Why do expats get confused about the word ‘home’?
For expats, “home” is an emotional puzzle. Settlement comes not by choosing one place over another, but by embracing where daily life unfolds.
After 20 years in the UK, I’ve stopped stumbling over the word “home”. When I book flights to South Africa, I say I’m “going to visit”. When friends ask where I live, I simply say London. But it wasn’t always this straightforward, and watching newer expats navigate this emotional minefield has taught me more about settlement than any integration guide ever could.
The language of not belonging
Listen to someone who hasn’t quite settled yet. They’ll tie themselves in knots trying to explain where “home” is. “Well, my home home is Johannesburg, but I live in Manchester now.” That repetition, that need to clarify, it’s a tell. I used to do it too, in my first five years here.
Psychologists call this maintaining a “portfolio of homes”, where we assign different emotional weights to different places. But what I’ve observed is simpler. The ones struggling most are unconsciously idealising their original home. They remember braais and sunshine, conveniently forgetting Johannesburg traffic and load shedding. I did exactly this for years, romanticising Cape Town whilst complaining about London rain.
What settlement actually sounds like
These days, I notice the shift in others before they do. A South African friend recently mentioned “when I go home for Christmas” about her trip to Cape Town, then caught herself. “Actually, I meant when I go back to Bristol. That’s home now, isn’t it?”
Research calls this “working through”, the process of recognising and exploring conflicting feelings rather than suppressing them. Twenty years in, I’ve learned that home isn’t about choosing one place over another. It’s about where your daily narrative makes sense. I can love South Africa deeply and still call London home, because this is where my life is built, where my routines exist, where I know which Tesco has the better selection.
So where’s your home?
The expats who struggle most are those trying to keep one foot in each country, refusing to let either place be fully home. The freedom came when I stopped treating “home” like a betrayal and started treating it like a practical question: where do I live my actual life?
What about you? Do you still call your birth country “home” after years away? Do you stumble over the word? Have you made peace with multiple homes, or are you still working through it?
Leave a comment on our socials and let us know.