Martin Foye (Fruupp) - The Emigrant's Song

The Freedom of Being "Not Quite Right"...

I like having a split cultural identity. It’s liberating in a way. You stand back and reflect where others are mere puppets of socialisation. Sure – you’re more detached – but you can observe what other people don’t even know exists. It brings out the core of your personality: stripped of cultural manipulation. To some extent, at least. If ever there was a perfect recipe for self-discovery, emigration is it.

How To Overcome Homesickness: Remedy No 1

In the context of migration, the term “home” is often understood as the country of one’s cultural identity. Depending on an immigrant’s ability or indeed willingness to integrate, his cultural self-perception will change. An immigrant striving to adapt may, ironically, strive for homelessness. Biculturalism flies in the face of a unitary notion like “home”. After five years away, familiarities wane and impressions change, weakening any sense of belonging. Yet the remnants of a now foreign cultural identity can’t be eradicated. We are who we were shaped to be. The immigrant is shaped to be dissociated. He doesn’t have a home.

Remedy No 1 for overcoming homesickness is thus to realise that one has foregone the ability to have a cultural home.

Self-imposed Torture

I was a shy child who loved being at home. When my friends invited me over to play, I usually invented excuses. I lost many friends this way. The thing is – I didn’t like people very much. They either bored or scared me, and being at home was so enjoyable. Yet, I was thirsty for travel and longed to go away. So I did, again and again and again, on exchange, horse riding holidays, language trips, always harbouring a little resentment towards myself for abandoning my home, or for not returning to a place that I had already learned to love.

Not all that much has changed. I’m still averse to social interaction, I still love the place that is now my home, I still feel the need to go away. So I do, again and again and again, on walks, tropical holidays, road trips. Until I leave for good, again.

With the result that there exists a multitude of places that I would like to make my home.

The place of my first memories: A house somewhere in Swabia, with a garden full of plums and cherries.

My teenage room, a sanctuary.

A village in the Provence, where I thought I had a soul.

New York, a city that makes me feel alive.

Wellington, where I am happy.

The ever-present craving for more. Saying goodbye has become a ritual, but it is painful nonetheless. The more I see, the more I will have to miss. I’m spoilt for choice.

It’s self-imposed torture.

My Quest for Quark

After lunch, my mother would often serve dessert, “to close the stomach”, as she called it. Nobody in my family loved her desserts as much as I did. They ranged from heavenly Tiramisu to tinned fruit with cream, and I would never pass on either. It was not unusual for me to still sit at the kitchen table long after everybody else had left, savouring every spoonful of my mother’s concoctions. My father would hold his daily nap before returning to work, my siblings played or got on with their homework, and my mother cleaned up the kitchen. All the while I was trying to make my dessert last as long as possible. It was almost ceremonious.

Unless my mum had made Quark. If she had made Quark, I wanted to be over and done with lunch. I still ate it. I didn’t even dislike it. I just didn’t like it very much. Quark didn’t mean anything to me. It was one of my mum’s desserts, and it was good in cheesecake, and it was better with cherries than without – nothing less, nothing more. I left home to live in another country, but remained unmoved by the sudden lack of Quark. Even German cheesecakes I could do without. Quark simply did not matter.

And then, one day, I missed it. I went to three different supermarkets and scoured the fridges for milk products resembling Quark. My quest for Quark wasn’t what you would call obsessed – in fact, I was quite casual about it. No harm in looking, I thought. If I find some, I might give it a try, as a treat.

It was supermarket number three that brought my search to an end. Lucky supermarket number 3. On the top shelf, next to luxurious mascarpone and tiny balls of proper mozzarella, clearly sat a tub of “Quarg”. What a find! I read the label, looked at the price and double checked the weight. $3.79 for 200g. And I concluded that that was a little steep, for Quark that wasn’t even spelled right. So I moved on, feeling rather self-satisfied with my austerity. I can always make it myself, I thought. I’m still planning on making it myself, maybe, one day, when it’s raining, although I still don’t like it all that much.

"The deep heart's core"

Or are they simply following "the deep heart's core"?

The Lake Isle of Innisfree

By William Butler Yeats

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made;
Nine bean rows will I have there, a hive for the honeybee,
And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,
Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;
There midnight's all a-glimmer, and noon a purple glow,
And evening full of the linnet's wings.

I will arise and go now, for always night and day
I hear the water lapping with low sounds by the shore;
While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements gray,
I hear it in the deep heart's core.

Lifestyle Migration

Human migration happens for all kinds of reasons: political unrest, poverty, unemployment, family, money … - none of which are terribly unusual or difficult to relate to. In fact, people have moved around the world for centuries, seeking prosperity or escaping destitution. In the 17^th century, Irish people sought to benefit from England’s rapid industrialization, and in the 19^th century, Europeans departed for America to realize their dreams of wealth and independence. While historians do not always agree on the underlying causes of particular migration trends, these tended to be easily discernible concepts. Nobody would contest that, to convince a person to change locations, the prospect of a family reunion or wealth could easily be sufficient. We do it all the time. Within borders, across borders, over continents. We understand that people want to escape from poverty, or become rich. We also understand a person’s desire to be with loved ones. These are truly human needs and aspirations, ingrained in us as fundamental values of our existence. What is more, they are largely cross-cultural. We can thus grasp the concept of migration as an inevitable, necessary and natural part of life.

And so we stopped to probe the migrant’s psyche. Or to question his grounds for leaving. Going away is socially acceptable, and justifications unnecessary. We go away because we can. But of course – we do have our reasons, valid reasons. We know how to respond when asked, and they might even make sense to us. They are the reasons of white and affluent members of society, who want more from life, but don’t know what. They are effeminate, nebulous, obscure. They are: I want to live amongst friendly people. And: I want to get away from bureaucracy. So they leave. From England to New Zealand, from Germany to Australia. Where, on a good day, passengers thank the driver when exiting the bus, and where red tape might be blue. They leave with good reason, they tell us. The reason is “life-style”. And we understand.

"The great home of the soul is the open road"

"The great home of the soul is the open road. Not heaven, not paradise. Not 'above'. Not even 'within'. The soul is neither 'above' nor 'within'. It is a wayfarer down the open road." (D.H. Lawrence in Studies in Classic American Literature)

This blog is about the urge to move and explore: It is about migration, traveling and going for walks. It ponders questions of why and how, where and when. The self-assessment of a foreigner who will never cease to be foreign. It spans from trite observations on emigrant life to personal reflections on being a stranger. It covers all forms of voluntary leaving: temporary or forever; to faraway places or the townbelt, from a country, a family, or an address. It’s about leaving places that you love, and exploring when there is nothing to find.

I’m a German emigrant, currently living in New Zealand on a Residence Permit. I left my family home when I was 16 years old.