And I have lost so much.
My car, my friends, my relationship with my family, my job, my house and my overall strength to "carry on."
This year was basically a huge turn of events for me, and while I had seen it coming for the longest time, nothing can truly prepare you for the adventure (if you want to call it that) that awaits when you decide to immigrate.
It was right after my last December in Norway, Kim-Erik and I had decided to take things another step, and for me to move to Norway.
And well, theoretically, it shouldn't seem like such a hard thing to do, seeing as the statics of having a "good life" in Norway were surprisingly high, I felt that I had not much to loose!
Seriously, what could I loose?
I was working long hours, alone most of the time, I lived with my single room mate (I must mention she was my saving grace) in a flat that faced a main road, I could always hear traffic or the neighbors screaming children... I lived off popcorn and noodles,Honestly, I had no real motivation to cook for myself, oh yes and my dogs lived at my dad, so I had to drive over 30km to get to them to give them love and attention(not that my family weren't doing that) they needed, it was huge sense of responsibility and shame that they had to look after them for me.
Oh and not to mention my amazing set of wheels, that ALWAYS broke down.
All my friends around me where getting married and settling in well with their partners. I used to be the girl who had a partner and now I was the girl that was invited to tag along because I always seemed alone and single... My mother has been extremely off towards me, and I barely saw my brother or sister.
So basically to cut a long story short, my life was not the greatest at the time, and although I had made the best of it, I kind of hoped that all my life's answers would be simplified in Norway.
So, I decided, "loose everything" to gain everything. I know, it sounds super cheesy and cliche', but it felt like my one shot at a second chance, a way to redeem myself from past mistakes.
Anyways, I quit my job; said my good byes & I left, taking my dogs, a few boxes of crap and myself to live in Norway.
And ofcorse yes, I couldn't have been happier to finally spend everyday with Kim-Erik without a "day counter" as to when I would be going home again.
As soon as I landed, things felt different, the air smelled strange and even Kim-Erik looked unusual too. You could say my "reality" goggles where now out on and the pretty little petite rose tinted ones I used may times in Norway were left back in South Africa,
I shit you not.
Ever since I landed here, there was a huge shift. I longed for the bustling noise outside my bedroom window... the awkward hello from the Indian neighbors who lived below us and the aroma of last nights dinner seeping into our flat. The long hours of traffic and annoyingly hot days, with the sun in my eyes.
I missed my family and the long drives I would take to see my dogs, the discomfort I would have with the idea of "work tomorrow" on a Sunday night.
I longed for the ambiance and strange noises that come out of a typical day in Johannesburg; like the haa-di-daa's on a Sunday morning or the ice-cream trucks ALWAYS on the most freezing days.
And not to mention the adrenaline of driving around and living in Johannesburg, the most dangerous city in our country, the fear of the unknown, the fear of, "Am I next?!"
After all you truly are a sitting duck in that place...
Only to find myself in a city that has the same population as Randburg (a suburb in Johannesburg) with people who do not speak English, dress the same, eat the same and cock their heads to the side in confusion when I tell them I am South African and whattt, I am white. ?! My latest response is, "actually, I am albino!"
I have been compared to all sorts.
Namely, the unemployed, uneducated supposed "scum" of Norway. I have been told many awful things I wish not to even mention on this post as an example of my fate in Norway and all the years to come.
I wasn't sure what to make of it at first, in actual fact, I was quite confused, angry, sour and almost had a sense of regret and loss with the choice I had made to leave South Africa for here.
Some days, I found myself with so much social anxiety, I could not even leave the house, or it was so cold and dark that I just laid on the couch, curled up in a little ball resembling a fetus.
I felt as weak as I ever have in my entire life.
The little pleasures of driving to a local store & buying a local brand, laughing and chatting to the ever-so-friendly people in Johannesburg was all just a longing had in my gut, eating at me more and more each day.
None of my days had color, none of what I was doing in my days felt like they even mattered, and as you can imagine, this sort of attitude started destroying the relationship that Kim-Erik and I had worked so hard on!
I felt like nothing excited me, and I had to punish myself for the choice I had made to leave home. Leave all the things I felt I needed to list that were "bad" or "dangerous" and what was possibly going to be "better" abroad.
The truth is...
Nothing is better anywhere else.
All the happiness you have in your life, you create,
I have learned, personally for me that all the statistics in the world of what is "safest", "cleaner" and whatever other shit these polls come up with actually have very little to do with my personal journey to finding happiness.
I feel that with all the things that frustrated me back home, there was a sense of joy in them too, and maybe who knows when I decide to move back to South Africa, I may just feel the same way about Norway, too...
And as I sit here in my new little house with my new laptop looking back the past year, I know now more than ever that immigrating is not as glamoures as we perceive it to me, change is always good, and even though we feel like we can escape with the idea of going somewhere else to a new country or city, it doesn't take away the inner journey you had been facing, it actually heightens it and you face it more on your own, simply because there is no one around you that understand what you are going through.
So here it is.
My thoughts which took me nearly 6 months to figure out how to type.
I hope whoever reads this will understand me on a level I could never express in conversation.
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