I recently finished my honours programme at university. It was a 5-month long course for which 20 students were chosen. Starting from the selection process until our final symposium a few days ago, everything in honours was linked to storytelling. Stories were the central theme of the programme: Europe and its Stories for the first part and Selling Stories for the second.

My peers were all internationals from Vietnam, India, Turkey, Lithuania, Poland, France and other European countries. So for the first 2 months, while I did attend some really interesting workshops, we mostly sat in a room and discussed questions like- What is Europe? What does it mean to be European? What does it mean to be an outsider in Europe? What is our European identity as expats?

We would debate what we mean when we say Europeans though. Are only people born on the continent European? People who moved here and liked it so much that they just stayed? People here for work? Students? To me, it was the nationals. People with European passports. But then comes the question of Europe as in the continent or the European Union?

To prepare for one of these discussions, we were asked to read Epic Continent: Adventures in the Great Stories of Europe by Nicholas Jubber. The author travels through Europe and explores classic European tales and history and socio-economics to understand what being European mean. In the preface, he shares that he had to leave his wife and his infant to make the journey precisely when he did because he had to find out what it truly means to be European. I too have had the chance to ask many Europeans the same question in the past few months.

There isn’t a clear answer. Truth be told, there isn’t an answer in most cases.

Maybe that is because they did not choose to be European. It is as they say- “You don’t choose the crown, the crown chooses you.” Being European is not a choice. You are born in this land. A European passport sure is quite a luxury. Or is it? Are you European because your passport says so?

My Russian friend hides the cover of her passport at the airport, my Moldavian friend prefers only to carry her Romanian passport. My Indian friend is learning Dutch so that when the time comes, she can apply for residency because she cannot wait to get a “stronger passport.” Are passports the most important factor in being a citizen? Are you European because your country is in the union? Or because on the map, your country is marked on the continent? Or because you feel like you belong there? Or is being European a sentimental feeling?

These are questions I can objectively look at and discuss for hours because I will never be European. My skin is a shade too dark, and my desi accent a tad too thick. My sense of self is too deeply rooted in the smell of chandan in temples and in the proper enunciation of Hindi words, in my mother’s sarees and in my desi ghee ka tadka. I am not European, I am here because Europe is a pool of opportunities. I am here to take a dip in that pool. I am here for an exceptional summer full of interesting conversations, diverse stories and a little bit of day drinking. And when the sun sets, I will pack my bags, get my non-European passport stamped and go back home. My sweet home.

An upcoming wave awaits, from the ocean the world knows as India.