Surviving Culture Shock

How moving countries was a blessing in disguise

I didn’t get to experience making a friend for life when I was very young. I changed schools when I was 8, moved to another country when I was 11.

I was bullied for being different. I had a Spanish accent, I was a little overweight, wore glasses, and suffered from acne. I dressed differently to what was deemed fashionable at the time and I did not understand the British way of doing things.

The entire being that I had become in Spain was rejected in the UK.

Everything about me shouted, “hit me.”

In Spain, I was popular for being clever, but in the UK no one liked me. Even down to the sarcastic British humour, I couldn’t understand it. Everything was so vastly different, I lost myself.

I Had Culture Shock

I thought my life could not get worse when I woke up nervous every day to go to school. I’d try to fake an illness and I resented my family for dragging me to a country in which I did not belong.

But there is always one.

There’s always that one person who will make it better.

There’s always one person who will call you after school to ask if I was free that weekend.

There’s always one kid who will play near your house and won’t stop you from joining in.

I made 2 friends in the first 3 years of being in the UK. A boy who lived up the road from me, and a girl who joined our school in the second year of secondary school.

In hindsight, I wonder if they prevented me from becoming depressed later in life. I’m sure it’s because of them I allowed myself to grow in confidence, and show unapologetically who I really was.

Gemma

Gemma was and still is my rock. We met in 2002. She walked into our class as the new girl. Someone else in the class (my bully, actually) had been asked to show her around and help her settle. I remember in that instance feeling like another chance to make a friend had been squashed — she would become the bully’s bestie and I would remain friendless.

But that wasn’t the case. I mustered up the courage to say hello, and there just hasn’t been a goodbye since.

My most vivid memory that established our friendship was so small, yet so vital for me. I remember the bell ringing, telling the school the day was over and it was time to go home. I packed up my things, left the classroom, and made my way out. I was walking towards the school gate, rushing to just get home after another horrible day.

I heard a voice calling my name. I turned around to see Gemma almost running to catch up with me so we could walk to the gate together.

Someone wanted to hang out with me.

I had a friend.

From then on, I wasn’t scared to be the one to run and catch up to her so that we could walk to the school gates together. I knew she would not ignore me.

She is my chosen family. I don’t do enough for her now, though. We live in different countries and we have seen each other once since she moved away. She was a bridesmaid at my wedding — she dragged her barely one-year-old baby across the world, on 3 different flights, to be at my wedding.

She effing rocks this world.

I may not be able to visit for some time, but I hope she knows how important she is to me. I hope we will someday be reunited, living as neighbours. Actually, I don’t hope, I know this. I don’t know the hows and the wheres and the whys, I just know we will be able to walk into each other’s houses at zero moment’s notice and the other will not find it rude or impolite.

Love you, Gem.

Huey

He was the wanna-be funny 12-year-old kid who lived up the road and terrorised me. He started off just mocking me for every single little thing about me. My glasses, my accent, the fact I was Spanish.

My nickname became Spaniard, somehow evolving to Spinach eventually, and I did not find it offensive. Despite being bullied at school this did not affect me.

If anything, I learned the difference between a little bit of light-hearted mockery and outright abuse thanks to him.

We’d bump into each other on the way to school and end up walking together most days until eventually, he waited for me to get up the road to his house and walk with me. We also got into the habit of waiting for each other at the school gate to walk home as well.

I think our friendship was loose because throughout our lives we have been in and out of touch, but he played an integral part in my life that I think many of my traits are based on. He was the joker who made me feel normal. The jokes he played on me taught me to have a bit of fun and made me explore my own sense of humour.

We aren’t in touch all that often, but he’s that one friend who doesn’t escape my mind altogether. We can go years without talking to each other but yet when we do I feel completely comfortable to just continue on from where we left off.

There is no game playing or pretending with him, we just are, and we accept it.

Lessons Learned

Everyone who appears in your life is teaching you something. These two very special friends taught me that it is not a country that makes you feel at home, but the people in it. And they made me feel at home, in the cheesiest way possible.

Even my bullies taught me something. They helped me prioritise. They helped me learn what not to tolerate. They taught me about resilience and self-respect. I grew in spite of our unpleasant interactions.

To those who are struggling to feel at home in a strange place, I give this advice:

Treat every human interaction as a chance to learn something new, and make home what you want it to be.

There are always silver linings no matter where you are, you just have to make the effort to look.

Sylvia Emokpae, thinker and philosopher, is passionate about motherhood, self-love, and pro-race. See more work like this.