My Journey Across the Pond
(Inspired and written on the train from Barcelona to Madrid)
I must confess: I am an Anglophile. The mere sight of the Union Jack flag makes me smile. My fondness for all things British caused me to insist that my children call me “mummy” long after moving back to the United States from Cardiff, Wales. (Much to my delight they have never uttered “mommy.”) A large British flag hangs proudly in my house, and when people inquire about my thick Texas drawl, I extraneously mention that I once lived in the U.K. Living in another culture has so heavily influenced my life that I can’t help but let people know that there’s more to this Texas-born Portlander than meets the eye.
Without a doubt, living overseas was one of the most rewarding and challenging things I have ever done. It changed who I thought I was and who I am now. Don’t get me wrong, I liked who I was before moving to the U.K. in 2006, but I am no longer that person. According to Russell V.J. Ward,
“Living abroad is one of the most profound undertakings a person can make. You don’t change job or move house, you do that and more. The scenery changes outside your window along with everything and everyone you once knew. The impact on you is huge.”
From the moment I set foot on foreign soil, things seemed to go wrong all of the time. It was hard to learn to smile at my frequent mishaps, because for goodness sake, in my former life I had been an intelligent American woman. Feelings of inadequacy flooded in when I eagerly arrived at my fitness consultation to incorrectly (yet confidently) input my weight into the elliptical machine as pounds instead of kilograms. Only when my trainer looked upon me with pity did I realize what I had done. Small mistakes such as these were everyday occurrences as I had to think harder about common tasks that I had so easily taken for granted in my home country.
Once in the bathroom of a large bookstore I pulled what I thought was the toilet handle, only to find out that I was actually activating the emergency sprinkler system. The bright red cord hanging from the ceiling should’ve made me think twice, but I was so used to doing things differently in my new country, that it only seemed logical that one would find a bright red toilet handle hanging from the ceiling. I cowardly ran out of the store with my wet toddler, laughing and crying at the same time. Eventually, experiences such as these taught me to to not take myself so seriously.
Take it from me, DO NOT pull the red cord.
The world became a whole lot bigger to me, and I was eager to learn about it. Everything had a history and everyone had a story. Initially just wanting to fit in, as Texans living in Cardiff were like unicorns, I faked a British accent. (“Hiya luv, you aight? Ta-ra.”) Sounding more like Madonna, less like Catherine Zeta Jones (who is Welsh by the way), my husband insisted I stop embarrassing myself and just be me. Slowly I began to embrace my “foreigner” label as I found it came with the perk of allowing me to ask many questions and genuinely get to know people. And as a result, they embraced me and easily opened up.
I made friends with people from around the globe, all of whom grew up different from me. I learned that American culture was not “better”, only “different.” More than anything my empathy and compassion increased for others. When I sat down for tea with a mother of my child’s classmate to learn that her family had been murdered in her home country, I vowed no longer to be quick to judge a person without truly knowing them.
Living abroad was hard and exhilarating all at the same time. New sights and smells opened up all around and I became addicted to exploration. I also learned that life in America moved on without me, and relationships that I once held dear changed, not always for the better. Like a bag of Chex mix, good and bad things were often mixed together (oh how I loathe those tiny pretzels). But above all, living in another culture was a beautiful gift that was life changing. Still to this day I cannot believe I had the opportunity and privilege to do so, and I will forever be grateful.
Buckingham Palace
Ward, Russell V.J. “Four Ways Living Abroad Changes You Forever.” Life the Blog. HuffPost, 5 January 2015. Web. 7 December 2017.