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Illustration by Catherine Chan
Where does an immigrant belong?
Nowhere.
Waking up to a chilly morning in an Ontario town, I remember feeling that something was amiss – I couldn’t tell what. “I couldn’t be homesick on day one, could I?” I thought to myself. After all, I wanted to come here. To become competitive in getting a position as a professor back home, I had to have a postgraduate education in a North-American University.
I saw the vast space out the patio of the family friend’s house I was staying at. It seemed as if I was all bare, unprotected – against winds, sunshine, the forceful elements of nature. It took me a decade to make sense of what I felt that day more than 20 years ago: The vastness of the land was overwhelming for a person who had grown up in a city of 15-million people, where architecture of some form, both attractive and unattractive, pierces into one’s horizon from every angle. The empty space made me cognizant of my speckness in the face of the vast space and time, which was happily hidden from my consciousness while I was immersed in other people and buildings, the bustle of the city life back home.
Then I moved to Calgary with my new little family. More land, more space. My survival skills kicked in. I learned to enjoy hiking through the cold soaring Rocky Mountains, and not fear them. I found peace listening to a babbling creek and meditated watching the blaze of our campfire. Albertan sunrises, with the ineffable shades of red and pink and blue, gave me awe, no scientific explanation can adequately capture the hues.
Still, I’ve longed for the busy streets, the food smells, the music that moves me, the excitement of the unexpected – pleasant and unpleasant – living in my quiet … sanitary … predictable … neighbourhood, where evidence of life is hard to find as you stroll through its streets in the evening on summer nights. Houses have lights on but rarely do they show any signs of life. Anyone laughing so loud I could hear from the street? No. Are they some old ladies having tea in their front yard? No. Are children playing on the streets? No, not at this time.
To fill in the emotional gap, I’ve been watching soap operas produced back home. But I’ve found that they alienate me even more from the culture that surrounds me. Here I am today questioning my sense of belonging. I don’t feel like I belong here or back home. It’s as if I’m floating in some purgatory, or I’m on an ever-lasting train ride, unable to get off at any station.
I expressed this feeling to an immigrant friend of mine, Akın, whose response was: “Yes, I feel the same, if a sense of belonging requires a place. I belong to the people I care about.”
That gave me a pause.
Perhaps, then, a better answer to the question, “Where does an immigrant belong?” is the following: To the family, community they have been welcomed into and built for themselves.
Then again, this begs the question of how to build your own little community without shared cultural or religious common grounds or practices: What will weave the members into a community? When one looks beyond the particular beliefs and practices of individual cultures and religions, which routinely successfully bind individuals, one ends up with a general common ground – humanity.
But that’s too general to create a strong tie amongst us, as history has shown over and over again. We cannot unite over any cause, even the cause of saving humanity against nuclear obliteration or against destroying the habitat that sustains humanity.
A more promising middle ground is the love of good food, good company, good music and dance, regardless of which culture these are coming from. Just enjoy it all! Now that I think about it, this is what I have been doing in my interactions with people. And it has worked. I show an interest in what kind of music moves people, how they prepare their favourite dish in their culture, I try to dance to their music, and teach my dances to them, I try to listen to their dreams and regrets. I am grateful to all my friends who make life meaningful for me in Canada. My sense of belonging is still a work in progress, but I sure do enjoy the ride.
Gülberk Koç Maclean lives in Calgary.
