Boulogne-Billancourt, as seen from the Sein. - Photo by Giles Rambault, Flickr

Where do I belong and do I belong anywhere?” That is the question. It’s a question that I have asked myself since my arrival in Vancouver nine years ago and has preoccupied me significantly at times. Probably because it is very difficult and complicated to answer.

I was born in Levallois-Perret, a suburb of Paris, and spent my first eleven years in Boulogne-Billancourt, another suburb of Paris. However, I never obtained a French passport for the good and simple reason that France does not give French citizenship automatically to those born on its territory. According to the paolitical authorities of this world, since my parents were Canadian, I was also.

Although it’s true that, thanks to my parents, I spoke fluent English and was daily immersed in a family environment that wasn’t French, it would have nevertheless been much more logical to consider me as French.

In everything, I considered myself as such. The History of France that I learnt at school was not the History of a people amongst whom I was a guest. Indeed, it was the History of my country, my homeland.

The culture that surrounded me permeated my way of thinking and living. I lived and anticipated a French life. I saw extending before me a path going through collège and lycée, leading to an adult life of which I knew very little, save that it would preferably take place in my native country.

But, my parents desiring to return to Vancouver, the city of their own childhood, to be closer to their ageing parents, I had to leave France in 2003. This move completely turned my world upside down. I felt uprooted due to this separation from my country that had been forced on me. I thought constantly about the friends I had left behind as well as almost all those people that had formed the world of my childhood. The worst thing was to know that they were getting along fine without me, that things would change without my being there to experience it.

At the same time, I kept making a continuous comparison between Paris and Boulogne-Billancourt on one hand, and Vancouver on the other. The city that many consider one of the best in the world suffered, in my eyes at least, by this comparison. I lamented the lack of history of Vancouver and its smallness relative to the French capital.

Its charms, its beaches and mountains, were so many things that I was insensitive to. At the first chance I planned to return to France. My heart was torn.

Nevertheless, over seven years spent living in Vancouver, the hurt obviously attenuated itself, perhaps even disappeared. If it hadn’t done so, my life would have been quite difficult. I felt more and more happy and even started to feel Canadian. I thought less and less about the existence I had left behind and in the end felt very little feeling of loss. The situation has change a bit since then, starting in 2010.

I have gone back to France twice since I moved, for summer holidays in 2006 and 2010. The first time, I immediately felt back home. Hearing French spoken around me elated me, as well as speaking French all day long with the childhood friends with which we were staying. The reintegration was quick. However, in 2010 it was less so, because although I had continued to maintain my French thanks to pursuing my education in French Immersion, I had neglected all other contact with my French side. Even as regards the language, I was less sure of myself orally than I would have wanted, particularly in everyday life.

As a result, as soon as I got back to Vancouver, I decided to reconnect with the French side of my identity. That’s why I now speak French at home, follow French news and listen to French music.

This reconnection has had two effects. On the one hand, I realized that I still had, without knowing it, a hole that moving here left me, that reconnecting with my French side has allowed me to fill. So, I feel happier and more whole now. Nonetheless, the second effect has been to give me again a sense of not really being at home in Vancouver, and therefore the desire to return to France, at least to see whether I feel more at home in Paris or Vancouver. What I’m scared of is that I might not really feel at home anywhere. That’s why, for the moment, the answer to give to the question I started this piece by is so unsure.