Postcards from Milano 01
On experiencing the familiar, yet unknown
09/14/2023
I’m currently sitting on the most lavish airplane seat with ample leg room and hundreds of hours of entertainment at my fingertips— yes, I’m referring to the Basic Economy seating on United Airlines. Jokes aside, as an average sized human, I’m quite comfortable. If I arrive at my destination safely, I would totally recommend.
Anyway, I now sit on this eight-hour flight forced away from all the noise of the world with the perfect atmosphere to process my thoughts and realign myself.
Frustration and stress have been recurring feelings in the past few months. With last minute preparations for Hack the North, planning our family trip, getting everything ready to move abroad, working through a content-heavy semester and prioritizing many small commitments throughout the term as I put a lot of effort into relationships, celebrations and other events. Although sleep was definitely sacrificed, I was also mentally prepared for this, calling it my “overcommitment era.” At the end of the day, I knew it was going to take a toll on me. As stressful as it was though, these were some of the best few months I’ve lived through—I strengthened old and new relationships, took steps that made me feel more confident in making decisions for myself, made an intentional effort to dedicate more of my time into creative aspects I’ve been putting off for so long and most importantly, I just had a lot of fun.
It’s been exactly two weeks since I left home and moved to Italy for an exchange semester and I’m now on my way back to good ol’ Canada for the final execution of Hack the North, a weekend long hackathon I’ve been helping organize for months. It’s been about a week since my family left Italy to return to their everyday lives. Yet, amidst the absolute chaos I’ve encountered throughout these past few months, I’m still looking forward to seeing familiar faces and spaces again.
But first, let’s do a little recap and see how we got here.
Rewinding
At the beginning of 2023, I accepted an exchange opportunity to study at one of the biggest engineering universities in Europe for six months. All I’ve ever wanted was to “travel the world” but even leading up to the last few days in Canada, I couldn’t wrap my head around the fact that I’d be living in another continent, across the Atlantic Ocean where English is not the first language, all by myself at only 20 years old. Ten-year-old Binal obsessed with globes would be peeing her pants seeing me now (to be clear, fifth grade Binal would not actually pee her pants, ever).
I arrived in Milan with my family at the beginning of September. After my summer study term ended, preparations for planning this family trip and everything that was left to do for my move across the ocean were in full force. This was our first ever family trip at this scale and everyone’s first time in Europe. After a couple years of big changes in our relationship with ourselves and one another, as well as the stresses of everyday life, a change of environment is what we all needed for a bit and this was the perfect excuse to make that happen. As the person in charge of all the planning and execution, I wanted to make sure this trip would be as worthwhile as possible for everyone.
There was no room to “go with the flow” in my eyes considering our family dynamic. Not having a rigid plan to deal with all the things that could go wrong that I could think of caused anxiety, while coming up with this plan caused a great deal of stress – it would be a lose-lose situation either way, so I chose to go with the latter! Spoiler alert though, no matter the seven iterations of itineraries, restaurant options, budget plans, and whatever else, most things still did not go accordingly to plan (yay!). From pushing everything two days back in Milan to losing my credit card on the train back from Lake Como to being traumatized seeing a woman get slapped for trying to steal a purse in Venice to my sim getting locked in Cinque Terre to my landlady getting confused and asking for double the rent—something unpredictable ended up happening practically every day which truly tested my patience.
Do I regret spending that time researching and planning beforehand? No, not really. It made making decisions on how to restructure our day easier as things came up last minute. Was it worth the tremendous stress and frustration leading up to and sometimes during travelling? Not sure, but it happened, so we’re going to live, love, laugh!
In general, everything ended up working out well in the end. Our travel dynamic as a family was surprisingly good and we covered quite a lot of Italy in a short time with no regrets about leaving a place sooner than we would’ve wanted to. It was the perfect way to say goodbye to my family for a little while and make many memories together that we could look back on forever. The best part about it was seeing my parents tapping into their inner child during the trip and moving away from constantly being amid survival mode in their everyday lives. Although I felt a little burdened with everyone relying on me the entire time, seeing them take pictures, make jokes, dip their toes in the water, and not feel the constant stress of life for a bit made this experience very worthwhile to me. I want nothing more than for them to experience the fruit of their labour and do things for themselves more often.
Oh, and my sister told me she was very proud of me for taking the step to go on this adventure by myself. Considering my family was primarily focused on how much they’ll miss me (who can blame them, of course), her words meant a lot to me.
First Impressions
Coming to Italy, I’m not sure what I was expecting. I wanted to experience the unknown without any presumptions, so I told myself to not have any expectations. Despite this, I felt strangely emotional whenever I had a chance to reflect while travelling with my family during the first week of being in Milan. There was lots of anxiety for the future, bittersweet feelings and not as much excitement as I anticipated, especially as my time with my family quickly came to an end and the door to complete independence came closer.
When we got to a more residential area of Milan where my apartment is located, we were quite taken aback by its resemblance to the places my parents grew up in India. Recalling similar roads, marketplaces, apartment structures, driving styles and more. It was incredibly strange for Italy, a place I dreamt of all my life, to feel so familiar to the place we abandoned for a better life thirteen years ago.
