There was a tweet, recently, relating to an old Guardian piece about the fact that an Indian guys didn’t feel he could be considered an expat.

Of course, it depends on your audience.

If, as an immigrant to Italy, I wrote a piece in an Italian newspaper, I could hardly call myself an expat since a) I am NOT Italian and b) I have not moved out of Italy.

For me it’s a matter of simplicity. Here, I am an immigrant – unless and except when I am talking to other English/American/Canadians here. When I talk to them I am an expat. They are expats too.

However, when I’m with Italians, as, in fact, I have done in the past, I point out that I, too, am an immigrant.

This is usually when they are complaining about the numbers of immigrants here.

It’s interesting that when I point out that I am also an immigrant, they usually respond with something like “Ah, but you’re different.”

What they mean, of course, is that, even if I can’t speak the language (whereas many immigrants can); even if I look different from the majority of Italians (with my blue eyes); even if I act differently (like being more courteous), I am OK because I am white and English and their friend.

As opposed to black or brown, non-European and selling roses or trinkets or working in a kitchen in a restaurant.

But I am mindful that I remain and will always be, an immigrant here.

I am from one of the current EU countries and so I have some “right” to be here – but, I guess, I could also be shipped back to the UK should the authorities deem it necessary.

Here, I have no roots; no “original” place to go to. And so it was true of the Indian writing the Guardian article. So, speaking to a British audience, he was always going to be an immigrant and not an expat.

I don’t think it’s that difficult an idea to grasp?