are only allowed a certain number of pounds to be shipped from place to place (without us having to pay out of pocket), and that number is not the same for every posting.  A furnished post will have a maximum shipment that is half of an unfurnished post, and that's as it should be.

So for those of us (and I mean me) who arrive at post every single time with the maximum allowable shipment weight, we have our hands full when moving time comes around.  Take into account the sheer amount of crap you accumulate in three years.  Then imagine wanting to keep it all but having to get rid of enough old stuff to compensate for that extra weight.  By the end of a packout, no one is surprised to hear of people giving away nice, expensive, and/or barely-used items to friends and neighbors.  Our household help always makes out like a bandit.  You start begging people to take things and leaving things (like goldfish) on doorsteps before taking a car to the airport.  Yes, even I have done things like this.  It's not so bad when you're in the States and can innundate the Goodwill with crap no one else wants.  It's an entirely different thing to start throwing perfectly good items away because you simply can't add any more weight to your shipment.  Books, you say?  Ha! I haven't bought an actual book in years.  I've given most of my paperbacks away over the years, just to help make weight.

And just like saying goodbye to people in the FS life isn't that hard, neither is saying goodbye to stuff.  We just don't get attached to things like people who will live in the same place for the next 30 years.  There's no point.


14.  Goodbyes are a way of life and aren't that hard for us after a while.

Goodbyes are not that big of a deal to us.  It doesn't mean we don't miss our friends and family.  It doesn't mean we're emotionally stunted or anything like that.  It just means we're used to it.  We say goodbye to our entire friend and social network every two to three years.  It's like changing clothes at this point. There are people you will miss desperately, and there are those you hope you never see again as long as you live.

Sure, saying goodbye to someone you really care about can be difficult; but it's not like it was the first time we had to do it.  I have to give credit to blogs and Facebook for that.  I cannot imagine what FS families went through twenty years ago when one had to rely on letters and intermittent mail.

FS kids don't get that upset when their friends move, either.  Chances are that we'll all see each other again, either during training or at a future post.  We're a relatively small community, and the kids know that.  They're so resilient.


15.  Lots of us have domestic employees/servants like gardeners, nannies, housekeepers, and nannies.  We can afford it, but we know it's not the norm everywhere.

There are a lot of countries out there where household help is cheap.  I'm talking a few dollars per day!  If you lived in one of these countires, wouldn't you try to hire someone to clean your toilets?
I thought so.  Our first post, we had three "domestic servants."  It was so cheap for full-time help that we hired a gardener, a housekeeper, and a full-time nanny.

A lot of people who hear about FS families having armies of servants assume that we're stuck up.  While I'm sure some people are, that's not usually the case.  We do without a lot of luxuries and niceties to be able to afford that help.  We also do a lot of good for local communities by employing people who might not otherwise find jobs.  Actually, in some places, it's insulting not to hire at least one helper.

I know in our family, we have absolutely always loved the people that work for us.  We always treat them fairly, pay them above-market salaries, and give them lots of time off. Do we know how lucky we are?  You betcha!!!