CALI, Colombia — When you’re 14, the only thing you want is to feel like you belong and, in my case, it took me a long time to find my place and my people.
Then, not long after I did, my father came home with the news that he was offered a job in Toronto and that he had accepted it.
The joy and excitement in my parents’ faces were palpable. They were finally getting a chance to achieve the future they had dreamed of for the last decade, not only for themselves but for their daughters.
So how could I, a girl just coming into her teens, tell my hard-working parents that I did not want it?
I had my life, my friends and my family, all in one place, in Cali.
When you grow up in Cali, you always hear the saying, “Cali es Cali, y lo demás es Loma,” which means “Cali is Cali, and the rest is hill.” And the boast is true.
Nothing compares to Cali, the warmth of not only the city, but its people, the sounds of salsa when you walk past bars on a weekend, the breeze you feel on your skin when you’re in Barrio San Antonio, the food you eat, which is not just food, but a memory.
How could a faraway land that I had never thought of before hope to compare?
I didn’t dwell much on the potential benefits of the move. All I knew was what I was losing, and what I would be taken away from.
Even so, at first, I was excited to be in Canada. The first month felt like a vacation. Everything felt new and it looked like a movie.
I remember everything. My first time seeing snow. My first time at Tim Hortons. And also the first time I felt completely lonely.
Canada was a different place, the people were different, the ambience was different, everything was different, which is a good thing. I just wasn’t aware of that yet.
My mental health was at its lowest during my first year living in Canada. As much as I tried to step out of my comfort zone, I never seemed to fit in a culture that was so different from my own. So I isolated myself and lived in a lonely bubble for a long time.
A full year and two months after living in Canada, I was introduced to therapy, something I never thought of before, but something I found was desperately needed.
My therapist, also a Latina immigrant, became my confidante. It felt so good to share my thoughts, feelings and problems with someone who understood.
When I’m in Canada, I make sure to share my Colombian heritage with my loved ones and friends who so eagerly listen to the memories of my life back there. PHOTO CREDIT/COURTESY OF SARAH HURTADO
It was 2018 when things started to change for me, I had found a group of friends who all shared the same experience, and together we created our own community, where we missed our first home while creating our second together.
I finally accepted Toronto as my second home, which although bigger and different, still had those little glimpses of the warmth of the place I grew up in, the one I carry in me forever.
My life in both places is completely different. When I’m in Colombia, I feel connected to my roots and culture. I take time to enrich myself with all of what my beautiful home country has to offer.
And when I’m in Canada, I make sure to share my Colombian heritage with my loved ones and friends who so eagerly listen to the memories of my life back there.
But I also make sure that I make new memories with them, so I never forget that one person can belong to more than just one place.