Alone

I’ve just come back from a reception for the 30 participants in the Summer Program at the Law School – a program that teaches the basics of the American legal system to foreign attorneys and those seeking to further their legal education in the States. Thirty people, many from Asia, some from South America, a handful from Europe, including one from Poland, all here to take part in this intense course of study. Most are in the States for the first time. One lawyer from Korea is here with his entire family – wife and two adorable children; another lives in Berlin and works in a town that borders with Poland. And the Polish participant – she’s here after just barely finishing her legal studies in Poland. She lives in a small town outside Wroclaw. Most Americans have never even heard of Wroclaw. (She was shocked when I came up to her and started speaking Polish.)

I am impressed with the lot of them. To travel to a different academic setting, halfway around the world is difficult. [Been there, done that, and I never had the language issues to worry about.] To leave people behind in the close communities that you grew up in, be it Berlin or Tokyo is nearly impossible. I can guarantee that this evening will stand out for them for a long time, perhaps forever. The first 24 hours you spend in a completely alien setting is like that. You are alone, completely, utterly alone where no one understands anything about your life, your culture, your home. You are here for a purpose, but in the initial moments you can’t quite get a grasp on what the purpose is. You feel like you are totally out of your element.

Sometimes those impressions come back to haunt you even when you are no longer a new transplant. In later years, even when you know how to pretend otherwise, you understand that you are not part of this world, you are an outsider.