Transatlantic Sister Bonds

My younger sister is my only sibling. She is my baby, the one I named and the one with whom I shared a room for 11 years. Nobody knows me better than my sister and at her scarce 15 years of age, she advises me with more wisdom and confidence than any other person. We are so different. I admire her poise and maturity, her talent for every sport, her innate leadership abilities and her resistance to the chaotic sway of emotions. I lack all of these qualities. Our differences, however, have worked to make us perfect complements, perfect teammates. Indeed, we have shared much more than a room over the years. We have shared our parents, our clothes, our secrets, our opinions, our love, our laughter.

How We Cope

Our separation is thus the very worst of my time in London and it has required effort and dedication to make distance more bearable. Nothing makes my sister happier than my phone call when Barcelona score a goal, and nothing makes me happier than receiving one my sister’s famous video messages. (She even recorded and sent me her own rendition of “The Twelve Days of Christmas”!).

Every time I visit a new city I buy a postcard to add to my sister’s collection on her room wall. Not one night sees us go to bed without having talked through our saviour: Skype. Despite the hour-difference, my sister and I manage to keep up-to-date about every detail of each other’s lives. I check her school essays, provide feedback on her outfits and wait impatiently for her continuous updates whenever an important event is going on back home. We communicate as if our beds had never left the same room.

Homesickness and separation anxiety are bound to affect any foreign student at some point of the journey abroad. From the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, sisterly love and caring gestures bring me some relief.

Maria is a guest blogger for Foreign Students. She posts regular updates of her experiences as a postgraduate student at LSE in London. Click here to see her older posts.

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