“Welcome home.””
The woman at YVR customs hands me back my Canadian passport and smiles warmly.
Home? Where is home? I wonder, glaring at her for starting this internal conflict again. Is it Vancouver, the city I have grown up in, where most of my past and most of my future seems to be? Or is it Belgrade, the city in which I was born, where generations before me have lived and died and where I become overwhelmed by my grandmother’s fleshy embraces and steaming platters of food when I visit?
I was born in Belgrade, but my family escaped the growing political unrest when I was two years old and immigrated to Canada. My parents predominantly did this for me, the child that supposedly napped through the entire process. They left a life rich with friends, family, and memories, and came here to nothing — no credentials, no family, and a few friends that were no better off than us. Perhaps, had they not had a child, they would never have left — something which becomes apparent when they meet with others who left Serbia at around the same time, who they nostalgically reminisce about their lives “back home” with over traditional dishes and wine. It is also because of this that they never let our language and traditions die the way that many immigrants unfortunately do. Because Serbian was my first language and many of the traditions and cultural habits are things I grew up with, I have always felt a familial connection to the country, something that has further contributed to the dilemma of where I belong.
Nothing makes me feel the cultural dissonance as much as when I visit Belgrade and realize that, just as I have habits that I credit to being Serbian, I also have Canadian habits that make me feel like a fish out of water when I visit Serbia. The most obvious example to me is the habit of apologizing when I accidently step on someone’s toe, bump into someone, or, let’s be honest, when somebody steps on my toe or bumps into me. The concept of apology is not as light in Serbia as it is in Canada; just as Canadians are known for their excessive politeness, Serbs (and most eastern Europeans) are notoriously proud and an admittance of fault comes only after one stubbornly argues for a while. So for me to apologize to a stranger on the bus in Belgrade is met with confusion and reminds me that I don’t fully belong there.
Likewise, growing up in Vancouver, I have always felt that, despite fitting in, I never felt 100 per cent right. As a young child, I loved the fact that my family and I had a ‘secret language’ where we could say anything we wanted in public without anybody else knowing the content of our conversation. To this day, my parents beam as they tell me of the incident where I, ever the leader, led the entire preschool into a chant of “‘ajf, ‘ajf, ‘ajf!”. My parents still laugh at the anecdote as they describe the confusion on my teachers’ faces, and the relief when my parents explained that rajf in Serbian meant hairband, and that I was referring to the bright pink hairband I had so proudly put on that morning. In my teenage years, already an age where adolescents are embarrassed by their families, my mortification was intensified: going out to a restaurant here with my loud Serbian family always elicited more than a few glances, our table ordering more and more dishes, yelling regardless of the emotion we are conveying, and flailing our hands to get our point across. As I grew older, and became more comfortable with myself and my roots, I also realized that the things that had embarrassed me about my family and culture as a teenager, were the exact things I now loved and found endearing: the excessive eating was a love for food and life, the dynamic communication was passion and excitement, and — as much as I had tried to distance myself from all of that as an adolescent — there was no denying that these were all traits and behaviours that I had grown to possess, whether I liked it or not.
The knowledge that I had a part of me that others did not varies from innocent anecdotes like this, to the devastating confusion and helplessness provoked by Serbia’s continuous political instabilities. The most memorable to me is the 1999 NATO air raids of 1999, where the Serbian community in diaspora bonded over the common grief and powerlessness of watching televised images of Belgrade burning, and wondering whether family members were still alive and well, making us feel like I should be there and not here. There is a passion and warmth amongst people that resonates with me; generations and generations exhausted by wars and politics that hold people together, something that I have never experienced here. And yet there are also things that frighten me and make me feel so lucky that I was raised here, such as Serbia’s unemployment rates and poor quality of life, the continuing political instability, and the bigotry and judgment that are prevalent there. When I watch Vancouver’s pride parade, a joyous celebration of people’s differences, I get so overwhelmed at how far human rights have come, and I am so glad that an event like that is so massive and filled with support. On the other hand, Belgrade’s most recent pride parade had to be cancelled for the protection of the organizers, based on violent precedents set in past years.
I don’t think that I will ever truly be able to identify with one cultural identity over the other. While I can successfully integrate myself into both, I always find myself feeling that some of the pieces just don’t fit. Living in Canada, I always identify Serbia as my nationality; however, when I am abroad in Serbia I feel it’s necessary to say that I’m visiting from Canada. As much as this seems like a restless life, one of confusion and uncertainty, I feel as if both sides have contributed to who I am, and what I’ve experienced. I am lucky to have opportunities here that many Serbians of my generation living back home can only dream of — but I am also lucky to have a different history and perspective that comes from being raised Serbian.
“Thank you. Good to be back,” I respond, smiling as I take my Canadian passport. After all, how else can I respond to this stranger? I walk out, scanning for my family. I spot them instantly, speaking loudly in Serbian and waving their hands, waiting to take me home.
