Author: Melda Baysal Walsh
The Immigrant Dilemma: Who to Be, Where to Go?
My intention with this blog post is to acknowledge and validate the questions of “who to be?” and “where to go?” and explore the idea that these questions might be never ending, forever accompanying ones, specifically for those of you with direct and indirect immigrant experiences. If this topic resonates with you, I hope that the following thoughts will inspire you to embrace the identity intersections that inevitably exist through immigrant experiences in ways that will support your well-being and personal preferences.
“Immigrant Dilemma (ID) is neither contagious nor hereditary. It only affects the person that originally contracted it. You can detect ID in the longing gaze and teary eye of any immigrant (no matter the age, background, or education) when she/he hears an old song or has missed out on a relative’s or friend’s funeral or wedding or birth. ID is never forgotten and it never forgives. The worst part is, ID never really goes away, once you got it, it stays with you until your last breath…” (Erhan Ercan, August 2021)
This quote is only a snapshot of a blog post which was published by a friend a few months ago. While I believe that the immigrant dilemma can certainly unfold and manifest as a physiology (e.g. sensations in our bodies and/or thoughts about how we relate to the world around us) that can be passed down generationally, I was struck by the way Erhan Ercan describes his immigrant experience as it resonates with my lived experience as an immigrant very much. I am an immigrant by choice and I want to acknowledge that this is a privilege. It is a privilege to be able to choose a new destination, it is a privilege to have choice; yet, it comes with its challenges. While these challenges, which I will share more about in a moment, might be a reflection of some shared experiences that immigrants and refugees face, it is not my intention to equate or compare them. And I recognize that the hardships that are inevitably tied to the lives of refugees need to be distinct from the challenges and possible shared experiences of people who have left their homelands that I am about to reflect on.
What might be a shared experience is the sense of belonging, or rather, the lack thereof after having moved away. When we no longer step foot on the soil that connects to our sense of self, when the places we navigate no longer resonate with our familiar ways of being, when we can no longer own our spaces, life becomes unusual.
For me, the unusual was exciting at first. It was filling and enriching and it certainly shaped and added to my identity. Almost 20 years later, the richness of a culture that is not mine is still inspiring me, and it sometimes feels as if I can own parts of it a little bit. Other times, it feels as if doing things in a familiar way can have an existence here, yet, oftentimes, it is hard to keep the familiar alive.
The intersections that I live as a German-Turkish woman, partner, friend, professional and mother of three children in the U.S. often require a negotiation of customs, traditions and values. How do I organize birthday parties, how do I do play dates and how do I do certain things at doctor’s appointments? (A little anecdote here about how I had no clue at my first gynecologist appointment here that I was supposed to wrap myself into a big paper drape that was laying on the exam table). How do I express my transcultural thoughts in a language that might not have the words that capture my lived experiences, my opinions and perspectives?
While most of these new ways of living life seem manageable, this is not what presents the challenge. The presenting challenge consists of a twofold question of which the first part is about “who to be?”.
My Turkish grandmother used to say “Iki dil, iki insan” which means in its literal translation, “two languages, two people”. Over the years, I have mastered the English language and consider myself a person of three languages and three cultures. I continue to embrace all three and they are all alive within me, but they cannot always be lived out to the fullest, in neither country, which brings along the second part of the question which is “where to go?”.
The richness of experiencing and holding three cultures has, among all the appreciation and gratitude I have for it, also led me to a place of “un-rootedness” and displacement; and sometimes even causes the experience of misplacement. Circling back to the questions of “who to be?” and “where to go?” and the idea of allowing these questions to accompany us on our lives’ journeys continuously, I would like to invite you to view any encounters you have with these questions as opportunities to re-story your experiences and live them in your preferred ways. For me, this means to view life as a continuum with no final destination and no final determination of identities. It is rather about viewing life as an ongoing flow that allows for moving forward and looping back and moving forward and looping back again…forever experiencing newness, while also reconnecting to our past.
Reference:
Ercan, Erhan. “Immigrant Dilemma – Leaving US after 25 Years for the Netherlands.” Linkedin, 16 Aug. 2021, https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/immigrant-dilemma-leaving-us-after-25-years-erhan-ercan/?trackingId=e6uLyYoxeLsD7EFdxRMlHA%3D%3D. Accessed 29 Nov. 2021.
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