Multicultural-Multilingual-Mixed-Race Jaia Sowden: Moving Countries as a Generational Legacy [Ep 43]

British-Italian-Brazilian, @JaiaSowden, references three generations of her family moving countries as a "tradition," even proposing that moving countries is "in their blood," and that putting down roots "would feel claustrophobic." Jaia is the daughter of my Episode 41 guest, Tabitha Sowden, and certainly there are overlaps in their stories, such as relocating from Milan, Italy to the UK at around 17, where both mother and daughter finished secondary school. But from the UK, Tabitha ultimately went South, falling in love with Brazil, and a Brazilian, Jaia's father. In contrast, Tabitha went north from the UK, falling in love with the Nordic countries Denmark and Sweden, becoming proficient in the Swedish language. Jaia says it was her grandparent's move from the UK to Italy, when Tabitha was two-years-old, that put this family in motion.  And "It's one of the best legacies," she says. 

Transcript

[00:00:00] Louise: Welcome to Women Who WaIk. I'm Louise Ross, writer and author of Women Who Walk the book, the inspiration for this podcast. And just as I did for the book here, I'll be interviewing and unpacking the journeys of impressive, intrepid women who've made multiple international moves for work, for adventure, for love, for freedom - reminding us that women can do extraordinary things. You can find a transcript, with pictures, to each episode, and my books on my website, LouiseRoss.com.

[00:00:47] Louise: Hello, listeners. Welcome to Episode 43 of Women Who Walk.

[00:00:51] Louise: My guest today is 27-year-old Jaia Sowden, who is based in London. Jaia's mother, Tabitha Sowden, who is based in Lisbon, was my Episode 41 guest.

[00:01:06] Louise: I'm using the phrase 'based in London' and 'based in Lisbon,' intentionally here, as both mother and daughter indicated in their conversations with me that where they're living right now is not permanent.

[00:01:21] Louise: In the Introduction to Tabitha's episode, I mentioned that I'd met her, and her mother, Caroline, who was visiting Portugal, for afternoon tea in Cascais on the coast outside of Lisbon. It's most unusual for me to have the opportunity to talk with three generations of women from the same family. And one of the things I learned is that Tabitha's frequent country moves, and then Jaia's repetition of her mother's restlessness, may well have found its origins when in the 1960s, Caroline and her husband moved their young family from London to Italy to live.

[00:02:01] Louise: It's an interesting familial pattern, which Jaia thinks of as a family tradition, even going so far as to say moving countries is in their blood, and that putting down roots would feel claustrophobic.

[00:02:15] Louise: And with each generation, the moves have expanded geographically. For instance, Caroline's move was from the UK to Italy and eventually back to the UK. Tabitha's moves were to Italy, back to the UK, back to Europe, then to Brazil, and ultimately to Portugal. So Tabitha gravitated south.

[00:02:38] Louise: Jaia has moved within Europe, back to the UK, and then to Denmark and Sweden. So her internal compass pulled her north, which seemed curious to me because culturally it's far removed from her father's roots, which are Brazilian, and her mother's, which are British and Italian.

[00:02:59] Louise: But Jaia talks of having an ear for Nordic languages, particularly Swedish. In fact, an ability with Latin languages too. And this facility with language, she attributes to having studied music and singing and just as music is a universal language that bridges cultures with each country move, Jaia's linguistic ability has helped her navigate cultural differences.

[00:03:25] Louise: I haven't actually interviewed Caroline for this podcast. Not yet anyway, but I would like to. Recording the stories of three generations of women moving countries, first during the sixties, which is Caroline, and then Tabitha's moves, which began in the eighties and continue, and now Jaia's early 21st century moves, all indicative of this family's ease with mobility, seems like an important historical and generational snapshot.

[00:03:54] Louise: And of course, I can't help wonder, if Jaia has children, will the family tradition continue?

[00:04:01]

[00:04:12] Louise: Welcome Jaia, thanks for being a guest on Women Who Walk.

[00:04:16] Louise: From the interview I did with your mum, which I mentioned in the introduction to this episode, we learned that you were born in Germany and that for the first couple of years of your life, your British born mum, who grew up in Milan, and your Brazilian father, who's from Brasília, were selling their handcrafted jewelry in various markets in Europe and London and Brazil. And then when you were two, your mum and dad split, and you and your mum went back to Milan where she'd grown up and where you ultimately lived till you were 17. What was it like going to a local Italian school as a mixed-race third culture kid?

