Anxious, scared, excited, curious were the whirlwind of emotions that rushed through senior Charanya Nair’s mind, as she felt the jolt of the Malaysian airlines airplane land onto the platform of O’Hare International Airport in Chicago. It was July 27, 2012, when Nair and her family arrived in Chicago from Seremban, Malaysia. There was nothing she could do, but to face the challenges that was awaiting for her in a country, where everything was foreign.
Facing challenges of moving to the U.S. from the very beginning, Nair describes it was a lot of work, from selling the house to packing everything was a hassle. After arriving in the U.S., it was even more difficult to adjust to the unfamiliar environment and language.
“We didn’t know anyone here,” she said. “We didn’t know the shops. We didn’t know where to get food. Certain things that you all called here was different from what we called it in Malaysia. We had to learn the vocabulary that was used here.”
Nair faced some challenges in becoming familiar with the language, while Americans had difficulty in pronouncing her name which was of Indian origin.
“People couldn’t pronounce my name, so I kept repeating it to them like ten times,” she said. “Some people would ask for a nickname like a shorter version of my name or an English name. So from Charanya they wanted to make it into Sharon or something like that, but I did not want to. I wanted to be myself. I didn’t want to become an American.”
Nair said she believes it is important to keep your identity as a foreigner and to remember your origin rather than blending in and establishing a new identity as an American. Remembering her origin, Charanya describes how she felt when leaving her friends in Malaysia.
“I was sad because I knew my friends for 16 years of my life and moving away from them was very difficult,” she said.
Leaving friends behind and making new ones is natural when moving. Nair describes how she made her first friend on her first day of attending Niles West.
“On the first day of school, I knew no one,” she said. “My brother was in eighth grade so he went to another school. At that time, even the people in my homeroom were so awkward. There was one girl that I met and her name was Janvi Patel. She was my first friend in the U.S.”
That same year, Nair made two really good friends. They describe how long they have known Nair for and how their friendship began.
“I have known Charanya for about three years, since sophomore year. I remember I met her in homeroom. We became friends on the first day,” senior Freyzl Ghandhi said.
“Well, it was sophomore year during lunch, I was drawing and she saw me drawing and then we just kind of started talking,” senior Riya Kamat said.
Even though Nair made friends during the course of her attending Niles West, she said it was difficult while adjusting to the school system here.
“In Malaysia we all had the same group of friends because all the classes were the same with the same people and then here we keep moving from class to class so you don’t see the same people in each class so it was hard,” she said.
Talking about the school system, Nair describes how the school system here is different from the school system in Malaysia.
“The school was very different,” she said. “In Malaysia we had to wear uniforms, here it’s just casual, so all of that was different. Culturally, there it was more conservative. For example after school you go home, study, and go for extra classes. Here it is more open. After school you have time to hang out with your friends and go out.”
Soon Nair will be leaving the U.S. and headed off to Scotland to attend University of Aberdeen where she will be majoring in Genetics. She is going to experience the challenges of fitting in culturally and socially all over again; however, she said with some confidence she will gradually overcome those challenges while being proud to establish her identity as a foreigner once again.
