The hard part about moving since young, and living abroad, is the family we leave behind. The different aunts, uncles, grandparents and cousins (specially latin families due to emotion + large families).
I was lucky enough to be able to go back to my home country after more than a decade, it was so surreal to see my grandparents in person. It was surreal to see my aunts having their own families, and long childhood friends having kids and businesses.
All in all, it was a mixture of joy + guilt, happy for being able to create memories with them, guilt for leaving them once again.
In my books, expats are one of the strangest people in the world, because it is already hard enough to learn a new culture and language, but people forget, the guilt and sadness that one endures every day with the thought of realizing that you are aging away from your loved ones. although it is one choice, it is still not easy to live with that guilt buried in the back of the brain.
Cherish the moments you have with your loved ones. Far or close, nobody knows what tomorrow will hold. Book that trip and visit them, don’t wait a decade to get to know them. Don’t wait a decade to show them you think about them everyday.