With all the warnings about burglary, I also felt a little scared of the environment I was going to live in. I clench my belongings tightly every time I leave my house. I need to unlock three doors to enter my apartment. I can’t keep my window open at night no matter the humidity in case someone climbs through. I don’t quite understand the extent of these burglaries in everyday life yet, but I feel like an easy target. Either way, I’m slowly learning that if you’re smart about your actions in this lifestyle, you should be okay. And through small everyday interactions, my faith in humanity is slowly being restored. The other day someone tapped me on the bus to warn me about where I had placed my phone as it was in easy reach to be stolen. Another day, the man at the newsstand ran to catch up to me because I forgot the bus tickets I just bought at the stand. I’m reminding myself that I can’t judge a place simply based on one aspect. It’s a beloved home to almost 60 million people for a reason. My goal is to figure out what are the things that make it so special.
At this point, I haven’t quite built a connection to the country or community. It’s a relatively pretty city, but I’m not “in love” with it and there isn’t a big force motivating me to explore. The language barrier is also quite prevalent making it harder than to navigate and connect with others than expected, but it’s not impossible.
I just finished orientation week and had my first day of school. I’m feeling more like an outlier than I thought I would. Even amongst the exchange students, I’m feeling a bit like a minority being one of the small handful of people from North America and an even smaller, if not only person of Indian/Punjabi decent from North America. I haven’t quite felt this way since I came to Canada— even then, I don’t remember those feelings anymore. It feels like people have formed their groups while I don’t have the urge to make the effort to truly connect with anyone yet. I’ve been feeling awkward navigating my way around campus, and not completely inclined to build relationships and be social as often as others. This invoked a lot of doubt initially. Will this really feel like home at a point? Was this a mistake? Did I just take negative steps in life? Will I ever fit in?
I guess I’ve been a little stumped navigating why I’m feeling what I’m feeling. After reading countless blog posts and scrolling through dozens of reels of Italian paradise, I’m confused as to why my first words when people ask “How’s Italy” aren’t “Italy is absolutely beautiful,” or “I can’t wait to spend my next few months here.” I feel like I’m doing something wrong. Sometimes I question if I’ve made a mistake when I can’t provide an incredibly meaningful answer when asked why I chose Italy. I’ve forgotten why I wanted to specifically be here and what I’m expecting to gain from this experience. As someone who goes through more than six stages of “Why” when she’s making any decision and someone who holds self-awareness as a core value, I’m a little embarrassed to admit this. I don’t want to discredit this country in any way, nor do I expect this place to feel like home in a couple weeks. I know it’s going to take time to integrate into the community and have it grow on me. But, I’m at a point where I feel quite lost in so many ways and it gets frustrating to be in the middle of chaos for so long. I know I’m making a lot of progress towards my goal of trusting myself more this year, yet I keep feeling like I’m threading water in the middle of nowhere sometimes. It feels like I’m not getting any closer to figuring out who I want to be, what I want to do next and how I want to do it.
To combat these feelings, I’m reminding myself that I encountered similar feelings when I went to UBC for a month 4 years ago surrounded by people I’ve never met. I felt extremely out of place at first, but it ended up being an unforgettable summer. Time is what builds the connection I’m looking for, so I need to learn to trust the process again because there is going to be learning no matter what. I don’t have to “force myself to like it”, but I should put in the effort to make the most out of things I don’t love (yet) or take the initiative to turn them into something I’m more satisfied with/appealed by.
I’m reminding myself that these past few months have been extremely chaotic. I desire downtime the most right now so I can have the space to finally process all these feelings I’ve been pushing off. I’m reminding myself that relationships take time and that it’s too soon to give up on those connections. With these affirmations, I don’t feel as disappointed in myself for feeling this way.
Looking ahead
I cannot tell you how good it feels to finally do this mind dump. By the time I’m finishing this reflection, I’m making my way back to Milan in the same lavish seats. Having processed all these feelings and finishing Hack the North, I’m feeling ready to finally check out of the last term and feel more present in this new and exciting next chapter. I’m going into it expecting the unexpected, while putting in the effort to make the most out of this phase of my life. There’s tons to do as always, but I’m looking forward to settling into a new routine, planning more adventures, documenting my experiences, looking for my next job, learning to be more okay with the uncontrollable, finding a sense of belonging, and doing lots and lots of people watching.
Conclusion
Growing in university feels like things I’ve romanticized my entire life keep becoming reality so suddenly. It always takes me a minute to process how life turned out this way every time I take a step back. Something I should do more often though is remind myself that although I am very privileged both financially and with the incredible people around me, these experiences didn’t solely come from luck. I played a big role in bringing my current life into fruition, something I find I often forget. It took countless difficult conversations, steps outside my comfort zone and a heck of a lot of trusting myself. As more feelings of fear, anxiety, and imposter syndrome from this new adventure arise, I want to remind myself that if I could do take on these challenges so far, I can do it again. So, keep trusting yourself Binal, you’re doing great.
Here’s to the next six months. Until next time🫡
♡ Binal