My Sister on Living Far From Home.
Intermediate (B2) · Conversations · 15 min · Free
There is an Arabic word for the ache of being far from your country: غربة. Today my sister Lotus and I talk about what it actually feels like, and how it changes.
Lotus has spent most of her adult life away from Syria, and her answer surprised me: she does not feel غربة anymore. Montreal is her second country now. But she remembers exactly what the first years felt like, the sadness of not being around people who look and speak like her, the pressure to adapt fast, and the strange mix of grief and excitement that comes with a new country.
We talk about the small rituals that keep home close: mate, which reached Syria from Argentina with returning emigrants and is the number one drink in our town Salamiyah, dabke, which is our region's dance more than it is Damascus's or Aleppo's, family barbecues, Syrian coffee, Fairuz in the morning. And her advice to anyone who just arrived somewhere new: do not rush the transition, keep your own habits while you adopt new ones, and make friends, because once you have friends the other problems start solving themselves.
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