At the airport, everything feels bright and possible. Signs promise opportunity, voices rush past in accents you’ve only heard on television, and the air smells like movement—coffee, metal, ambition. You arrive carrying a suitcase and a story about who you are. You believe the country will add to it, not subtract from it.
At first, the loss is slight. You lose your accent, sanding it down word by word so people don’t ask you to repeat yourself. You lose the foods that once defined comfort, replacing them with convenience. You lose the habit of looking strangers in the eye because here, everyone is in a hurry.
Then you lose time. Days become shifts, weeks become bills, and years pass quietly while you’re busy surviving. You stop calling home as often, not because you don’t care, but because explaining your life has become complicated. You lose celebrations that once marked seasons. Holidays shrink into single days off, if you’re lucky.
You also lose certainty. Back home, you knew where you belonged. Here, you are constantly proving yourself—your worth, your legality, your pronunciation, your patience. Success is dangled like a reward, but it comes with conditions. You learn to measure yourself by productivity rather than presence.
Yet, something remains.
You gain resilience shaped by loneliness. You gain courage from starting over again and again. You gain a wider view of the world and a sharper understanding of yourself. What you lose teaches you what matters. What survives becomes your core.
When you come to the USA, you lose pieces of who you were. But if you’re careful, if you remember, you don’t lose who you are.
and then 