Who are you?

We now interupt the normal happy narrative for a bit of a pondering about the meaning of life

About a week ago I was sitting in the main teachers room drinking tea and eating my dessert from lunch, when the third grade class teacher decided that she wanted to talk with me. I have exchanged very few words with most of the non-english teachers, because I have to keep up the perception that I know no Turkish at all. And most of the other teachers don't know English, or more likely, are too shy to use it. So anyways, she asked me where I was from, how old I was, the usual. And then she asked me a question that I was completely unprepaired to answer - who are you? I still remember it because I think it is the first time in 23 years that I have ever been directly asked that question.

I remember sitting in the orientation the critical language program had put together before we departed for Istanbul and two months of intensive language study in summer 2005. In one of the presentation the guy made this observation - in the american language the most frequently used verb (in questions at least) is to do. Do being most oftenly used in the question - what do you do? In every other language, he pointed out, the most frequently used verb is not to do, but to be. In other cultures, who you are is more important than what you do. Perhaps he was wrong, or I am remembering incorectly, but I think the gist of it is interesting

And so I sat there and could not think of a thing to say. I went to this university, studied this, now I live here, etc. But those are all things I do, or did. I was saved from having to answer as she went off to do something else and then the bell wrang. And I have yet to think of an answer. Who am I? I'd like to think I am not alone in not knowing.

On a related note, it has been brought to my attention that I may not know what I am doing with my life, be uncommited, and not be living in the real world. The first is true - I do not know what I want to do with the rest of my life. I know that I do not want to be a lab scientist, nor do I want to spend my life doing only data entry, nor do I want to be in the army, nor do I want to work for a huge corporation selling anything, nor...

I am not, however, uncommited. For the vast majority of my life, the opposite has been true. I have been completely overcommitted. When I say I will do something, I do it. And so I got good grades, did math club and science club and theater and wrote a thesis and had a job and etc. Now I do not have a contract, only a verbal committment that I will stay til June, and even though I have found private lessons pay better, I have not broken that committment. Instead, I am thinking of staying at the same school for next year.

On the subject of the real world. I am living over the ocean from my family, and am not being supported by them. I am living on money that I have earned while here. I am living in a different culture, in a different language that I am trying to learn, I managed to find a job, a flat, get a bank account, and find friends in a place on the other side of the ocean. I live in a flat with no central heating and no hot water in the kitchen. We have to boil water to wash the dishes. So I'm not sure how it gets any more real world than that. Perhaps because I love my job and the place I am living, perhaps because I am happy, then it is not the real world?

So who am I - I am daughter of Sarah and Tom, sister of Ian, adopted daughter of William, step-daughter of Shannon, step-sister of Christi and Cari, friend to many, lover of life, happy where I am.