My Journey into Greater Personal Authenticity
By The Modern Day Nomad (alias).
“Wanting to belong is probably the fastest route to rejection,” I said to myself one night when me, myself and I were having a meeting in my head. I discovered this truth at twelve but twenty years later, I still have to check myself daily to suppress the desire to find a herd. After all, “I can do bad all by myself” (to quote Tyler Perry’s movie title) and all I need is one more self-love motivational talk to remind me of this.
The desire to belong seems to project an aura of desperation and vulnerability that receives the same reaction as publicly-sharing your diagnosis of having caught an illness. The treatment is the same too – kindly isolate yourself, deal with your symptoms and re-join society when you are healed.
Ok, noted.
Well noted.
I grew up in lands where my passport meant more than my Zambian national registration card (NRC). My passport was a lovely green document that contained information on the country I belonged to, my travel history and a visa expiry date that indicated when I needed to leave by. Unlike my NRC, my passport had no concern for my tribe and its traditional leaders and consequently, it could not tell you very much about the language we spoke or whether Mr. so-and-so could be my relative. Perhaps this is the reason why these concerns slipped from my conscience or why I had no answer when, on my return to living in Zambia, people asked why my Bemba sounded so funny.
My passport meant I was a foreigner. My classmates were kind enough to remind me of this — ironically, usually around the same time I started to get comfortable in my new surroundings. Simple, everyday activities have a different emotion when you’re doing them as a foreigner. For example, on public transport, arriving at my destination raised my anxiety levels as I had to practise how to request to dismount in a tongue that wasn’t mine. When I finally sounded the words, my voice was loud and uncertain, startling the amused passengers. I would run out without looking back and hope that we all never meet again. Sometimes courage would fail me and I would deliberately miss my stop.
In addition to the language barriers, the occasional jibes and accusations of taking resources that belonged to true citizens were particularly difficult to digest as a child. I learnt early on that “expatriates” were people from non-African countries (usually western) that ‘added value to the local economy’ while “foreigners” were people from fellow neighbouring African countries who were simply tolerated. I learnt to survive by making everyone comfortable, providing signals that I did not come to take anything, assimilating in my mannerisms, speech, tastes, and living as a ‘fly on the wall,’ participating only when invited.
Fast-forward a few years and I finally reached the grand old age of twenty. I said “adios” to the place that had housed me and went in search of a place to call “home”. My first stop was a predominantly white country, over an ocean, to attend university. Now, being a veteran in Surviving As A Foreigner, I assimilated, and the experience was positive yet it still left me questioning my identity. This 3-year period became a time of following natural hair Youtubers after doing the ‘big chop’, spending several hours absorbing Black Literature and understanding that we built kingdoms too. The stolen history of slavery and colonisation was my history, and the young adult in me was geared to mine it out of its hiding places.
As I tried to recall the society of my ancestors to better understand myself, I developed an identity grounded in being proudly African. I was now ready to return home. I was ready to be part of the change. I landed at Lusaka International Airport black and proud. Checked my passport: African through and through.
My cousin invited me over for dinner one evening. We spoke at length, trying to get to know each other as adults through our few shared childhood memories. I was finally home. She told me that she loved my chitenge material earrings and my afro. She also told me that it was so fascinating having a “white, coconut” cousin.
Wanting to belong is probably the fastest route to rejection.
I arrived at a funeral. I had my headwrap but had forgotten my chitenge. I stood out, the way my skin tone stood out on my predominantly white university campus.
I arrived at a matebeto with my chitenge but had forgotten to check the smart-casual dress code. I stood out like a child asking to stop the bus in a tongue that wasn’t her own.
I didn’t need my passport anymore. Here, my NRC was sufficient for opening bank accounts and meeting all my other adulting needs. However, I was still something of a foreigner.
The piercing word “coconut” would be repeated by my workmates, and even my boyfriend and his friends in the years to come. In addition to the language barriers stemming from my awkward Bemba and Nyanja, the occasional jibes and accusations of taking resources that belonged to citizens were particularly difficult to digest. After all, with my experience of living abroad for so long, why did I bother coming back to Zambia when I could be earning valuable dollars elsewhere? Having not grown up in my own country, I learnt to survive by making everyone comfortable, providing signals that I did not come to take and assimilated in my mannerisms, speech, tastes, and living as a ‘fly on the wall,’ participating only when invited.
It’s a rainy evening and me, myself and I are having a meeting in my head. We conclude that assimilation is not a fair reward for discarding authenticity. We debate as to whether the various versions of myself that arose from assimilating in different lands have provided the return of a new type of authenticity; one that is grounded in embracing all the different paths that led me to being here as I am.
We resolve that perhaps it is okay to be proudly black in looks and mind with perceived Western mannerisms. We resolve that “coconut” was a tool of understanding that others needed but it need not be embraced as my identity. We resolve that it is not my responsibility to explain myself but perhaps it is the responsibility of others to use their green passport to travel and live something of my experience for themselves. We resolve that I, and only I, know my pieces so if my puzzle fits, I am whole, and the picture need not be explained.
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