ANYTHING TO DECLARE? VOL. 02
I felt my hands get clammy as soon as I left my apartment, the package tucked neatly under my arm. Through numerous trials and errors, I’d learned how to carry the box just so to allow my palms access to my jeans for the needed periodical dry-off. This happened every single time. Hours before I’d depart, my heartbeat would quicken while my pride would fire off a foreboding, anxiety-laced fear to my brain. It used to be just an errand, an easy stop on the way home. It never used to induce this silent, furtive terror. It, I’m somewhat embarrassed to say, is the post office.
Back home in California, the post office and I understood each other. In fact, the worst thing about it was the inconvenient operating hours. All that changed with my legal place of residence. When it became the posthus (or la poste during a year in France) instead of the post office. That’s when anything involving sending and receiving mail became a light form of psychological torture.
That might seem like hyperbole, but we tend to skew reality when fear is involved. Walking with my packages to the simple building — sometimes tucked away in a deceptively friendly corner of an innocuous grocery store — the disquiet of my mind grew from a low rumble to a steady buzz trailed by the mocking echo of my pending ineptitude. I knew one of two things would occur: 1) I would make a mistake or 2) I would have to ask for help. Neither of these things is usually an issue for me, but in this foreign setting, it gets complicated. If there is one thing the post office means, it’s “I live here.” As an immigrant, if there is one thing I’m trying to prove day in and day out to both passers-by and myself, it’s “I live here.”
Perhaps you’re thinking, “It’s just the mail.” But it is exactly the perceived simplicity that tormented me. Other areas that commonly conjure fear are actually much more welcoming to strangers. A train station, for instance, is by its very nature well-versed in interactions with outsiders — it has maps, check-in points, prepared staff, and often directions in multiple languages with imagery. For fellow travelers, an anxious foreigner with a furrowed brow can represent a straight shot to a good deed. Police stations and immigration offices are like that as well. They’re imposing, yes, but accessible and serve to outline rules for the uninitiated or unaware.
A post office, by contrast, is insular. It’s like a modern home TV setup — everyone has one and they all do the same thing, but if your neighbor came over, you’d likely have to instruct them as to the specific order of buttons to press to get a picture. Oh, they want sound, too? The lesson might now extend to additional remotes. The way countries handle their mail is similar. Post offices look alike in the macro view, but there are micro internal differences that can throw the whole thing off. A form to fill out here that isn’t required there, for instance, can make you spend five minutes feeling dumb while looking for a piece of paper that doesn’t exist. Or a box that you definitely need to check there isn’t required here, and now you’re worried that your father will have to spend $200 to accept some trash Christmas novelty socks. Or the ins and outs of what constitutes “domestic” when living in the international EU. The postal service may accommodate goods from all over the world, but not people. Even the procedure to take a number to be served in Denmark features a taunting, triangular little piece of paper sticking out from a simple machine like the tongue of a schoolyard bully. It’s unforgiving.
The post office, that federal hostel for mail, became a battleground for my own internal validation. That’s the honest truth. It was the arena in which I could dispel the doubt I feared in others. Here, I could quell any notions of my being an imposter. I could display my adaptive capability with an ease so great it would go unnoticed. And yet, in this realm of redemptive possibility, I failed. I constantly felt ill-prepared and unconfident — suddenly bereft of the language needed to explain my needs clearly and succinctly. I couldn’t serve as my own resource. How pathetic to not even be able to get a piece of mail from here to there! The thought of not being able to properly perform such a basic task made me feel wobbly inside. Insecure in my footing. An interloper extraordinaire. I hated this feeling because I knew it was, in some ways, true. A disappointing reminder that I could find ways to fit in, but I didn’t belong.
Perhaps you’re wondering why I didn’t just ask for assistance from people who already knew I was foreign. It’s a good question, a logical question. I did start asking friends if they needed to go to the post office, then offer to accompany them. This improved things, but for some inexplicable and asinine reason (read: pride), it felt like cheating. Even thinking about seeking help was in direct opposition to my goal of proving my belonging. I would rather stand there alone for extended periods of time, fooling myself into thinking I was unnoticed, trying to figure it all out from afar using my powers of observation and telescopic eavesdropping. It rarely worked. Anxiety would creep in and proclaim that I would never truly be home in this place, that I was foolish for trying, and that everyone around me could clearly see now that I didn’t “have what it takes.” I imagined them all in a group text with the Minister of Immigration, the emojis surely not favorable. 💩 👾
Standing there, disrupting the natural order of their post office, I would become extremely aware of the confusion I caused both patrons and staff. I think of it often when I see a group violating the expected etiquette at a restaurant or someone queuing improperly at the grocery store. I wonder if they have an accent and if they hesitate to speak because it would reveal their otherness. I wonder if my offering to help will be a relief or a catalyst for an internal tornado. I wonder how many other people think they must simply be stupid, as I know many people thought I was stupid. They failed to register my behavior as my stubborn dedication to learning on my own. I wonder if you, dear reader, think this as well when you see an adult awkwardly taking up space and poorly masking their confusion in a place you consider to be habitual. I wonder what you’ll think next time.
In writing this, I’m reminded of a memory. I honestly had forgotten it until just now. In 2017, I found myself in Goa and an older Indian gentleman came up to me off the bench where he was sitting surrounded by his belongings. He had just witnessed two different sets of East Asian tourists ask to take photos with me because I was Black. We laughed about it and chatted for a while before he asked where I lived. “Denmark,” I told him. “Ah! I know only one Danish word: frimærke,” he said. Stamp. I asked him why he knew such a random word. “I met a Danish man traveling many years ago,” he replied. “I asked him for a stamp so I could write him a letter. Then I asked him how to say it. I’ve always found foreign people take me more seriously when I know the word for stamp.”
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This is the second of a 12-part mini-series exploring my experience with immigration. Read the first installment below and sign up to get the rest of the volumes delivered directly to your inbox here.