Moving to London

Left: Abuelo and Abuela in Manilla in the 1950s, Right: Mum and an assortment of (now) uncles and aunts in 1963

Forty-eight years ago you sailed into Sydney and leaned against the railing of the ship 

Thinking of children who weren’t even born yet

All the children with you would one day be grown-ups and married with children of their own

Could you have imagined me, your granddaughter, named after you

Who when she went to Spain for the first time felt strangely at home

Despite the language barrier 

Who longed her whole life to be European, to speak Spanish, who thrilled and delighted at finally getting a Spanish passport 

How would you feel knowing your nieta is not an out and proud Australian

That I cringe at our accents and our inability to speak more than one language 

That I find Australian culture frustrating

That I can’t stand that our national day of pride is a day commemorating a bloody battle thousands of miles away 

That I cannot connect with Australian history because it is so contested 

A few months ago I sailed into Sydney myself

I got up at 5am to watch the lights of Sydney Harbour come into view

And I thought of you leaning against the railing of the Iberia

Could you have imagined as you sailed past Nielsen Park or Point Piper or Taronga Zoo that these would be the sites of my childhood?

Strange to think that the Opera House wasn’t even finished yet 

Could you have imagined me singing in the Opera House?! Or having my year 10 formal at the Zoo overlooking the giraffes looking out to the Harbour? 

Could you have imagined that I would grow up among the eucalyptus and the smell of the Australian bush

And yet never feel at home in it

To feel frustrated every time someone asks “but don’t you feel so lucky?”

In two months, I’m leaving this place

To go to the land where your brothers live

And then to London to seek my own life and put down my own roots

Where I will be in forty-eight years time? 

And what stories will have played out between my arrival at Heathrow and sitting down to reflect on it all?

Abuelo, forty-eight years ago you sailed to Sydney

To a land that for you was entirely sight unseen 

No internet to do your research

No crystal ball to let you know that it was all going to be ok, that you were making the right decision

Our wanderings are not over yet

We are still shifting in time and space 

But wherever we go, there we are

And we have our stories and our ancestors to guide the way