Sam and Cj are international in just about every way possible: born in Cambodia, being raised in Seychelles, citizens of Great Britain and eventually the USA, they can claim affinity in many directions and will have choices upon choices when older for education, work and life.

Their British passports are actually European, so they will be allowed to live and work in any EU country. Procedures for processing their US documents have to wait until we go there again ... possibly next year if we can take the thought of thirty-six hours of travel with little kids ... and will give them options in the States, too. Seychelles will always be home and close to their hearts, a place for them to come when the big old world gets too busy, too stressful ... too cold.

The one link that is broken, however, is the one that would take them to Cambodia. Both came with passports from the Kingdom of Cambodia, but Rath Sen Chey and Rath Pokleahkena are now Samuel and Chamroeun Jada Benoiton, so that legal tie has been cut.

My kids are Khmer by ethnicity and Cambodian by birth, two facts of their lives that must be honored.

Knowledge, respect for and love of birth country are duties of internationally adoptive parents ... one most take on gladly, happy to embrace the culture of their children's first home, to learn new words, foods, concepts and histories.

Some take things a bit far and take to dressing in traditional ethnic garb and shopping only in their local specialty markets for imported tidbits, making something of a spectacle of their family's international mix, but to each their own!

Whatever works, I say, and integrating birth country ways into family life can take creativity.

We're lucky, in that life here is somewhat similar to Cambodian ways ... it's tropical; we eat lots of rice; Seychelles is also a 'developing nation'; most of the people are some shade of brown ... so we don't have as big a stretch as we would if we lived in America or Europe, but the gap is still huge.

More on this later ...