[00:04:59] Jaia: I settled into a very local life quickly. My awareness of my cultural background came later on. I was aware of the fact that I spoke a different language at home, but I was so well integrated in Italian culture that I don't think it necessarily clicked until later on. Considering also that I was growing up with my mother, rather than my father who is black, that mixed race'ness was maybe not an element that I was seeing on a day-to-day basis. I think it came more with being a teenager in Italy later on.

[00:05:42] Louise: What was that like to be a teenager in Italy. This point, you're bilingual or trilingual?

[00:05:50] Jaia: Um, I've always been trilingual. I spoke Portuguese with my father until about the age of six, whenever I'd see him. I think I had a knack for languages, in the sense that I was not speaking in Portuguese that much, but I've fully retained it. It's never gone away.

[00:06:07] Jaia: What it eventually led to was a misunderstanding in myself as to what my connection to Italy actually was. I also traveled extensively to London to go and see my grandmother, and there was a very stark difference when I would get off the plane in the UK as to the multiculturalism I was faced with, which I was not faced with in Italy.

[00:06:34] Jaia: Entering teenagehood, I think I started becoming more aware of my differences and questioning fitting into Italian culture, as teenagers do, an element of existentialism, who am I, and thinking also that the world revolves around you.

[00:06:51] Jaia: I started thinking, okay, I've been brought up by my British family, I speak English, I speak Portuguese, I speak Italian, and I also don't really look like my peers, and I have a very different family dynamic to my peers. My family is scattered all over, so I became very curious about the UK, London in particular. It's taken me in my later years to sort of reconnect with that Italian'ness in me, because what has always been a problem, is how do I label myself? People tend to ask whether I feel more English or Italian or Brazilian, and I dunno if there's quite an answer to that.

[00:07:35] Louise: Mm, yes. I don't think there is. We didn't talk about the definition of third culture kids, but I did a much earlier episode with someone who is a third culture kid and now quite an expert in third culture kids. But we'll just say that the definition is you have parents of two different cultures and you grew up in a third culture.

[00:07:57] Jaia: Yes.

[00:07:58] Louise: But of course there are a number of other definitions, but for the purpose of our discussion, it fits perfectly with your experience. So I think third culture kids absolutely have the dilemma that you are talking about, which is that you don't quite fit in anywhere. You're multicultural and multilingual, and you're a citizen of the world, in essence.

[00:08:22] Louise: Definitely.

[00:08:23] Louise: Did your dad remain in Europe after your parents split, or, or did he return to Brazil? I ask because I'm wondering if there were opportunities for you to go to Brazil to spend time with your dad and his family there?

[00:08:36] Jaia: He stayed in Europe until I was about six. In those first six years, I traveled to Brazil once with my mum, and spent time with my family. I've got aunts and cousins and my grandma. And then after he returned, I spent time directly with him and the rest of the family.

[00:08:57] Jaia: But unfortunately then throughout the years there was an economic barrier that prevented us from being able to travel there. And I did not return to Brazil until I was 18, and that is also the last time that I've been there.

[00:09:10] Jaia: I can really feel Brazil in my bones, and Brazil has always been such a prominent feature in my household, my mum really transmitted the love that she had for it, definitely, I inherited that, but direct contact was not as much as it maybe could have been. It was more digital or over phone calls with the family, which probably helped me keep up my Portuguese as well when I was talking to my grandma or my aunts or my father.

[00:09:43] Louise: And so the times that you did visit, either with your dad or spending time with his family while you were there, did you have a natural sense of the culture as a result of your father being Brazilian or did it feel a little strange?

[00:09:57] Jaia: I don't have particularly strong memories, but I certainly don't have memories of it being strange. I was taken into the, the family very easily and I think it felt very natural. It felt like a part of me, and it always has done. I don't have memories of it feeling alien.

[00:10:19] Louise: One of the things that we also learned from the interview with your mum is that she wanted to create a stable life for you because she had moved around a lot. And she was going to do that by making sure that you were living in the same neighborhood for an extended period and that you were able to walk to school. And so she did manage to achieve this, but she says in her conversation with me that as a teenager you said to her, 'Mum, can't we go somewhere different?' And I'm just wondering, where do you think it came from, this desire to go somewhere different?

[00:10:54] Jaia: I think it was definitely prompted by those emotions of teenagehood and confusion with belonging. Where do I belong and who am I? But it had the added factor of my multiculturalism. I got to a point where I would look around and realize that very few people had my kind of background.

[00:11:16] Jaia: There wasn't something necessarily tying me to Italy, feeling strongly about my Italian identity. Even though I'd built such a strong friendship group. I had a very stable life in Italy. Definitely. But I think my curiosity about myself and my background and with the lack of roots, without having an Italian family, I started feeling like I wanted to explore.

