Nationality is a pretty big part of a person's identity and it plays an even more significant role when you aren't living in your home country. Suddenly, it becomes a defining personality trait, if not THE most defining trait about who you are and what makes you different from those around you. I remember that in my first day of Swedish classes, I learned how to say, "Thank you," "My name is Camille," and "I am American." In a classroom full of immigrants from all over the world, taking turns introducing ourselves by announcing our respective nationalities was a way to say the most about who we were in the fewest words possible.
The more fluent I became in Swedish, the harder it was for people to know right away that I was American...obviously. But a funny thing started happening. For some reason, I was constantly taken for an Eastern European. It happened so often in fact, that it became a running joke between me and Anna whenever we would go out and meet new people. After 15 minutes or so of talking with strangers (which is about the time they would start to notice something fishy about my Swedish), they would inevitably ask me where I was from. Then, I would always ask them to guess. Anna and I would hold our breath in anticipation of the answer we knew was coming. The person, without fail, would guess that I was either Finnish, Polish or Russian, and every time we would laugh in their face. Typically this lead to confusion on their part as to what was so funny, and an explanation on my part as to how Swedes always guessed wrong.
Anna was always sweet in saying that because I don't have an American accent when I speak Swedish, it really throws people off. They have trouble placing me and turn to the super blond hair for help. I'm learning now, however, that my appearance may have had more to do with it than the language. Two times in the past three days, I have been asked if I was Russian. The first time was by an Indian man working a jewelry booth in Greenwich Village, who, after hearing Klas and I speak Swedish asked me, "You Russian, no??" To which I answered, "Nope, I'm Swedish." The second time was at Subway when the guy making my sandwich stopped, smiled, and said something I could not understand. Vladimir, as I saw was his name on his name tag, saw the utter confusion on my face and said in a thick Russian accent, "Zorry, I shot you was Rush-in. Where you from?...Pol-land?" I broke into laughter and this time told the truth, "Nope, I'm American."
I've gone through different stages when it comes to my feelings about my own national identity. There have been times when I have been very proud to proclaim my American-ness in a room full of Europeans and there have been other times when I would rather avoid the subject. No matter what the reason may be for me wanting to avoid the topic, I would NEVER deny that I am American outright. It is not something I have ever been ashamed of, but is also something I would never want to define me 100%. I think I'd rather keep people guessing because it's a pretty fun game. I just need to learn some Russian and dye my hair brown and then people will be really confused.
btw...The title to this post says "I am Russian" in Russian...I think. Contrary to popular belief, I have no clue how to pronounce it.
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