I moved to England in my 20s. I had all the advantages—my whiteness, knowing the language, a financial cushion, and a support system—and it was still hard.
This is a great piece, Pablo. Thank you for taking the time to write it. I've had the privilege of living in several countries outside of my native United States, and I can empathize with those feelings of both gain and loss, culture shock and reverse culture shock, that such experiences give us.
I experienced racism directed at me for the first time in my life when I lived in Japan for two years, back in the 1980s. People would leave the seat next to me empty in a crowded bus. They would talk about me disparagingly not just behind my back but literally in front of me, assuming I couldn't understand. Children would point at me and giggle and run away in fear. Men would leer at me or grope me in crowded trains. More than once, when I had non-Japanese friends of East Asian origin visiting me. we would have the almost comical experience of me speaking Japanese in a store or a restaurant and an employee or server directing their replies to my friend, even when it became clear that the friend could neither speak nor understand Japanese.
I was incredibly privileged as I was in Japan for only two years, on a time-limited graduate fellowship, and knew this wasn't going to be my life forever. But I gained an appreciation for how those daily racist microaggressions can take a mental toll.
Thank you very much for reading and for leaving such a thoughtful comment, Careen. I'm sorry you had that experience. No one deserves that. I know from your bio that you were an immigration lawyer. Do you think your experience in Japan influenced your professional path?
As I find myself amid these same conversations in Mexico, "bloody foreigners gentrifying... Oh not you Nadine you've been here for ages," I don't feel much better about it. It's not great to be the "one acceptable unit" of your clan.
And I laughed at the Tony Soprano wad handover 😆 🫱🏻🫲🏽 it's humble of you to recognise this. I also migrated, whiteness and all, and it was hard. Can't even get my head around the struggles someone of colour moving to a predominantly white country would face... I didn't have the language or family here but I DID have the advantage you didn't: I don't look local. Mexicans tone down the slang for me. The problem with England is its international population: most people can legitimately be local, so we do not even think to finish our words properly or tone down those idioms we've spent centuries perfecting 😆
I loved hearing your story, thank you for sharing so candidly.
Thank you for reading, Nadine, and for sharing a bit of your experience too. Interesting about how not looking local worked to your advantage with respect to the language. That wouldn’t have occurred to me. I struggled in the North for a while. I think part of it is that Americans are more accustomed to hearing southern accents, so we have some point of reference. Regarding Tony Soprano, I grew up in that area so Sopranos references come naturally lol
The pleasure's mine. And by the way I hope the butcher's son got hit on by a gay Spanish asylum seeker or something he might consider equally horrific by his standards, after this interaction with you 🙄
This is a great piece, Pablo. Thank you for taking the time to write it. I've had the privilege of living in several countries outside of my native United States, and I can empathize with those feelings of both gain and loss, culture shock and reverse culture shock, that such experiences give us.
I experienced racism directed at me for the first time in my life when I lived in Japan for two years, back in the 1980s. People would leave the seat next to me empty in a crowded bus. They would talk about me disparagingly not just behind my back but literally in front of me, assuming I couldn't understand. Children would point at me and giggle and run away in fear. Men would leer at me or grope me in crowded trains. More than once, when I had non-Japanese friends of East Asian origin visiting me. we would have the almost comical experience of me speaking Japanese in a store or a restaurant and an employee or server directing their replies to my friend, even when it became clear that the friend could neither speak nor understand Japanese.
I was incredibly privileged as I was in Japan for only two years, on a time-limited graduate fellowship, and knew this wasn't going to be my life forever. But I gained an appreciation for how those daily racist microaggressions can take a mental toll.
Thank you very much for reading and for leaving such a thoughtful comment, Careen. I'm sorry you had that experience. No one deserves that. I know from your bio that you were an immigration lawyer. Do you think your experience in Japan influenced your professional path?
As I find myself amid these same conversations in Mexico, "bloody foreigners gentrifying... Oh not you Nadine you've been here for ages," I don't feel much better about it. It's not great to be the "one acceptable unit" of your clan.
And I laughed at the Tony Soprano wad handover 😆 🫱🏻🫲🏽 it's humble of you to recognise this. I also migrated, whiteness and all, and it was hard. Can't even get my head around the struggles someone of colour moving to a predominantly white country would face... I didn't have the language or family here but I DID have the advantage you didn't: I don't look local. Mexicans tone down the slang for me. The problem with England is its international population: most people can legitimately be local, so we do not even think to finish our words properly or tone down those idioms we've spent centuries perfecting 😆
I loved hearing your story, thank you for sharing so candidly.
Thank you for reading, Nadine, and for sharing a bit of your experience too. Interesting about how not looking local worked to your advantage with respect to the language. That wouldn’t have occurred to me. I struggled in the North for a while. I think part of it is that Americans are more accustomed to hearing southern accents, so we have some point of reference. Regarding Tony Soprano, I grew up in that area so Sopranos references come naturally lol
The pleasure's mine. And by the way I hope the butcher's son got hit on by a gay Spanish asylum seeker or something he might consider equally horrific by his standards, after this interaction with you 🙄