[00:11:43] Louise: Your grandma who with your grandfather, moved the family to Milan where your mum grew up, so there was this sort of generational experience of moving countries, so I wondered if you had just sort of imbibed that experience and therefore felt curious to, to do something similar, or if it was just you wanted another experience because you had grown up in the same neighborhood and a very stable first 17 years of your life.

[00:12:13] Jaia: I think the fearlessness of being able to suggest that, because I think I actually started suggesting it, more age 14, 15 and it was 16 when we eventually moved. And so for a 14, 15, 16-year-old to have that in them definitely came from knowing that that is how my family had come about in Italy. That is how my mum had ended up in Brazil.

[00:12:44] Jaia: Fearlessness to pack up and go, opportunity for new horizons rather than a chapter that is closing or something that has failed somewhere. It was just, we did it with such ease. It didn't scare me at all. And I know that that definitely comes from almost family tradition of doing so. Embedded in that was also this curiosity to, this desire to fit in. And I had very strong memories of London being a place that was so multicultural that I thought, well, I will fit in, where everyone looks different. Everyone comes from everywhere. No one, no one and everyone fits in.

[00:13:31] Louise: Mm-hmm.

[00:13:31] Jaia: But London was something that we eventually settled on. We actually looked at the whole world. We looked at school all over the world. It was a total blank page. And once I got Mum on board, it was like a little adventure and neither of us were scared at all. And we just saw it as, yeah, we are ready for change.

[00:13:55] Louise: You went to the UK to go to do your last year of secondary school? Is that right?

[00:14:02] Jaia: It was my last couple of years. I interrupted Italian High School halfway through and because the system changes in the UK, I perfectly slotted into what is normally called Sixth Form, which are the final two years in the UK.

[00:14:16] Jaia: So although I started the year about a month in, I hadn't really missed out on anything. It allowed me to finish a year earlier as well. So I went to university earlier than my Italian peers who were still at high school when I was at university.

[00:14:32] Louise: And did you feel like you fit in?

[00:14:36] Jaia: Interestingly, I arrived in London with all this confidence of this is finally going to make sense. This is exactly where I'm supposed to be. And I quite quickly realized that I was very Italian and that I was very, I don't want to say provincial , but Milan to London was a big difference.

[00:14:59] Jaia: There was a lot of teenage British culture that I was not accustomed to, from the way people socialize, just popular culture reference points. I didn't get them. I didn't understand them. That was the beginning of probably me reconnecting with my Italian side and realizing that there was a lot more Italian'ness in me than I realized. Then, of course, every time I ended back in Italy, then the British side would come out as well.

[00:15:30] Louise: That sounds very like what your mum talked about feeling like.

[00:15:33] Jaia: Yes.

[00:15:33] Louise: She was the Italian girl in Britain and the British girl in Italy.

[00:15:38] Jaia: Exactly. It was very interesting to see this overlap between our lives. But yeah, I did get used to British life, and I spent two wonderful years in London and I'm really grateful for that opportunity. I'm really grateful for a mother who would take on such a challenge to go, just the two of us.

[00:16:02] Jaia: But it made sense and it helped me connect a lot of threads within myself and my identity. I didn't necessarily resolve questions, but I started connecting some threads and understanding my multiculturalism more and more.

[00:16:18] Louise: It sounds like a very important period in your life. So you said two years. Where did you go after those two years?

[00:16:27] Jaia: During my time in the UK I fell in love with literature. I've always done a lot of music in my life. I did lots of singing lessons. I did choir, I did the piano. And so I was quite sure that that's what I was going to end up studying. But I finally discovered English literature from an English perspective in the UK. In Italy, I was always sitting in English classes for Italian students, which I could basically do with my eyes closed.

[00:16:54] Jaia: So I started looking at actually courses that could combine the two. I went to see a number of universities across the UK. I was convinced that I wanted to move out again and spread my wings, and I found myself in Leeds, seeing the university. And that is where my grandfather originally comes from. That is where he grew up, and it all made sense.

[00:17:18] Jaia: It felt like a really nice reconnection to a place that he'd left in the early sixties to start our family life in Italy and I was gonna end up there again. And so I spent my university years in Leeds and it was wonderful and it was really fun.

[00:17:39] Jaia: In between those years, I did an exchange year in Denmark, wanting to always explore new places.

[00:17:45] Louise: And a very different culture. How did you adjust while you were in Denmark? What was your experience like there?

