Migratory Patterns

Shannon Martin thinks a lot about life stages- of podcasts and of people. Currently the Director of Communications at Podbean, the hosting platform for all of Migration Media's shows, she has a bird's eye view of the rapidly-changing world of on-demand audio and often helps shows just starting out to grow and endure. She also works with Aging Wisely, a company that works with families to help plan for the later stages of life. Given that experience + her many years living overseas, She knows better than anyone that while the #ExpatLife is full of fun and adventure, it's never too early to start thinking about how they'll spend their later years. Her work has been mostly focused on families in the US, but many of them face situations - like children who live far away from their parents - that are analogous to expats. What is it like to help plan for the care of an older parent when you live thousands of miles away? And what kind of obstacles do expats face when thinking about where they'll settle down in their later years?

Get in touch with comments, suggestions or interview recommendations:  

• Twitter: @zax2000
• eMail: [email protected]

  Check out all of the shows in the Migration Media network on the web (www.migrationmedia.net) and please take a moment to "Like" us and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Podbean or wherever you get your podcasts... and subscribe!

This week I've got some more bonus content to share with you: a recent episode of The Bittersweet Life podcast. On my last episode I spoke with co-host Katy Sewall about her journey from a safe career with NPR to expat, to podcasting entrepreneur, and we touched on some of the themes that come up often in her show. In essence, I tried to do in about 40 minutes what she and her co-host, Tiffany Parks, have done over 275 episodes (so far). So I thought that it might be a good idea to share an example of the kinds of conversations that they have each week. On the episode that you're about to hear, Tiffany has just returned from a visit to the U.S. and reflects on the things about American life and culture that never fail to surprise her every time she goes back. She also reveals the surprising reaction she had upon flying back to Rome, as well as a thought she hasn’t had in all her 15 years of the #ExpatLife.   Find The Bittersweet Life wherever you get your podcasts, or check out their website to learn more: http://thebittersweetlife.net/about   Follow the show on social media:  

• Twitter
• Facebook
• Instagram

  Get in touch with comments, suggestions or interview recommendations:  

• Twitter: @zax2000
• eMail: [email protected]

  Check out all of the shows in the Migration Media network on the web (www.migrationmedia.net) and please take a moment to "Like" us and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Podbean or wherever you get your podcasts... and subscribe!

Katy Sewall used to be, as she says, one of those "get-a-great-job-and-hang-onto-it" kind of people. That is, until she got an opportunity to move to Rome where her best friend from childhood, Tiffany Parks, had been living for several years. A senior producer at NPR's Seattle affiliate, Katy decided to jump at the chance for adventure and turn her experience into creating a podcast. Their show, The Bittersweet Life, has been "on the air" ever since and has become one of the most popular shows about the #ExpatLife as it's documented their respective journeys as migrants. Katy talks with me about what it was like to make the transition from a person with a career to life as a podcasting entrepreneur, the hesitancy of long-term expats to get to know short-term folks, her migration back to and within the US, and how her show has evolved - with her- to not so much ask, "What's it like to live overseas?" as it asks, "What's it like to live, and what kind of life do you want for yourself?"   Find The Bittersweet Life wherever you get your podcasts, or check out their website to learn more: http://thebittersweetlife.net/about   Follow the show on social media:  

• Twitter
• Facebook
• Instagram

  Get in touch with comments, suggestions or interview recommendations:  

• Twitter: @zax2000
• eMail: [email protected]

  Check out all of the shows in the Migration Media network on the web (www.migrationmedia.net) and please take a moment to "Like" us and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Podbean or wherever you get your podcasts... and subscribe!

Chaniece started her journey towards life overseas when she was deciding which foreign language to take in college. As it turned out, the professor with the highest satisfaction ratings from students taught Chinese, so that's what she chose. After scoring consistently high grades in her classes, she decided to make it her major and her fate was sealed: You really can't succeed in a Chinese program without spending time in China. Far from the exoticism of the #ExpatLife that many imagine, Chaniece spent time in the trenches doing menial jobs before an opportunity arose to actualize one of her passions, veganism. Now she's the CEO of Plant-based Consulting, a company that works with local restaurants and the vegan community to expand plant-based options and to reduce the amount of animal products consumed in the city. Today, after 5 years overseas, and after having learned so much about herself and developing so many new skills, can she see herself ever returning back "home?"

