IMMIGRANT NOSTALGIA-WHY IT IS DIFFERENT

Sometimes I will chit chat with my friends about what it was like growing up. During our discussions it becomes clear we had very different pasts. They dealt with snow and squirrels and I dealt with a cruel heat and monkeys. They got in trouble over stealing makeup, I got in trouble for stealing mangoes.

We would look back sadly on those days, they are now long gone and the world will never be the same. But I noticed that I would always be much sadder about this nostalgia and I never quite understood why. After all, we all travel time and space in the same way, so why would thinking about my past make me so sad.

A few days ago I took the liberty to Google earth my old neighborhood, so much had changed. I felt so sad, and that's when I realized why immigrants have a different outlook on their past than do people who were born and raised in the same place. When a native looks at their past, they see a time that no longer is, and when they look at their present, they see one that is imbued with their actions and contributions. They are part of their present and their past.

However, when an immigrant looks at their present, they can see that history happened in the country they are from without any of their contribution and that they are in a present in their new country that was created by others. The world changed without them and for them. So while someone born and raised in the same country can feel sad about a past that no longer is. Immigrants look at their past with sadness, but also a reminder of how insignificant we human beings are. We know that a place will continue to grow and exist regardless of whether we are there or not and vice versa. We connect on a very deep level with the impermanence of our own humanity and that's why it hurts to look at our past-because we know there is a present without us.

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MODERN IFIGENIA

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