Friday, November 21, 2008
state of the migrant address 2008
It was my last year of my first year of school today, with only one more year to go. I handed in my very last big project for the year, then went out to a pub with a whole lot of people from my year. It was a fantastic afternoon.
And it's been an absolutely fantastic year. Fantastic. It's been a huge year, one where major life changes occurred, and one that will forever go down as one of the most important years in my life. But despite its ups and downs and the constant struggle, it was all absolutely glorious.For several reasons:
1) I challenged myself to no end and pushed my abilities to their limit, and in the process set new limits for myself.
I am still discovering what I am capable of and enjoying the process immensely. I don't think I ever want to stop discovering. It wasn't a walk in the park, either. I worked like a maniac, worked harder than I ever knew I could. It was an experience that made me more confident but also more humble.I feel that I have found what I am born to do.
2) For the first time since I moved here, I feel I have real relationships.
You wouldn't have wanted to hang out with me when I first moved here. I was so negative and kept comparing all the people I met to my "real friends" back home. It wasn't something I could help, as I felt so lonely and isolated. But now I know that when you're starting out in a new country and building your life from scratch, your relationships are your most important investment. Sure, in the beginning it often feels pointless and tiring hanging out with new people, especially if you're longing for your old friends. But these new people will someday be your old friends if you keep investing in them. It takes time, and it's unfair to compare them to other people, especially if their intentions really are sincere.
As a migrant, you soon realize that it doesn't matter how different your backgrounds are, or whether or not you ever would've been interested in even talking to each other if you had met back home. The only thing that matters is that they're good, genuine people, they care about you, they're good company, and they will be there for you. But they can't always be the ones reaching out to you. You have to do your part, too. In fact, every time you feel lonely, or start feeling like the odd foreigner, the best thing you can do is to reach out to someone. You have to break the wall you've built to shut out others.
This year, I realized that I really, really like my friends here, not just as a substitute for my Manila friends, but for the people they are.They're real friends, too. It took awhile, but I am so blessed to have them, and I look forward to the future memories I will make with them. If all else ever goes wrong, at least I have people who matter in my life.3) There's a Filipino community all over the world, and if you ever relocate to a new country, chances are that there will be a Pinoy network ready to take you in and take care of you. I love our bayanihan spirit, and the help we got from kind strangers from the community made it somewhat easier for us. But I didn't want to stay under the Pinoy umbrella forever and ever. I didn't see the point in moving to a new country if I was just going to try and recreate the Philippines there. Fellow Pinoy migrants were a great support group, but I didn't want my being a migrant to be the story of my life forever. It's a given that it will always be one of the main stories of my life, but I felt I could have other stories, too. I wanted to feel like a part of the bigger whole, to be comfortable in my own skin, to be able to venture out of my comfort zone and run with the pack, to overcome that "otherness" frame of mind I had when I moved here. I felt that if I stuck only with other people from the Philippines, then I would never have any reason to change, and there would've been no point in leaving my entire life behind to move here. This year, I really feel like I branched out. I have Pinoy friends who grew up in the Philippines, I have Pinoy friends who grew up here, I have Australian friends who grew up here, and friends who grew up in other places. It feels good.
4) The most unexpected surprise of all is finding a person who gives me yet another reason to stay.
I've come pretty far from the person I was 3 years ago, and I am so happy life has turned out the way it has. When you lose something, something new comes in to take it's place, life moves forward, and a new order will be created. But you have to be willing to surf the waves that come your way. I never planned this or asked for this, and sometimes, it's better to not plan and just say 'yes' to life.
Happy me this afternoon.
Hanging out with my classmates today, the conversation turned to a few of the other foreign students in school and their preference to stick with each other, and why they never really bother to reach out even if others make the effort to reach out to them. Some reasons are obvious, like the language barrier. Many people who are not confident with their English skills feel easily embarrassed in social situations, such as the Korean man in the cafe yesterday who went ballistic on me because I asked him what size he wanted his coffee. He started screaming at me. Maybe the phrase "small, medium, or large?" was a direct affront to his lack of confidence. He was rather embarrassed when he finally understood what I wanted to know. Anyway, I digress.
Language barrier is one thing, but there are those who speak perfect English and still choose to isolate themselves anyway. Maybe because they're painfully shy, but in some situations, I sense that it's more resistance than shyness. Resistance to what, I can't really tell. To newness? To a way of life that's different from theirs?
There was a girl I knew once who had just moved here from Pinas. She spoke and understood English perfectly and confidently but insisted in speaking in Tagalog when she spoke to me, even if everyone else hanging out with us was Aussie. I thought it was a bit rude because everyone else around us, who couldn't speak or understand Tagalog, felt shut out and suspected that we might be talking about them. I mean heck, I'd feel really left out and awkward if I was hanging out with a group of people and they all started carrying on in French so that I couldn't join in. Anyway, said girl kept to herself alot, and she remained fiercely loyal to her Manila way of life, the Manila attitude, even passing up chances to connect with others in order to remain loyal to this way of life. I understand she must've been homesick. In fact, I completely understand her because I was exactly like that once. Didn't want to change, in the name of being true to myself and my roots, thinking it was everyone's job to adapt to me, and that it was their loss if they didn't. And always I felt lonely because nobody "got" me.
Was it fear disguised as arrogance? Maybe. But now that I think about it, what if it had been the other way around? What if some Aussie guy moves to Manila, refuses to talk to anyone, puts everything down and says that everything is better in Australia, and refuses to appreciate the Philippine way of life? And insults everyone's accent? Who would want to hang out with a douchebag like that?
Alot of my loneliness and isolation at the beginning of my move here was my own doing. And I realized I had to be the one to reach out first. If I wanted people to care about where I was from, I have to care about where they're from, too.
***
Thanks muchly for all the great suggestions I got for observational drawings!!! I won't tell you which ones I chose, I'll just be posting the occasional one online :-) *Excited*
at 3:31 PM 
M
: 10:48 PM
I hope you get to have better experiences there, and wherever you might go. And good luck with your art! I'm a big fan, and I'm seriously looking forward to buying some of your works in the future! ;)
: 2:22 PM
: 3:15 PM
I guess it's interesting, somehow comforting, to read about the whole migrating experience from other people. I realize I haven't been documenting it myself. I guess I don't feel the whole depth of the experience, like right now I feel like everything that's happening is just everything that is happeng. I've never realized that hey, I am rebuilding my life.
But of course, we all have our stories. You're awesome
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