I am one, and I feel like one, and sometimes I don't. I suppose my idea of "an immigrant" came from films mostly, desperate people in rags clutching their few possessions as they arrived at Ellis Island. I didn't imagine them as flying into Heathrow and strolling in with a rollie suitcase and some hand luggage. I suppose it also helps that I didn't need visas, so I did literally just stroll in.
But then I do feel it sometimes; I certainly felt it when I arrived. There were times when I felt like I'd been born at the age I arrived in the UK, given that I couldn't remember all the children's tv shows or foods that other people could, who were my age. It was disconcerting. Then, also finding some things so strange and exotic, like the sheer volume and choice of lettuce in the UK supermarkets. I only ever recall eating one type of lettuce in South Africa (I'm guessing it was iceberg), I don't think we'd ever felt the need to have 15 different types of lettuce. Also, standing in front of a fridge in a supermarket and having no idea which type of yogurt is actually good (and being told that you pronounce the word incorrectly), or not knowing where to buy things. I remember trying to buy my Dad a magazine. I thought that Clinton's Cards = Cardies, but no, they did just sell cards. Not magazines and cards, or cards and fluffy toys. Just cards. (I now know that WH Smith is the place to go when you want cards and magazines, and to be asked every time you go to the till whether or not you also want chocolate). Now when I'm back in South Africa, I have the reverse, and I have to trawl back over a decade to figure out where and what to buy, and does that still exist?
The other thing I find strange, is that I'm now jealous of the people who grew up in the same place their whole lives; who belong so firmly in one town or city. Before we left, I always wanted to move around, to go all over the place (my grandmother said that I had itchy feet, and I don't think she was referring to athlete's foot). Yet now, I see (through the magic of Facebook), all these people who stayed, who are so firmly established and part of my native city, going to the parks I went to as a kid, whereas I'm not. I never thought I would have that jealousy. But then I know, if it was the other way around, if I was the one who stayed looking at the others who moved, the jealousy would be worse so ultimately, it was the right choice.
I suppose the other jealousy I have, is belonging so much to one place, rather than partially belonging and therefore not belonging to so many places. I no longer know what is normal, and this has been compounded by being married to a French man, who has another version of normal (like saying that there's only five continents, whereas everyone knows that there's seven. What are they teaching over there?).
The best is to just embrace it, know that I'm not alone, that there are plenty of people who have split lives, who know where to buy magazines on three continents and have friends stretched over multiple cities linked electronically, and who belong here and there and everywhere.
