Sorry

My mother came in France in 1994. She lived in a poor village in Algeria, with little food and sisters and brothers to care for. She wanted a new life and her goal was to find a plane ticket to come to a richer country, to a country she believed in. So, thanks to loans made to her family and an ambitious will, she succeeded in finding her plane ticket.

She met my father the same year, they married and got my sister. Money was just enough to meet the needs but when I came, it was not enough anymore. My parents haven’t done long studies so few jobs were available, moreover French was not very well-mastered especially for my mom. My father came in France at 1 so he learned French early but my mom learned French by watching movies and listening to French songs. She finally got a job as a waitress.

She really missed her family but when she left Algeria it created a gap between her and those who stayed. People watched us with big eyes because we spoke a different language, have different manners or maybe because of our way of thinking.

There used to be a time where we couldn’t feel home in either of these countries, we were regarded as Algerian in France and as French in Algeria but now we accept ourselves and we feel half-French and half-Algerian.