D is for...

Diversity. It is something that continues to strike me, as the honeymoon phase of my stay draws to a close. I've already mentioned the huge variety of food available in our area, and all of those restaurants have chefs and other staff members from that particular country so the food is as authentic as it can get outside of the country of origin. We went for Thai recently and if I'd closed my eyes I could have been in Thailand, the tastes and aromas were that perfect.

So I did some research, and here's what I found on 'Rascismnoway': "Although the majority of the population are Australian born, more than 75% of Australians identified with an ancestry other than Australian in the 2011 Census. About 2% of Australians come from Indigenous backgrounds and about 43% have at least one parent who has born overseas. 30% of the population were born in another country. Of the overseas born, the major countries of birth are England, New Zealand and China. About 8.5% of Australians were born in non-English speaking countries. In all, Australians come from over 200 birthplaces."

So the interesting part of the journey for me lately has been around my own foreignness. This is something I have never questioned before, not really. I was horrified at the xenophobic attacks in South Africa and made friends with actors and models who were from other parts of the world and making a home in South Africa. I always found the idea of living in a foreign country romantic, and would try to imagine if I could live in the places I visited for my holidays. But like trying something on without actually buying it, I could dream up all the perfect circumstances of my life there without living it, and not worry about the uncomfortable parts or if my bum would wobble in it.

The reality is I get surprised by my foreignness. On the surface I don't look like I'm not from here, and so it's when I open my mouth that I realise I'm different. And not all the time either. I'm used to sounding different to DocCoffee, but when I'm surrounded by Aussie accents in a group or out somewhere and I start to speak, I hear my accent like nails on a chalkboard. I almost visibly wince. Just last week I asked a question in a theatre panel discussion and needed to speak into a microphone to be heard by the room. I got so distracted by the sound of my voice that I don't think I made much sense.

I've also been looking at arts funding and sponsorship for some ideas I have, and have become paralysed when I wonder if I'm eligible, being, you know, not Australian. And so it has made me relook at the people in my life back home who were foreign. Shadrack, the Zambian caretaker at my building who was arrested and thrown into Pollsmoor because a neighbour had a problem with him. Anne, a German actress who I often connected with at castings and her struggle with sickly and aging parents back home. There were others too. I never understood how hard it is to be foreign. And it's not a surface thing. Here I have access to everything the Australians do: healthcare, work etc. But it's there, like a birthmark. And it's not like a single person has made me feel like less because of it. It's coming from me. I feel really different for the first time in my life. And how crazy wonderful to be 37 and have never truly experienced otherness. It throws my life back home into huge perspective, how good and easy I had it as an artist and a white, middle-class woman, despite the sometimes hideous realities of life all around me there. I guess it will be something I will grapple with for some time to come, so here's to embracing my foreignness, and making it work for me.