To learn more about Plant-based Consulting and Vegans of Shanghai, you can follow them on WeChat by searching for their official account, "vegansofshanghai".   Get in touch with comments, suggestions or interview recommendations:  

• Twitter: @zax2000
• eMail: [email protected]

  Check out all of the shows in the Migration Media network on the web (www.migrationmedia.net) and please take a moment to "Like" us and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Podbean or wherever you get your podcasts... and subscribe!

This week I've got a bonus mini-pod for you! Both before and after my interviews with Olivia Muszynski & Alaina Miller - the Ricci Scholars featured in my previous two episodes - we had fun, engaging conversations about a lot of topics that I couldn't fit into their podcasts, which is a pity because they're both brilliant, driven people who are endlessly fascinating. Luckily, I was able to get my microphone out for one of those chats and record it. Enjoy!

Learn more about the Ricci Scholars program at Loyola University here:  https://www.luc.edu/ricci/index.shtml   Get in touch with comments, suggestions or interview recommendations:  

• Twitter: @zax2000
• eMail: [email protected]

  Check out all of the shows in the Migration Media network on the web (www.migrationmedia.net) and please take a moment to "Like" us and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Podbean or wherever you get your podcasts... and subscribe!

While the small town in Michigan where she grew up is the place that she goes back to whenever she "needs a safe haven," Alaina Miller doesn't think of it as "Home" anymore. Not since she set off for school in Chicago- and especially not since she spent the last year studying abroad as part of the Ricci Scholars program at Loyola College. What's driven her constant shifts to bigger, newer locales has been the vast diversity and different ways of thinking that she's encountered at every step of her journey. She went off to college knowing that she wanted to travel internationally and saw the Ricci Scholars' program's destinations of Rome and Beijing as a natural evolution, with each stop being a jumping off point to something ever-more foreign. Her project to study migrant housing has opened her eyes to a world of possibilities, and it's been incredibly fulfilling, but she realizes that she's starting to move outside of the experience of her traditional group of friends, and that she may find herself facing the same challenge that many who have spent time overseas face- discovering that they need to connect with different kinds of people than they did before they left.

Learn more about the Ricci Scholars program at Loyola University here: https://www.luc.edu/ricci/index.shtml   Get in touch with comments, suggestions or interview recommendations:  

• Twitter: @zax2000
• eMail: [email protected]

  Check out all of the shows in the Migration Media network on the web (www.migrationmedia.net) and please take a moment to "Like" us and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Podbean or wherever you get your podcasts... and subscribe!

This week I'm sharing the first of my conversations with two recipients of the 2018-2019 Ricci Scholarship. This Loyola University program offers scholarships to highly qualified students to spend their junior year studying abroad in 2 countries and conducting cross-cultural research.   Olivia Muszynski owns the fact that she's still figuring things out, and it's apparent from the start when her answer to "Where is home?" is "To be determined." Having just wrapped up a year abroad as part of the Ricci Scholars program, her idea of "Home" right now is all about relationships and experiences. She's a couple of years removed from life in the small Florida town where she was raised, which she says "feels like a memory, but not like home," and she's just started exploring the world, trying to understand her place in it. It just doesn't make sense yet to declare a single location as "Home."    What began as an internal migration from the American South to blustery Chicago has quickly evolved into a desire to live overseas, and her experiences in Rome and Beijing have only served to whet her appetite for more. A self-professed nerd who "loves reading the tax code," she's been studying the differences between the real estate markets of the US, Italy and China as part of per study abroad program, and she's been discovering how financial systems fit the cultures that they're in, which opens up new avenues for understanding between us. It's a unique take on the learning experience that usually happens as people migrate!   Learn more about the Ricci Scholars program at Loyola University here:  https://www.luc.edu/ricci/index.shtml   Get in touch with comments, suggestions or interview recommendations:  

• Twitter: @zax2000
• eMail: [email protected]

  Check out all of the shows in the Migration Media network on the web (www.migrationmedia.net) and please take a moment to "Like" us and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Podbean or wherever you get your podcasts... and subscribe!

