Years ago I met an international businessman’s daughter who lived her formative years in Asian countries. After years immersed in those cultures, her family returned to the States and settled down in Ohio, near relatives, where this young woman had to finish up high school.

By the time I met her, she was a young adult reflecting on her childhood and the challenge of living with a kind of hidden diversity—she looked like a typical white Midwestern girl, but in many ways felt Asian. I asked for an example of when she might have felt differences, and she talked about high school kids in Ohio “cruising.” She didn’t understand the past time at all: piling into cars and driving slowly, aimlessly, through town.

“How is that fun?” she asked.

“I don’t know, but it’s what my friends and I did growing up,” I admitted. “What would you and your friends do for fun when you were growing up overseas?” [Read more...]