yes, my ancestors came from southern india. my tan skin and skinny ankles will attest to that. yes, i am palestinian. my stubborn hair and stubbornness, for that matter, are proof. i am confident in explaining my two halves, perhaps american comes in somewhere, but that's understood. yet, i don't know if i'm balancing the right amount of any of them. i wonder what my parents must feel like to live worlds away from the people they love. what it must feel like to yearn for the smell of ripe figs in the fall, or for the scent of freshly cut coconut. everything here must seem so stale...the food, the people, the work. i can't imagine crying myself to sleep every night for months because i'm in a strange country where i don't speak the language, or leaving my family behind after a parent's death. i wonder if they are disappointed in who i am. if they must cringe at my constant use of "you guys" in reference to them when i'm angry, or at my constant journeys into the city. i am one to always shy away from tradition if it doesn't make sense, if it hinders on my beliefs, yet i am one to embrace it for its beauty and passion. i think i've finally met my father's match in palestinian history, and my love for poetry runs through me. i nag at my mother to tell me about a country she seems to have forgotten, one that she never seems to want to return to if even for a visit. i get my fixes of stories about guyana from my uncle, the one brother amongst seven sisters, and i'll be going to visit this summer. i roll grape leaves, pack a mean argeela, bail roti, but my arabic and broken english are far from anything to brag about. my passion is palestine and social justice in general. in all of my confusion and certainty i think i disappoint them. i feel selfish all the time. when i spend hours on end studying, when all i want to do is kick back with some friends, when i want to get out of this town. yet i know they live for me, my parents. and that's why i stay here. in this house, in this town. not to say i don't value and cherish our time together...don't get me wrong, it's not out of pity. but despite my constant arguing to stay out a bit later every time they call, which is every time i go out past 11, i always stay. i constantly think about the two years i lived in the city, or about my dream to move to barcelona for a year,yet i reside in a place that stunts my creativity and passion. i don't belong here, that's for sure. the roads are too perfect, the land is too flat, all the people that give me life are gone. i love my family dearly, but if they knew that i was just trying to make the best of a life that isn't for me, would they understand why i wanted to leave? although i feel closer to them and to who i am when live an hour away, i hold my family together. my brother has been gone for years, and this house would be too empty, too quiet for my parents to endure. they mean more to me than anything, so much that just like their sacrifice for me, i've given up a part of who i am to give them a life they deserve.
