Land of the Free, Home of the Brave

Absence makes the heart grow fonder. I've heard this time and time again, and I didn't buy it until the past week.

Do I miss my family? Of course I do. My boyfriend? Clearly. My friends? Without a doubt. Do I long for salads without slimy vegetables, forks instead of chopsticks, toilets that don't require squatting or hovering, and a language I can understand? More than I could possibly express. However, the absence I've felt most during this entire trip is over a much more nebulous thing I never thought I'd shed tears over.

I miss my country.

The idea of a homeland is a pretty funny concept to begin with. Does where you're born really matter that much in shaping who you are? Even if you've lived there for most of your life, would you ever really feel an allegiance to that place? You can miss people and foods and languages, but is it really possible to feel a void when it comes to something as huge and vague as your homeland? Especially in America, where people still claim roots in Ireland, Hungary, Germany, Italy, Poland, etc., the concept of "homeland" is strange and fluid.

It's not that I've ever disliked America. I've always pretty much liked my country, but I've also had my fair share of gripes with it too. I was raised with an understanding that I'm lucky to live where I live and to have what I have, so it was part of how I perceived the world. I traveled to Juarez, Mexico when I was ten with a group from my church and I knew then that where I lived was something special. However... there is a bit of maturation that occurs between ten and twenty-one (in most cases, at least), and my time in China has illustrated many things for me, but the brightest illustration has been that the United States of America is a beautiful, incredible, awe-inspiring place to call home.

To clarify: I'm not saying that China is bad. I'm not even saying I've disliked my time here. I've actually really enjoyed my time here, but there are certain differences that one simply cannot ignore. It's also not that I'm judging the Chinese or saying anything about "East" versus "West," (I say this not only as a disclaimer so that Emerson professors don't get all up in arms, but also to clarify that my feelings do not stem from an understanding of "East" and "West" as legitimate defining concepts) but rather that in looking at certain basic human needs (clean water) and desires (communication, freedom), I find China to be lacking.

It's hard, too, to totally ignore what your life has been when you travel someplace new. For a while when I first arrived, I tried hard to be "unAmerican," so that the Chinese would see me as something more than my country. I didn't want them to see me as loud, obnoxious, and large. I wanted to blend in as much as possible while making them see that I was more than where I came from. After a while, I realized a few things. The first thing is that any concept of a nationality as being strictly one way is just unfair. The Chinese aren't all polite and quiet. Americans aren't all loud and obnoxious. The Irish aren't all drunkards, and the Jews aren't all cheap. So... if I happen to be loud and American, then that's what I am. After a while, I realized that I will never blend in here. It's just impossible, and maybe that's not such a bad thing. After struggling with chopsticks and stumbling for words, after being photographed and pointed at, after realizing that regardless of how well I use a Chinese fan I will always still be "foreigner," I understood something. The truth is (and maybe this is "so American") that I don't care what these people think of me. I don't want to offend anyone, and I go out of my way to ensure that doesn't happen. I'm not disregarding cultural sensitivity or awareness. Quite the opposite, I'm embracing my own cultural differences and understanding that aside from all that, it's not my job to change the way an entire country feels about my own. I do think that it's time that some dialog happened between the youth of our two countries (there are so many issues boiling beneath the skin of our two selves), but my two months here could not possibly show all of China that Americans are as human as they are. My two months here could only broaden my own understanding, as far as I know it, because their minds are their own. My mastery or ineptitude with chopsticks has nothing to do with who I am, and it certainly has nothing to do with who these people are or what their lives are like.

What I do know is this: I am more thankful for my life and where I come from than I ever thought I would be. I have watched medal ceremony after medal ceremony, and every time an American flag is raised and I hear our national anthem, I start to cry. My heart aches and swells with pride and longing for my homeland. I'm still Hungarian and Irish and a sliver of German, but my roots are buried deep, deep, deep in American soil.