Adaptation

Hey, have you seen the movie “Adaptation”? It’s a piece of art from Charlie Kaufman. I watched a couple of his movies recently. You know why? Well, I broke my big toe in a bike accident two weeks ago (how typically Dutch!) and I couldn’t walk much. So simply, I had to stay home and took my chance to watch some of the movies I always wanted to see. Anyways, at some point in the movie, two of the main characters discuss what adaptation is referring to plants and Susan Orlean who is a writer interprets it for people:
John Laroche: You know why I like plants?
Susan Orlean: Nuh uh.
John Laroche: Because they're so mutable. Adaptation is a profound process. Means you figure out how to thrive in the world.
Susan Orlean: Yeah but it's easier for plants. I mean they have no memory. They just move on to whatever's next. With a person though, adapting almost shameful. It's like running away.
For a person who is studying and discussing migration mostly in relation to terms like integration, cohesion, adaptation or assimilation of immigrants, these a few lines say a lot and make one think. But the funny thing is, now as an international student; this discussion applies to me as well. I have two homes, two mobile phones, two bankcards and two identity cards.. Every time I’m moving between Utrecht and Istanbul, it takes time for me to get used/adapt to one of my lives. When I’m in Utrecht I feel that I figure out how to thrive in that world but when I’m in Istanbul it’s more like feeling a bit sad about having the need to re-adapt… The good part is that, it takes so little time that this feeling passes away after some time and you just enjoy being back with family & friends. That is actually the case now. I’m back in Istanbul for the holidays. So I’ll keep this blog short, cause I’ve got people waiting for me in the living room… But I’ll be back soon with an additional blog… So long till then… PS: If you are interested in this dual life and how immigrants experience this, I would suggest you to read Abdelmalek Sayad, who has brought up a new perspective to migration studies by writing actually about the case of the Algerian immigrants in France.