The Parts of Ourselves That Don’t Always Translate

Language, identity, belonging, and the international student experience

There are some experiences you can understand in theory without really knowing what they feel like from the inside.

For me, one of those is what it means to build a life in a language that is not your first.

I can understand the obvious parts: moving somewhere new, learning how people communicate, missing home, trying to make friends, and getting used to a different culture while keeping up with school, work, and everything else that does not slow down just because you are adjusting.

But when I asked Tyson Wang, MHC-LP to share some of his thoughts about language and belonging, he described parts of the experience I had never really considered.

Not necessarily the dramatic moments. Often, the very small ones.

The joke you understand a few seconds too late. The childhood reference everyone else seems to know. The compliment about your English that feels encouraging and also reminds you that your English was being noticed in the first place.

And maybe most of all, the realization that people can understand everything you are saying and still not have access to every part of who you are.

When You Understand the Language but Still Miss the Context

Tyson described speaking another language as sometimes feeling like becoming a slightly different version of yourself.

Not a fake version. Not a less authentic one. Just different.

For him, humor is one of the clearest examples. In Chinese, he can be quick with jokes, wordplay, and responses. In English, there can sometimes be an extra step: understand the joke, think of the response, and figure out how to say it naturally.

By then, the conversation may have already moved on.

He mentioned a joke that captures some of that experience:

“It’s too bad you can’t meet the version of me who speaks my first language, because I’m much funnier there.”

It made me laugh, and then it made me a little sad.

Because nothing has technically gone wrong in that moment. Everyone understood one another. From the outside, there may be no reason to think anything was difficult.

But the person inside the conversation may know there was another version of the response that would have come faster. A joke that would have landed differently. A part of their personality that did not quite make it into the room.

And sometimes it is not even about language.

Maybe everyone starts talking about a television show they watched growing up, a school tradition, a commercial, a snack, a song, or a joke that only makes sense if you already know the reference behind it.

You can understand every word and still feel one step outside of what everyone else seems to understand without trying.

Those may sound like small moments. But belonging is often made up of small moments too.

How Much of Belonging Is Not Having to Explain?

One thing Tyson said stayed with me:

“I think belonging often has a lot to do with how much context you need to explain.”

There are people around whom a joke does not need a footnote. A reaction makes sense without a backstory. You do not need to explain why something reminds you of home or why a phrase carries more meaning than it appears to on the surface.

There is simply more room to exist.

At the same time, Tyson was careful not to equate shared language with sameness.

He is Taiwanese, and he described how speaking Chinese with another Chinese speaker who is not from Taiwan can feel familiar and comforting while living in the United States. There is already more shared context than there may be in an English-speaking environment.

But there are still differences in accent, vocabulary, communication style, history, and cultural references.

Sharing a language can make the distance between two people smaller without erasing the distance entirely.

That distinction feels important, especially when we talk about culturally responsive care. Sharing a language or part of someone’s identity can create comfort, but it does not mean we automatically understand their whole experience.

“Your English Is So Good”

I also asked Tyson about fluency.

At what point does another language stop feeling like something you have to think about?

His answer made me think about the difference between being fluent and being comfortable.

He compared speaking your first language to being at home in your most comfortable clothes. A second language can be an outfit you know how to wear very well. Other people may even compliment it. But you can still be more aware of yourself while wearing it.

That comparison made even more sense when he talked about comments like:

Your English is so good.

I can barely hear your accent.

Those comments are often kind. They may genuinely feel encouraging.

And they can also contain a reminder:

You noticed.

You noticed my English. You noticed my accent. You noticed that there was something here to evaluate in the first place.

I do not think that means the compliment was wrong or that someone should necessarily feel offended by it.

I think it means the same comment can hold more than one thing.

It might feel reassuring one day and land differently another day, especially if someone is already feeling self-conscious, exposed, or unsure of how they are being perceived.

Good intentions and complicated feelings can exist at the same time.

Another Language Can Give You Something Too

What I appreciated most about Tyson’s reflections was that they were not only about what gets lost.

Sometimes another language gives you something too.

He talked about phrases expressing pride, affection, sympathy, or vulnerability. In English, saying something like I’m proud of you or I’m sorry you’re going through that can feel relatively natural in many relationships. The equivalent in Chinese may carry a different emotional weight depending on the relationship and context.

The feeling is still there. It may simply be expressed differently depending on the language and culture.

That part immediately made me think about Urdu and Hindi, particularly poetry.

Sometimes I can translate every word into English correctly and still feel as though I have failed to translate the thing itself.

The literal meaning survives.

The feeling does not always come with it.

There is something incredibly special about knowing what a phrase truly means in the language that holds it. And something a little bittersweet about knowing that you may never be able to hand someone else that exact feeling through translation.

But Tyson’s reflection made me think about the opposite too.

Maybe another language can allow parts of us to emerge that were harder to express before.