Steve Schwankert is one of the proudest and most committed expats that I've ever met. Originally from "the part of New Jersey that loves Spingsteen, and not the part that loves Bon Jovi," Steven had his eyes set on moving to China as early as high school. Now, 23 years after making the leap, he's sick and tired of people asking him when he's going to "come home" - because he already is. His career in journalism has led him to many interesting projects, and his latest, the new documentary, The Six, is incredibly exciting. It tells the story of how he and his collaborators set off to unearth the stories of the 6 Chinese migrant workers who survived the sinking of the Titanic. Not only is it an incredible feat of research and storytelling, but it lays bare the risks and discrimination that migrants in the [late 19th and early] 20th centuries faced when they tried making their way from East to West. And while technology and methods of transport may have changed for most migrants since then, the story otherwise remains the same. And the greatest lesson for all of us might not be what it takes for people to make their way to a new home, but what their effort says about what it means to originally be from that place. Can you know what it means to be an American if you've never had to fight to be one?   Learn more about Steven's documentary, The Six:  

• Trailer:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-0gpvPHaZs
• Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/thesixdocumentary
• Website:  https://www.whoarethesix.com

  Listen to my interview with Eleanor Liu (Ep. 015) here: http://bit.ly/MP015-EleanorLiu   Get in touch with comments, suggestions or interview recommendations:  

• Twitter: @zax2000
• eMail: [email protected]

  Check out all of the shows in the Migration Media network on the web (www.migrationmedia.net) and please take a moment to "Like" us and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Podbean or wherever you get your podcasts... and subscribe!

This week we're sharing a little something extra with you: The episode of The Stoop that got me hooked on the show! As I discussed with her during our interview earlier this week, co-host Hana Baba has explored and discovered new things about her heritage through her work producing her podcast. One of the things that she talked about with me are the particular attitudes and that Sudanese bring with them when they immigrate, and some common disillusionments that they experience after their arrival. Like many immigrants, people coming from Africa imagine the US as a haven, a moneymaking paradise. When they get here, it can be a different story. On this episode of The Stoop we meet African immigrants who tell their stories of "Coming To America," and what the wish they'd known before they came.   If you like what you hear, please check out The Stoop by searching in Apple Podcasts, Podbean, or by visiting the show's website here: https://twitter.com/theStoopPodcast. You can also follow Hana and The Stoop online on all of the platforms:  

• Hana on Twitter
• The Stoop on Twitter
• Facebook
• Instagram

  Get in touch with comments, suggestions or interview recommendations:  

• Twitter: @zax2000
• eMail: [email protected]

  Check out all of the shows in the Migration Media network on the web (www.migrationmedia.net) and please take a moment to "Like" us and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Podbean or wherever you get your podcasts... and subscribe!

Hana Baba, the award-winning host of Crosscurrents on KALW & co-host of the groundbreaking podcast, The Stoop, grew up in much the same way as her baby sister, Ethar (see previous episode)- by splitting her time between Khartoum, Sudan, and the U.S. Now that she's all grown up with a family of her own, the concept of "Home" is complicated, as it stirs up feelings of longing for different places depending on where she is at that moment. Her experience being raised in wildly different environments has given her a profound desire to live in diverse, multicultural areas, and a drive to explore the complexities of the cultures that we inhabit through her work as a journalist. Her podcast, The Stoop, is an expression of this, as she and her co-host, Leila Day, tackle issues surrounding blackness, race, and identity in America through the eyes of the black diaspora.   Check out The Stoop by searching in Apple Podcasts, Podbean, or by visiting the show's website here: https://twitter.com/theStoopPodcast. You can also follow Hana and The Stoop online on all of the platforms:

• Hana on Twitter
• The Stoop on Twitter
• Facebook
• Instagram

Get in touch with comments, suggestions or interview recommendations:

• Twitter: @zax2000
• eMail: [email protected]

Check out all of the shows in the Migration Media network on the web (www.migrationmedia.net) and please take a moment to "Like" us and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Podbean or wherever you get your podcasts... and subscribe!