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Purpose — The purpose of this chapter is to provide knowledge and insights gained into Canadian expatriates' perspectives of living and working in Indonesia and to enhance the reader's understanding of the lived experience of being immersed in another culture.

Methodology — A descriptive phenomenological qualitative method was employed, which uncovered paradoxes that were lived by Canadian expatriate managers.

Findings — The following paradoxes are presented using participants' words and lived experiences of the authors: powerful-powerless, understanding-not understanding, being supported-not supported, belonging-not belonging and freedom-restriction.

Research limitations — While the qualitative findings may not be ‘generalisable’ according to a quantitative viewpoint, they are certainly applicable to others' experiences as demonstrated by the authors' description of their own experiences.

Practical implications — Enhanced understanding of this lived experience will spark improved expatriation strategies and lead directly to significant improvement in the overall performance of international organisations because an effective expatriate will be more capable of facilitating the two-way sharing and blending of the local and exogenous knowledge, therefore fulfilling a key role in knowledge transfer.

Social implications –– The importance of being open to others' lived experiences and supporting others who are immersed in another culture has universal appeal from a social perspective.

Originality/value of chapter — This is a unique research chapter describing research findings and joining participants' words and experiences with the authors' experiences. As well it is hoped that readers will relate to the paradoxes.

In Chapter 1, Susan Shortland (2011) examined theories and models that could be used to explain female expatriate participation with a view to identifying the most promising theoretical lenses for future research. Her study took as its basis, issues, evidence and explanations from both the ‘women in management’ and ‘women expatriates’ literature to identify four main theoretical domains: family issues, assignee characteristics, host and home country norms, and institutional factors. Findings revealed that the most promising explanations of women's low expatriate participation were identified as being linked to occupational gender stereotyping and sex roles in employment, women's reduced social capital and patriarchal attitudes towards their identity and homemaker roles. These were reinforced by institutional isomorphic behaviour through which organisations mimic each other's human resource practices.