この場所は私には合わないかもしれないと思った理由は、人々による、肌の色における他者への区別の顕著さにさみしさを感じたためだった。好んで六年暮らしたニューヨークは、出身や国籍、人種に関わらず、住民をニューヨーカーと呼ぶような場所だった。日本出身でアジア系だが混合文化を持つ私も例にもれず、ただのニューヨーカーであった。東京で、日本を単一民族、単一文化と捉えるがごとくの社会の中でどうも日本人になりきれなかった私は、何をしても自己責任のあの街で、随分と楽になっていた。
I wasn't sure if this was the right place for me. Maybe it was because I felt isolation from people's distinction between the races regarding to skin colors. New York, the place I liked and lived for 6 years, was where everybody who lives there is recognized as a New Yorker regardless of race, culture, place of origin, or skin color. I (from Japan, Asian, multicultural) was just a New Yorker but anything else. I was feeling so released in NY, from the small society of Tokyo, which made me feel like it almost forced me to accept "the homogeneous nation/ culture Japan." Me, who couldn't form myself to act as an ordinary Japanese, was so relaxed in the city where anything I do is just on my responsibility.
ただ単に生理前だったからなのかもしれないが、ディエブグへ越してきた一ヶ月後くらいに一度、人前で泣いた。息を吸って歩いているだけで見つめられ、「トゥバブ(白い肌の人)」と叫ばれることに疲れていた。キラキラしていて温かい人々のつながりの中にどっぷりと入りたいと願い、そしてそれは不可能なことのように感じられて、随分とさみしい気持ちになったのだ。「ああ、ここで産まれたかった」そんなふうに思ったのは、初めてのことだった。
I cried once in front of my friends about a month later I arrived to Diebougou. I don't know if it was just because I was in the sensitive period in my menstruation or if this thing really did mean a lot to me. But I was getting tired of being called "Tubabu" (someone with white skin) at everywhere I showed up. I was longing to become a part of the warm, strong, relationship between the people and felt that it seemed impossible to be and became lonely. "I wanted to have been born here." For the first time I thought like this.
今はもう、さみしくはない。あの頃は、私自身がディエブグをまるで自分とは別の存在のように捉えていたのだろうと思う。この街で生きていくうちに、意思に関わらず、自身がディエブグの大きな一部分になっていくことを実感する。私たちの街というフレーズが、心にしっくりとはまるようになってくる。対トゥバブではなく、対私個人という認識の上で接してくれる相手が増えてくるうちに、自分の居場所ができてくる。ここで産まれなかった私も、ここの人間になれたのだ。毎日がキラキラと温かいものにつつまれて、私自身もそんな存在になりたいなあと思うのだ。
Now, I'm not sad anymore. At that time I think I was taking Diebougou as something different from myself, as somewhere I do not belong to. As I live my everyday life here, regardless of our will, I feel that I'm integrating into the city, am becoming a part of Diebougou. The phrase, "OUR Diebougou", is coming to fit well to my heart. Having more and more people who treat me as an individual instead of Tubabu, I feel that I'm finding my places. I wasn't born here but could become someone of here. I'm loving my life.
