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"In Maryam’s experience, it used to be the wives who adapted more quickly. Almost overnight they had decoded the native customs, mastered the ins and outs of supermarkets and car pools, grown confident and assertive while their husbands, buried in work, confined their English to medical terms or the vocabulary of seminar rooms."
This is one my favorite quotes from the novel. When I first read Digging to America, these lines immediately brought the members of spouses&Partners@mit to mind, and it made me want to share the novel with you! I hope you are enjoying it so far.
Does the quote ring true for you?
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I think a wife has to be that way, has to figure out how everything works in the new country, although it's not so easy to feel belonging because you're sort of by yourself, while your husband is in an environment where he can feel he belongs as he shares something with the people surrounding him, could be a job, or studies. She had to make headway through life by herself and keep the household afloat. Now we can assure behind every man, there's a great woman! :)
ReplyDeleteCarla, I agree that it's harder for the wives to find a place where they belong. They have to invent a home for themselves from scratch, whereas if they have moved for the husband's job, his place is already set up for him. I think it can be interesting for a couple when the husband and wife adapt to separate and different parts of the new culture. Maybe back in their home country, they both easily moved between the work/family/social circles, but now their roles and expertise are more strictly defined (only one knows how things work in the office and the other know how things work at their children's school). I can imagine that could put stress on a couple and would take some getting used it.
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