poem: First and second generation immigrants

I hold my roots

While I shed my leaves.

Itry to keep my face in place.

...

But sometimes it goes,

And my true colour shows.

At home I am foreign

In school I am foreign.

...

What is there, is what I see,

I can only be ... me!

.

Nadani Chandramohan

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What is the author trying to convey ? / Discuss and / or write about her feelings about coming from two cultures. / Why does she feel foreing everywhere ? / How successful is she in making her feelings clear ?

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-two cultures = people from two cultures are "between the chairs" -> don´t feel at home in one country

-consider themselves as foreigners -> they are considered as foreigners

-she = tree

-the roots (parents home country) are often not visible, out they are indispensable for the tree´s life

-leaves = visible, can fall down, change their colour

-she says that although she tries to keep up her image (adapt to the British way of life) sometimes her "true colour" shows -> so people only rarely recognize her for who she really is -> she tries to conceal her cultural identity / her ethnicity (colour)

-she can neither identify with her schoolmates nor with her family

-> she feels foreign and pretends to be somebody she is not (she has two different personas)

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her message:

-> she wants to be accepted and free. She demands freedom from the conflicting pressures she is exposed to and wants to be herself