When I was about half the age I am now, around 19, I went to San Francisco to study for the TOEFL and SAT tests at an English school. I was staying over with a host family outside the city. I had stayed there the year before and had really enjoyed my time there.
But lots of things changed in one year. The family told me they’d stopped working with the school, and that we would have to work out a deal together, without the school’s mediation. Oblivious to the reasons for that falling out with the school, I said ok, and we did.
The household was composed of three: a couple in their forties and the woman’s father, in his eighties. The first year, everyone cohabitated well with each other. As soon as I went back, i realized things wouldn’t be the same as the first year.
The old man would fight with his daughter’s boyfriend and soon the fights turned physical, one day involving a knife. The old man got hurt as the younger one tried to wrestle the knife from his hands.
One morning, as the mother was driving me to school, she told me to watch out, that her boyfriend had a gun, and that if things turned violent, he might use it. I felt threatened and tried to find a way out.
I decided to rent a hotel, but the only one I could afford was the one offered by the school. They helped me find a room at a hotel, but the next opening would be a week away. I had to couch surf for a whole week.
I hid at friend’s places, who were also staying at host families’ and weren’t allowed to have friends over. I went to YMCAs. There was a time where after 10pm I still didn’t know where I was going to sleep. I felt like a giant failure.
But when I talked to my parents on the phone, they supported me, and during one of those phone calls, before I hung up, and went back to my anxiety-ridden existence, my father said five simple words that have stayed with me to this day: “on est fiers de toi”. We’re proud of you.
Despite people who kicked me out of their homes and my original host family who initially wouldn’t give me my money back, I managed to sort things out, thanks to those words.
From the time I heard that, everything changed. And soon I found the strength to pull through. A few days later I was checked into a hotel on Bush street.
My parents probably don’t remember this conversation. But I won’t forget it.