A "misunderstanding”, because of the language

Today I'm going to talk about what a great topic and with so many and so many episodes... I know some of those tears already. And even if we speak Spanish... how different the cultures are. Many times, it means going the extra mile to make sure we understand well. Double effort, double portion of love when it comes to learning and understanding another language other than your native language.

I grew up in a house of: either you do it right or you don't, not as an encouraging word, but as a lapidary phrase that if it wasn't perfect it wouldn't work, or maybe it wouldn't work. I know that it is not easy to let go of this belief when it is subject to family belonging.

At times like this I have felt useless or a burden to myself, the moment has become lonely and isolation weighs (Some days it is noticeable more than others). But I also recognize that that pressure goes away, becomes lighter when we understand that these episodes are part of the process.

It is a very conscious work, to start by daring to do, like when little children start walking, what do we do?, we celebrate every attempt to get up and take his first steps by himself, and it does not occur to us to say that "if he is going to fall, he better not do it". We don't do that.

That is why, today, I celebrate my attempts that are always better than the paralysis that a situation or an event can produce.

These days when my niece Sonia's youngest son started primary school have been days of remembering for her, very vividly, the first times in Germany that she has in that country, where Sonia emigrated a few years ago, for her husband's work reasons. Victoria, her eldest daughter, started first grade the year she arrived in Düsseldorf, and she didn't know German, but she could read in Spanish.

I know how it feels, not to understand something. I know what it feels like to not understand anything, and also what it feels like to understand the other way around. It has happened to me in this Hive ecosystem where I write in English every day, and that is not my native language, it is Spanish.

So while she holds back her tears, I almost had to hold back mine when she was telling me on a video call what she was going through, with her little son, my nephew.

What she feels right now as an irreversible failure in motherhood is nothing more than a confusion that has a fix. One of those details in which a misunderstanding of language is mixed with ignorance of local traditions and the functioning of the school system, the Schultütte (cone full of sweets traditional in Germany for the school start) had to be saved for a local parade.

She didn't do it, no matter the reason, and although I insist that she has a solution, she now feels that the world is coming at her, that she failed her son, that she is alone and that she is the only one who makes mistakes.

Her son's smile, which reveals that it has been a great day, dissolves half of the pressure, but not completely, because he wants to “do well” for her. You don't have to tell me, because I have felt this way many times, and because I hear it in my work every day from my collaborators who live motherhood abroad.

The desire to “do well” as an indomitable self-demand becomes the desire to “do it” and when we take away the surname (“good”, “excellent”, “best”) we take off an enormous pressure. The video call with Sonia ends and I return to my routine on this South American continent, happy because doing is, in itself, a victory.

About this experience, my reflection is that...

In Germany, mastering the language gives you prestige. This country uses as a weapon to be able to master its language.

The children of immigrants often face situations in which someone tries to define them according to their origin. They are very brave when they are able to connect with their authenticity and stay true to themselves beyond any stereotype, that's why I really admire those children and teenagers who live the various edges that make up their identity and also those who accompany them.

Congratulations to all the people who keep working to our Hispanic families abroad.

Maybe you've been through that process a long time ago and this material is a reminder of what you've already overcome. If you have just moved to another country, I assure you that you have done very well.

In the photo Exuma, in the Bahamas, some years ago, I think that when you are a migrant inside and outside your country, I think that the heart grows by having several homelands, or by being a part and not being able to be in all of them at the same time, I don't know... If this is your case. How do you live this process in the day-to-day of bicultural parenting?. Follow in comments, I always read and reply to you.