We're all foreigners somewhere

 

Most of us don’t think of ourselves as foreigners, even when we’re overseas. We believe that we are one with the wider group. After all, foreigners are something else, they are the people who don’t belong.

I remember the first time I realised I was be an outsider. My British Caledonian flight to Zambia had landed in Lusaka and, when I looked out onto the tarmac, none of the ground staff looked like me. It gave me a thrill but also a sense of vulnerability. These people were not my people and I wondered if I would be safe among them. That thought prompted another – this is how visitors to my own country must feel. They are outnumbered, and their dress, skin colour, hair, any number of things, mark them out and perhaps leave them open to hostility. I have to say that I met no hostility in Zambia. Instead, my social skills grew as I learned to reach out to the people I lived among. Perhaps I did it to fit in, to ensure that I was less of a foreigner.

I didn’t anticipate feeling that same sense of being foreign when I arrived in the United States. However, my voice marked me out as an outsider. We had been invited to a dinner party in Chicago, and I did what many of us would do for the occasion: I put on a nice dress, a bit of make-up and made myself look decent. So, I was surprised when the hostess looked at me across the table and said, “You know, if I were to see you across the room, I would never guess you were foreign.” I was too polite to ask her what a foreigner looked like. I wouldn’t be so very polite today. A few years later, we were shopping at a ubiquitous mall when my husband met a couple he was at school with. He introduced me, and I said, “Lovely to meet you.” The woman turned to her husband in laughter. “My god, she sounds like she just got off the boat.” There were so many other things she could have said like, “welcome,” or “nice to meet you.” Needless to say, I didn’t cultivate any friendship there.

These cases were harmless. No one victimised me or made me feel like a lesser being - except the woman who made me feel like a boat person or immigrant. But what is wrong with being compared to an immigrant? I’d married a national, moved to his country. I was an immigrant. What was wrong was her attitude to a new arrival.

A friend recently sent me an article on the difference between the terms ‘immigrant’ and ‘expat’ and how use of the terms has a strong element of racism. Expats are usually white, or pink, from spending too much time in the tropical sun. Expats come from Europe and settle in their nation’s former colonies. It’s not a term of honour or respect but it tells us that the person is white. Africans, Asians, those from the Middle East are never referred to as expats. Immigrant however infers poor, huddled masses moving for economic or for safety reasons. However, one country refers to all its immigrants as expats, and it’s not a nation known for tolerance and enlightenment. In the United Arab Emirates, all immigrant are expats. Progress indeed!

Expats or immigrants in Dubai