I will never forget the day when I received the email that I have been waiting for. I can still recall exactly how I felt seeing that email sitting in my inbox. I’ve browsed through it, trying to get the gist of the message as quickly as possible, like a little kid ripping off the wrapper of Santa’s gift. I’ve read through it again to make sure that I got the message right. The word ‘congratulations’ was enough confirmation that the content of the email is something to celebrate about. It was indeed true… I got the job that I applied for internally, and it has been our passport to Australia!!
I felt happy and elated!! I was pleased and mighty proud of myself for such an achievement in my career. Not everyone is given such an opportunity. For me, it is an affirmation that dedication to your craft and continuous quest for excellence pay off. But it didn’t take long before that big smile on my face faded away. The few minutes of jubilation was eaten up by so much fear – fear of giving up the comfort of home and family for something unknown.
Since Orly and I got married, we have considered migrating to another country, but it was always half-hearted. We had our share of disappointments that sometimes lead up to anger, not specifically caused by a particular person or somebody in power, but generally in the system that runs the country. It was and it still is frustrating to see how the wrong becomes the norm.
We are deeply saddened because we believe that we, as a nation, deserve something better. There has been growing disappointments in our hearts because despite the efforts we exert to do our own share, we feel so powerless against the magnitude of problems in the society. It just feels impossible for a substantial change to happen in our lifetime… change that we hope for, not mainly for ourselves, but more for our kids.
We have, for so many times tried to contradict these negative feelings and exerted much effort to provide the best life possible for our kids – in our homeland. We have lured ourselves to believe that the adjustments that we make on a daily basis and the silent acceptance of our circumstances are enough to hide the glaring imperfections. The deep attachment that we have with our love ones is the strongest force that has kept us from moving away for so long.
Five years after taking that bold move to leave the country to start something new and search for something better, homesickness still brings us tears. I get choked up every time I think about our ageing parents and not being beside them as often as we want to. It sucks being so far from family and friends when they need you to comfort or console them, or even to celebrate small and big successes with them. We know the privileges of the choice that we made. We know what is better in this part of the globe. We also know what we are missing from home. But the sad reality is, for now, the choice is still clear. We still believe that the sacrifices that we make for our children now is still the better option for them.
Two weeks ago, we were naturalised as Australian citizens. It was a conscious decision that we had pursued to commit to Australia and to its people, accepting the responsibilities and the privileges of citizenship. For me personally, it is more of formalising my gratitude to this nation who has opened its arms to us, who has provided us hope and who has been offering us a wide spectrum of options today and into the future. We are enjoying freedom to its truest form that we were not able to enjoy back home. Being called an Australian solidifies our affinity to this land which we now call our second home. Does it eliminate that odd feeling of being second class citizens? No. Does it protect us from racism or from people who judge us based on the colour of our skin? Definitely not. But these are the sad realities that comes with giving up one’s comfort zone. Or should I say, these are facts of life because even within our own backyard, there is the glaring oppression where the rich and the powerful prevails. We just have to constantly strive and prove our worth, not to any person or nation, but to God, and everything will fall in its place.
A number of people congratulated us for this big milestone in our lives, and so we acknowledge and say thank you. Deep in our hearts, we know that a part of us rejoices while the other half is dying while we were verbalising our allegiance to a different flag. We will forever be grateful to Australia, but our blood and our roots will only know one homeland. We are looking for a lot of change to happen in the system in the Philippines, and we will all look forward to that time when each Filipino can feel safe and free and respected in our motherland. It might not be something that we can enjoy in our lifetime, but we will continue to pray and hope for these changes to happen as a Filipino. In the coming months, we are looking forward to regain our Filipino citizenship through the dual-citizenship process. Not for anything else, but as a symbol of respect to our roots and our commitment to contribute in our own little, remote way of bringing hope to our motherland.
nabasa ko na ^_^
So honest and touching. SO YOU!