Perhaps you are funnier in one language and more emotionally direct in another. More spontaneous in one, more comfortable expressing affection in another.

The Work No One Else Can See

Maybe nothing particularly bad happened today.

You understood the conversation. You answered the question in class. You laughed with your friends. You ordered dinner. You made it through the day.

And still, you may have spent more of that day translating than anyone around you realized.

Not only words, but humor, tone, context, what you meant, how you wanted to come across, and whether what you were about to say would make sense here in the same way it made sense in your head.

From the outside, you may look like you are adjusting just fine.

And maybe you are.

Adjustment and effort are not opposites.

Sometimes you can be doing well and still be tired.

What Do You Leave Behind When You Choose to Go?

There was another part of Tyson’s reflection that stayed with me.

He shared a line from a Mao Buyi song that, for him, captures the idea of knowing there is something beautiful waiting somewhere in the distance while also knowing that someone important will not be there.

There is something ahead that you genuinely want.

Possibility. Education. Growth. Independence. A different life. Maybe even a version of yourself you have not met yet.

And you can still know exactly what will not come with you.

Sometimes we talk about leaving home as though choosing to go means choosing against what we left.

But maybe some departures hurt precisely because what we left mattered so much.

You keep moving not because home means less, but because something ahead matters too.

The People You Love Are Moving Through Time Too

After we talked about this, Tyson shared a line from a poem he wrote several years ago:

“白了浪花，白了头。”

He described the image as family standing by the shore, waiting for someone who has gone far away. As the waves continue returning, it becomes difficult to tell whether the white you are seeing is the foam of the water or the hair of the people waiting, slowly turning white with time.

That image stayed with me.

Because leaving does not only mean that you are changing somewhere else.

The people you love are changing too.

Parents grow older. Siblings grow up. Friendships shift. Family routines change. Life at home does not pause because you left.

And maybe that is another part of what can make living far from home so complicated.

There does not have to be a decision you regret. You can still believe that leaving was right for you. You can love what you are building.

And still feel the ache of knowing that time is passing somewhere you cannot fully participate in.

You are moving forward.

And so is home.

When Home Starts Moving Too

Tyson described belonging as something that moves and changes with you rather than a destination you eventually reach.

You leave home and begin building a life somewhere new. Gradually, you make friends, develop routines, become more independent, and change in ways you may not fully notice until you return.

Then home can feel strange in a new way.

Still familiar. Still yours.

And not exactly the same.

Maybe your relationships have shifted. Maybe your expectations have changed. Maybe you miss your life abroad while you are home in the same way you once missed home while you were abroad.

Belonging can become complicated when more than one place has become part of you.

Maybe that does not mean you have failed to find home.

Maybe home has simply become bigger than one place.

Making More Room for Yourself

If different languages or places seem to bring out different versions of you, perhaps you do not need to decide which one is the most authentic.

You could become curious instead.

Where do you feel quickest or funniest? Where does vulnerability come more easily? Who are the people around whom you have to explain the least? What parts of home help you feel grounded when everything around you feels unfamiliar? What parts of yourself have only had the opportunity to emerge because you left?

And when you feel slower, quieter, or less confident in another language, it may help to remember something Tyson reflected on earlier: feeling less sharp in a second language is not necessarily a reflection of your intelligence. Sometimes you simply do not have the same immediate access to the speed, instinct, or range that comes more naturally in your first language.

Not understanding a reference does not mean you are bad at connecting.

Missing home does not necessarily mean leaving was a mistake.

Becoming attached to a new life does not mean you have become less connected to where you came from.

You are allowed to hold more than one truth at the same time.

You can miss home and still want to stay.

You can become more independent and still love your family deeply.

You can feel completely like yourself in English and still miss the version of yourself that comes more effortlessly in another language.

And you can change without betraying the person you were before you left.

How Therapy Can Help

Sometimes there is not a problem to “fix.”

There may simply be a lot to hold at once.

Therapy can offer space for experiences that do not always fit neatly into words like homesickness or culture shock: belonging, identity, loneliness, family expectations, academic pressure, cultural adjustment, and the feeling of changing while the places you call home change too.

It can also make room for the smaller experiences that may feel difficult to justify elsewhere—feeling different depending on the language you are speaking, wishing someone could know the version of you that exists in your first language, or realizing that both you and the people you left behind are changing with time.

Therapy does not have to determine which language, culture, place, or version of yourself gets to win.

Maybe, as Tyson reflected, the question is not which version of you is the “real” one.

Maybe it is how you make room for all the versions of yourself that are already real.

Looking for support as an international student in New York?

Tyson Wang, MHC-LP works with international students and adults navigating identity, belonging, cultural adjustment, academic and career pressures, and major life transitions.

Learn more about Tyson.

You can also explore Aura of Hope therapists who work with international students, immigrants, and multicultural clients throughout New York.