“Where are you from?” For most people, it is a simple question with a simple answer. But what happens when home has never been just one place? From Saudi Arabia and Dubai to Singapore, Bahrain, the UK and now Italy, growing up across different countries can make the idea of belonging more complicated than it seems. Between navigating cultural identities, building friendships and learning to embrace the unfamiliar, each place leaves behind experiences that shape who we become. But does having roots in multiple countries mean never truly belonging to one, or does it mean finding a little piece of home everywhere?
“Where are you from?”
It should be one of the easiest questions to answer. For me, it rarely is. Usually, there is a brief pause while I try to decide which version of the answer makes the most sense. I was born in Saudi Arabia, grew up in Dubai, lived in Singapore, and eventually Bahrain became home. I then moved to the UK for university, and now, I live in Milan, attending Bocconi University as an exchange student for the semester. Somewhere in the middle of all of that, there exists another answer: I am Indian.
Sometimes I give the short version and simply say, “I’m Indian.” Other times I say, “I’m from Bahrain.” Occasionally, when I have the energy to explain, I give the full story and watch someone’s expression change as the list of countries gets longer. For a long time, I thought I needed to have a better answer, one that did not require an explanation every time someone asked such a simple question.
There is something strange about feeling deeply connected to several places while never being completely sure which one you are allowed to call home. India is the country printed on my passport and the culture that has shaped so much of my family and identity, but it is not where I was born or raised. Saudi Arabia is where my story began, although I was too young for it to become the place I consciously remember as home. Dubai shaped my childhood, Singapore gave me another version of growing up, and Bahrain became familiar in a different way: the place I returned to, where my family was, and the place that felt steady while other parts of my life kept moving.
Then came the UK. Moving there for university meant starting again, but this time on my own. Suddenly, the places I had lived were no longer just addresses in my past. They became parts of myself that I carried into every new room. I began noticing it in small moments: explaining a food or tradition to a friend, recognising an Arabic phrase that surprised someone, finding common ground with another international student, or realising that my idea of “normal” was actually a mixture of several different cultures.
Moving so often also meant becoming comfortable with being uncomfortable. Every new place came with unfamiliar people, routines and expectations, and there was always that first stage of not quite knowing where I fitted. I used to be much more reserved, and the idea of repeatedly walking into rooms where I knew nobody terrified me. Over time, though, I learnt how to introduce myself first. I learnt how to ask questions, how to listen, and how to adapt without completely changing who I was. Most importantly, I learnt how to be independent.
When you are constantly exposed to people who grew up differently from you, you also realise how little of the world can be understood from one perspective. Living across different countries has introduced me to people with completely different languages, religions, cultures, ambitions and ways of seeing life. Some have become close friends, while others were people I knew only briefly, but every place I have lived and every person I have met has left a little something with me, shaping the person I am today. I have learnt to communicate with people who think differently from me,
to adapt when things do not go according to plan, and to find my footing in places where almost everything initially feels unfamiliar.
For years, though, I have treated my inability to answer the question “where are you from?” almost like an identity crisis. I wondered whether I was Indian enough, Bahraini enough, or connected enough to any one place to claim it confidently. There is a strange pressure to have a single origin story, as though “belonging” needs to fit neatly into one country on a map. It never has for me, and I am beginning to realise how lucky I am because of that.
I am grateful that my childhood memories stretch across countries. I am grateful that I have had to learn how to make friends from scratch, even when it was uncomfortable. I am grateful that I have been exposed to cultures beyond my own and forced to question assumptions I did not even realise I had. More than anything, I am grateful for the independence that came from leaving what was familiar and learning, repeatedly, how to build a life somewhere new. The identity crisis that once made me feel as though I did not fully belong anywhere has slowly become something I treasure, because perhaps belonging to many places does not mean belonging less to each one.
Now, Milan is becoming the newest part of that story. Coming to Bocconi for my exchange feels strangely familiar and completely new at the same time. Once again, I am learning about a city, meeting people whose lives looked nothing like mine before we arrived here, navigating cultural differences and slowly turning unfamiliar streets into places I recognise. There are still moments when it is intimidating because starting over always is, but this time there is excitement alongside the uncertainty. I have done this enough times to know how much can come from being somewhere new.
A new country can teach you things about yourself that you would never learn by staying comfortable. Strangers can become friends, mistakes can become funny stories, and a place that initially feels completely foreign can eventually become woven into your identity. I do not know exactly what Italy will leave me with yet. Maybe I will become more confident, maybe I will learn to slow down, maybe I will pick up more Italian than I expect, or maybe I will meet people who change the way I think about the world. Months from now, there may be completely ordinary things about Milan- a street, a café, a tram ride, a conversation, that I will unexpectedly find myself missing.
That uncertainty is what excites me most. I used to think identity was about finding the one place where you belong. Now, I think it can also be about collecting pieces of every place that has shaped you. Saudi Arabia is part of my beginning, Dubai is part of my childhood, Singapore widened my world, Bahrain became home, India is my heritage, and the UK taught me independence. Now, Italy gets to add something of its own.
So, when someone asks me, “Where are you from?”, I still hesitate. I probably always will. But I no longer think that pause means I do not know who I am.
I think it means that the answer is simply bigger than one place.
Hey! I'm Annika, currently on exchange at Bocconi from the University of Leeds in the UK, where I'm doing an MSc in International Business after an undergraduate degree in Food Science and Nutrition, a combination that's given me a mix of analytical rigour and strategic thinking I bring into most things I do. Writing has genuinely been one of the constants in my life, I keep a journal every single night, I was editor of my school newspaper and was a journalist for my university newspaper as well. There's something about writing that's always felt like my way of actually processing and connecting with things, rather than just documenting them, and that's exactly why I wanted to be part of Tra i Leoni; it's the chance to do that again, properly, in a new environment. Outside of that, music is a big part of my life, I sing, I've been to 23 concerts and counting, and I'm genuinely into the business side of the industry as much as the music itself. I also dance, play sports, and love travelling (been to 23 countries as well!), so I'm rarely sitting still for long. Back at Leeds, I've been involved in a lot of student leadership and representation work alongside the writing. Having grown up across Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Singapore, and the UK, I'm used to adapting quickly to new places, which has made settling into Milan this semester feel fairly natural, and I'm excited for this new chapter!