Foreigner at home

Have you ever felt like you do not belong to the place you are? You do not fit in there and the people are not the people you have expected to be. Well I felt like that last year when I went home. And it is this time of the year that I am going home again.

I am wordless for what I feel. To see my whole family and to cuddle them. The feeling when I am around the table with them, watching TV and talking like I have never left.

What I experienced last summer was unbelievable. People were looking at me very weirdly – maybe it was in my mind but was it… Everyone was grumpy when they serve me at the coffee shop or maybe it was something normal. I happened to go to the bus station and ask someone for information and she just pointed out where is the information gate. I do not remember what the question was but I am sure she could have replied back in appropriate way.

Did I feel like a stranger or like a foreigner? I felt like I wasn’t welcome there. How are people like that and why? When I talked to a few friends they tried to explain to me the wage is low and people do not care how they behave. They are not happy – I understand – but if you are working and getting paid, you should pay some respect to the people you serve.

When I was in Bulgaria, before coming to UK, I worked in a different coffee shops and restaurants, and no matter how much was my wage I was always smiling and nice to the customers. It is not easy of course, but that was my job.

It is normal to feel foreigner in another country but foreigner at home? I have been thinking about that and I think the reason is that people who go abroad are seeing different things. The social life is different and I know if I want to reach something, if I do something it is going to be appreciated. Here in England everyone always tried to help me. I have never felt hatred, even though I am not one of them. When I ask for a direction or something else, I always receive a politeness and help.

It is not only in my country that people are only interested in the materiality (money, expensive cars, hotels and jewels), power and nakedness. But in some countries it is with a vengeance. We cannot change the other people and we cannot tell them what to feel.

Everyone has different point of view. Everyone see varied things, have sometimes extraordinary experiences. We cannot blame them. Everyone could be a foreigner, even in their own country or to feel as they are at home, even abroad.