<p>Before I went to college, I thought affluent yuppie-type communities were monocultural, narrow-minded boring and pretty unexciting (prolly coloured by early childhood experiences in a certain New England town). </p>
<p>So in high school, the refugee/immigrant crowd seemed pretty attractive. But then I discovered they were monocultural too. Just that their culture wasn’t American. Why the heck do they self-segregate so much?</p>
<p>OK, I don’t even have to mention the American middle class.</p>
<p>Of course in college I discovered that being rich is usually the prerequisite to being cosmopolitan. International students are fun to be with, until they start suggesting venues that are totally out of your budget.</p>
<p>Well-travelled international: So I really like food X…
Me: OMG me too! But I can’t find the ingredients here though.
International: Well actually I heard there’s a new Y restaurant in town; it doesn’t water down its fare for mainstream taste.
Me: Umm, could we try cooking it…?</p>
<p>I wish we provided financial aid to international students so we could mix up their socioeconomic demographic a little bit. :(</p>
<p>There are cosmopolitan areas where being TC does not require being rich. Happykid’s HS is full of them here in suburban Maryland. Some parents are research scientists at the NIH, others parents are low-level embassy staff, still others are varying degrees of documented or undocumented immigrants.</p>
<p>Keep looking, you are bound to find your peer group. If you don’t have any luck with the undergraduates, ask the international student office if there are any grad students from country/region X. Most of them will be as broke as you are, and if you are lucky they might cook even better than your mom!</p>
<p>That international financial aid could come from their home countries instead of us- knew some Kuwaiti women in the early '70’s who were just as middle class as the rest of us from instate. Knew many other foreign students who weren’t rich over the years as well. It may depend on where one goes to college- state flagship U, elite academic, ritzy private U, or… for example.</p>
<p>I would confirm it as a reference to being a Third Culture Kid.</p>
<p>Those most open to seeing things differently or to taking other cultural perspectives into consideration are not necessarily those with experience living overseas or in a minority culture.</p>
<p>Look for people who share your interests or your values and who don’t take themselves too seriously.</p>
<p>I was an international student on full scholarship as was my H (from different countries), and as were a lot of international students at my college.
Some colleges do give scholarships to international students, others restrict them to US ciitizens.
But the ethnic restaurants here are far cheaper than comparable American ones. The local pho restaurant does a roaring business out of college kids who find paying $8 for a huge bowl within their means. My kid and his chums used to go out to Chinatown for dim sum for the same reason.</p>
<p>DS works with grad students. DS makes a good engineering salary. DS is surprised on the generous spending habits of some of the foreign grad students. </p>
<p>DS had MS and grad internships outside of USA. Each time he finished the program, he exchanged his foreign currency into US$. He discovered that he got 10-20% more than what he thought he would get. This scenario has been happening since 2006.</p>
<p>I was trying to think of what TCK meant too. I came up with Totally Cool Kid. That’s what my DS is. Compassionate. Not status-conscious. Cosmopolitan. Not into spending tons of $$$, but trying out <em>new</em> restaurants. Yep…Totally Cool.</p>
<p>I would look for artsy, clever types who make their own fun. International potluck dinners, chamber music you make yourself, an evening of Pictionary or Scrabble.</p>
<p>“Cosmopolitan” doesn’t necessarily mean wealthy. I’ve known boring (and bigoted) rich people.</p>
<p>I’m with you Chevda. But it sometimes seems that some people (I’m looking at you WuTang) are always looking for someone else’s government to pay for them to have the perfect college experience. They want internships, they want financial aid, they want work study, they want, want, want.</p>
<p>Well it’s actually because I’m part of the movement here on Grounds to expand AccessUVA to international students (led by you know, various international deans of admissions), which is going to be all the more difficult since McDonnell got elected.</p>
<p>Who said I supported the government doing it? I was actually thinking of private firms supporting the whole endeavour.</p>
<p>You’re right, WuTang, you never said anything about the gov, sorry!</p>
<p>But I have to ask, when you graduate from school and have a job, are you going to complain that there should be more aid given to immigrants so that you can find more Totally Cool (or whatever TC stands for) Adults to hang around with?</p>