What Doesn’t Kill You
Every parent, especially an Asian one has (an often very exaggerated ) story about how and why their childhood was so much more difficult than their own children's and how they miraculous survived. Now, especially with a teenager on my hands, it is most imperative that I strategically utilize my survival story. I thought I’d share my self proclaimed survival story, but I prefer to label it as my “thriver story” .
Once upon a time, the world was more insular or provincial, if you will and its people were not nearly as cosmopolitan. It was when international travel , let alone migration , was considered to be more for the reckless dreamers. Yes, some migration to the developed countries like the US happened but not often times did folks return to their developing homeland. Whenever I meet someone new (especially here in Florida) , it’s always that dreaded question: where are you from? Hmmm, where do I even start? So I start with a big sigh, of course, knowing for certain that the conversation is going to be followed by a look of surprise/confusion and then a barrage of predictable questions. Did I irk your curiosity as well? I was born in Nepal. …Naples? Nope. If I was lucky, the person I was talking to knew at least which continent this tiny but beautiful country was nestled in. This would be followed by me emphatically stating… you know, the country where Mount Everest is in! Anyhow, as I was saying, I was born in Nepal and grew up in Wisconsin. Wisconsin?! Yes, I acknowledge with humor , truly how random that sounds! I didn’t realize until someone pointed it out to me recently and we had a good laugh. Now I use that as my icebreaker.
Back to my story. I moved with my parents from Nepal to the US when I was five and returned at the hormonally labile age of 13. My father pursued further education and ultimately conducted research under the US government at the University of Wisconsin. My brag story is that he was the first Nepali to step foot in the south pole. I digress. My parents never failed to remind me that we were only in the US as temporary guests and that the plan was always to return to Nepal . However, one year turned into two and then into nearly a decade.
I started kindergarten and was assigned to ESL (English as a second language ). My first friend was Maria, a beautiful, blonde haired, blue eyed quintessential, American girl. She would try to speak to me in the few words of Spanish that she had learned. Her parents wondered how our friendship would survive. But it did ; even oceans apart. Her family became mine. I was blessed with amazing friends and their families who cared for me like their own. That’s another blog in itself. The time flew by (as childhood often does ) with the cold snow packed winters , sweet summers , crisp autumns, and flagrant springs. Memories were made of swimming in lakes (I wouldn’t dare to swim in as an adult ), the smell of smoky barbecue , the comforting smell of a fusion of ethnic and American food that wafted through the university housing complex and neighborhood.
Middle school arrived along with the hormones , boy crushes, cliques and young adulthood experiences .Everyone was either dreading or looking forward to high school. I was most certainly looking forward to it. Then one fated day , I came home from school, completely oblivious to the life changing event that would turn my little world upside down. Both of my parents were at home along with my little brother . My parents appeared nervous and solemn. My mom had whipped up an impressive spread of my favorite dishes and asked me to sit down and eat. They locked eyes and stated that they had to tell me something. I swallowed a lump in my throat and forced down the delicious food while anxiously wondering what this could be about. And then they uttered the dreaded words : “Babu, we are going back to Nepal” . Then came the ultimate shocker …”we are leaving in two weeks”! My mind froze, heart dropped and then tears promptly poured out in a classic shristi fashion. My otherwise previously excited little brother rightfully deemed “his sister’s tail” , began bawling as well. I escaped swiftly to my room but not before I dragged the phone and cord (yes I’m dating myself ) with me to inform all of my friends of what seemed to me to be a death sentence. I spent the whole rest of the evening on the phone. All of us wailed at what we determined to be the greatest teenage catastrophe. I was moving halfway around the world in two weeks. Farewell parties were planned at school and Beyond. I unashamedly reveled in my newly found celebrity status for the next few weeks. All my friends came to see me off at the airport. My world as I knew it, had been shattered.
The flight was long, taking nearly 2 days and multiple layovers. We stopped in Hong Kong, where I was introduced to the squatting toilet. No, I did not care that it was better functionally for the human anatomy. The public one was appalling. Being back in Asia ( in those days especially) came with a little bit of a culture shock to say the least. Everyone seem to stand too close to eachother , walk too close and stare a little too long. The site smells and sounds were so foreign. We landed at twilight and there was no electricity. The plane descended into a blanket of darkness. My grandmother was at our house and had candles lit. There was no central heat and it was dead in the middle of winter in Nepal.She cried tears of happiness, thrilled to see us after all these years. It was her first time meeting my brother. Strangely, she looked and smelled exactly how I remembered her. It was the smell of incense and Pooja. I barely slept that night. The bed was hard and I shared it with my brother. I tossed and turned, and upon waking up in the morning, I rushed up the stairs to the open terrace to finally discover in daylight, the place where my new life was beginning and I would now call home.
I couldn’t speak Nepali and I could barely understand a handful of words. Standing there at dawn , little did I know what the next several months would entail. It would comprise of one of the most challenging periods of my young life that I had ever encountered. I didn’t know that I would struggle at school , not to just learn a brand new language from scratch l, starting with the alphabet while having to take eighth grade level, grammar, and literature tests in a new language merely months later and a national board exam within two years. I didn’t know that I would be ridiculed, bullied and stalked on my way back home and discover dead frogs and hate notes in my backpack. I was blissfully unaware that the bathroom walls would have writing about me that I didn’t even understand in my innocence. I would hold it together , grit my teeth and bear it all with a smile and politeness only to come home and cry silent tears for months. I know it was hard on my parents to watch their little girl in turmoil and they even offered to move back on one desperate evening. However, I was determined not to let them down and not to let hate, carelessness and ignorance win. I know it broke their heart seeing how I was trying so hard and was still hitting walls . I didn’t know that I would learn to read and write nepali literature even before I would dare to speak it. One day, despite being teased for my accent and being “the foreign girl”, I would decide that enough was enough . I would learn to speak fluently over summer break whilst practicing with with my unsuspecting baby cousins. It was their secret and mine. I returned to the next semester of school and to the astonishment of my classmates, I set forth to speak the purest grammatically, correct Nepali in the most (Midwestern) American of accents.
So yes, what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. It shifts your perspectives. It showed me that the world was bigger than just the confines of my immediate surroundings. It taught me that the world was full of so many kinds of people in various walks of life and fortune. It help me realize that I had so much to be grateful for. That not everyone lived or thought the way I did and how environment and upbringing molds individuals . I learned that there is no one right way of doing anything . It expanded my world and my horizons. I learned early on that I could do the hard things. I learned that I didn’t need to put myself in a box or fit a label and that I could be truly proud to be different and unique. It was OK to stand out. I learned to rely on and trust my family , all of whom I became closer to as a result . Most importantly, I learned not to take no for an answer. If someone told me I couldn’t do something ( they often did) , that I could turn around and politely say, “WATCH me “ with the brightest smile and do exactly that and more.
They say what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. Try telling that to a teenager. Or better yet, teach them. So yes, my beloved son and daughter, remember , you can do the hard things . Remember , change can be good . When life leads you on to a hard rigid path, it teaches you to be fluid, to adjust and be flexible . It tests your character and refines it. It makes you realize that you don’t have to be a ragdoll like victim to life’s situations. You can indeed , make sweet lemonade when life hands you lemons. You can learn to dance in the darkness and fall in love with the soft glow of candlelight. Whatever doesn’t kill you, well… you know :)