To be an expat is to always feel slightly on the fringe of things. It is to perpetually be a little lost, to live with the nagging feeling that your life is happening elsewhere. It is to no longer really belong anywhere; to lose the ability to say, with total assuredness, This is my home.

With language out of reach, it’s hard not to feel as if I’m in a dream, or that I’ve crossed over to another world.