Losing a Part of Myself?

I recently became a citizen of the United States. And when I mean recently, I mean just a couple of weeks ago. I have lived in the U.S. for more than thirteen years and was raised here. When people find out that I was born in Saudi Arabia and lived there until I was about nine years old, they’re very surprised. Or so they tell me anyway. And although I was born in Saudi Arabia, I have always been a citizen of India. That’s where my parents are from, that’s where I feel most at home, and that’s a part of me that I never want to lose.

The whole process of becoming a U.S. citizen took an extremely long time. First, you have to apply for your green card or permanent resident card, live in the country for a certain number of years, and then apply for citizenship. For some people it takes longer than normal, and I think my family and I fell into that category.

We did delay the whole applying for citizenship process for as long as possible and for various reasons. The biggest being: could a simple sheet of paper change our devotion and ties to our heritage? By becoming a citizen would that mean that we were going to completely give up being Indian? When asked to identify myself does that mean I call myself an American, an Indian, or an Indian-American? Most of my entire extended family lives in India. We try to make trips every year or every other year. Would it become a situation where I wasn’t going to see them as often and soon they’ll become strangers to me as well? Were they going to think of us as too American or too assimilated into American culture and life?

Truthfully those were a lot of the things that we considered when deciding whether to go ahead with it or not. I know it’s just a piece of paper that signifies that you’ve become a citizen, but that piece of paper means so much to so many people. For me it was a pretty easy decision, of course; I have practically lived here my entire life. But when my parents moved here, they gave up so much. They moved thousands of miles away from their families. Their brothers and sisters lived in an entirely different country. They saw their parents only once every few years. I can’t even imagine that. If I go more than a month without seeing my family I tend to feel so separated and I end up feeling lost without them. I’m not sure how they did it at all. They gave up so much in order to raise us kids and give us all of the opportunities in the world. We’ve had it pretty easy compared to most other people.

So when I was sitting in that courtroom, taking my oath of allegiance, along with seventy-five other people from thirty-three other countries, in Milwaukee, Wis., it was weird how all I could think about was how I was missing work for this. It has been a long process, and for some people it really is a sense of accomplishment. Because they’ve been through the struggles, the hardships, and everything else it took to get to that courtroom. They weren’t giving up their identities and where they were coming from. It was mostly, I believe, their sense of accomplishment for getting there. The things they had to go through, the things they gave up for it, the sense of belonging, but not really all at the same time. It was just really nice to be able to share that moment with them.

Seeing Is Believing

I was talking to my sister recently about adjusting to life in another city—most importantly, meeting people. My sister relocated to Seattle about the same time that I came back to Madison. She moved there after she got married and somehow settled into her husband’s life. His friends became her friends and she was OK with that. For a while.

Once she started working, she figured she’d meet more people and build her circle of friends that way. But what my sister is struggling the most with is taking that next step in settling down. She has a job, she’s met a couple of people at work, but in her industry everyone is older. Like me, she’s a young professional in a new city, and I’ve tried explaining to her how now we need to take that time in building our networks—professionally and socially.

Luckily in Madison there are some great organizations that help young professionals adjust. They’ve definitely helped me along the way. Take MAGNET, for example. The YP networking organization holds multiple events every month, and the nice thing is that they’re not industry-specific and there’s lots of different ways to plug in. There are social gatherings, public policy sessions, community service opportunities and more. And if you don’t find something you like through MAGNET, the group is always looking for great ideas. So far, I’ve had only good experiences there.

This might sound strange, but what I like most about MAGNET is seeing with my own two eyes that I’m not the only one out there. I have no idea why I keep thinking my generation is all in hiding somewhere, but every time I go to a MAGNET event I’m reminded that there are a lot of people out there just like me. And it’s nice to see people with similar goals and interests in one place.

So that’s what I told my sister. Seattle’s been rated as one of the top cities for young professionals, so I’m pretty sure all she has to do is make the conscious effort to try to find them.
It’s making that first step that’s the hardest and most difficult. After that, everything else sort of falls into place.

Road Trips!

I like where I am in life at the moment. No real responsibilities, no one to really answer to, no diehard obligations. I’ve spent too many years worrying about the future, planning for it, and spending time either working or doing the responsible thing. At this stage in my life, I’m just trying to enjoy every minute of it.

I know I’m not even close to seeing all that Madison has to offer, but I’m pretty sure I’ve seen a huge chunk of it. I’ve already picked out my favorite hang-out spot (The Union Terrace and no, I can never get tired of that place!), coffee shop (Barriques by the Capital) and best restaurant (Vientienne off of State). I know there’s plenty of places left to explore, but I don’t want to tire of it so fast. I want to be able to have the enthusiasm and the love of the city for as long as possible.

One of my favorite things to do is get out of town, even if it’s just for a night or weekend. Since Madison has some but certainly not all of the things I’m looking for from a city (not just the number of people, but the diversity in people- and I don't just mean in terms of race and ethnicity, and places besides Denny's and Perkins that are open until 4 in the morning) I’m so glad that it’s close enough to places like Chicago and Minneapolis for me to escape and grow as a person. I’ve been back in Madison for almost a year, and I’ve spent less than ten weekends here in town. It’s not because I don’t enjoy weekend life in Madison, but because I simply like to explore cities and meet new people and cultures.

Being able to pack up my bags one weekend, leave, come back, unpack, work during the week, and then pack up again to go somewhere else keeps me going. I feel like I’ve found the work-life balance that works for me.