[00:17:52] Jaia: It was really interesting to experience Scandinavian culture. It had similarities with the UK, obviously lesser with Italy, but I really fell in love with it. I was quite determined that I was going to eventually, move back to Denmark. It also helped me reconnect with my multiculturalism, my languages, and realizing my ability to learn languages.

[00:18:19] Jaia: I'd studied languages at school. I did French in Italy and then I did Spanish in the UK. But I did them without paying that much attention to them. And when I moved to Denmark, I was so fascinated by a language that sounded so different, that I made a really strong effort to learn it.

[00:18:39] Jaia: I was there as an exchange student and I was one of the few people from my course who decided to actually dedicate nine hours a week to attend the free classes because I started seeing that languages were a real advantage in the way that it had helped me adapt to new environments and helped me understand different cultures and be flexible in myself and in the way that I could adapt like a chameleon, let's say. And I started seeing bridges between languages as well. So how can I approach a language that is so different and so new like Danish, but using the pool of language and linguistics that I already have.

[00:19:28] Louise: You have Latin languages, and English. Any other Nordic languages besides Danish?

[00:19:36] Jaia: A few years later, two, three years later, I ended up moving to Sweden. I can't envisage moving somewhere, regardless of how good their English is, and not attempting to understand what the local way of communicating is, because I've become really fascinated by little quirks of languages and little ways that people say hello or acknowledge someone.

[00:20:03] Jaia: I signed up to the Swedish classes, initially thinking that I would be starting totally from scratch and then eventually realizing that Danish had given me a really strong base to then approach Swedish. And Swedish was easier on the ears. I do have a very fond love for Danish, but it's much harder.

[00:20:22] Jaia: I suddenly found myself picking up quite quickly, by mostly listening. My classes were really good at making sure that we were all communicating with each other in Swedish. But at the time, I was also working as a preschool teacher and I learned so much from the children that I was teaching.

[00:20:41] Jaia: I was teaching them in English. I' d just spend my time listening to the Swedish teachers, communicating with the children and the children communicating with each other. And I learned so much just through that. Swedish has now become a language that I quite confidently say that I can use and I can communicate with and I can watch TV with and that kind of thing.

[00:21:03] Louise: You mentioned you love the little quirks, perhaps the idiosyncrasies of language in the way it reveals certain things about the culture. What can you tell us about the Swedish language that, uh, reveals a particular idiosyncrasy of the Swedish culture?

[00:21:21] Jaia: Swedes are very melodic in the way that they communicate. The way that you'll understand what someone is trying to say is by the inflection. But what I loved about it, it was actually so similar to Italian in the way that they express themselves. They are really vocal and I guess this is well known that Swedish is a sing-songy language, but the parallels between Italian and Swedish were quite prominent despite the two cultures actually being quite opposite because Northern Europe is known to be so much colder and introverted and sort of contained. And southern Europe being very open and very warm and amicable.

[00:22:09] Jaia: It was all about sound. It made me wonder whether my adaptability to languages also came from my background in music. It was almost like learning a song because the other thing that I noticed was that I could pick up easily, a local accent. Because I was not tied to a fixed accent, because I already spoke multiple languages, I could learn exactly how a Swedish person would say a particular word. And the same when I was in Denmark. I remember a friend telling me, I can tell that you have learned Danish in Copenhagen. You have a very strong Copenhagen accent. So it became almost like rehearsing music. That was really fascinating.

[00:22:53] Louise: That makes absolute sense. Because if you have a musical background, you can hear the musicality of language.

[00:23:00] Jaia: Yeah.

[00:23:00] Louise: And you also sang, didn't you? So your ability to use your voice in different range or ranges, I suppose you were able to do that with language as well.

[00:23:12] Jaia: Exactly.

[00:23:14] Louise: And they do say, when I say they, I don't know who, perhaps it's researchers and scientists. They say that in the brain, language and music is located in the same area. Those with an ability with one, generally have an ability with the other. So music and language. Language and music.

[00:23:31] Jaia: So it makes sense.

[00:23:32] Louise: Yeah. I dunno if it's absolutely true but it sounds good, doesn't it?

[00:23:36] Jaia: Yeah.

[00:23:38] Louise: As I listened to your story, and I think again about the conversation I had with your mum, when you moved up to Leeds, she moved country. She went back to Berlin, and then you go to Copenhagen and she's in Berlin for a little while, and then she goes to Milan and then you end up in Sweden. Your moves are sort of paralleling, but you're going in different directions. But it's very much a part of the way that your mum's lived her life and that you are starting to live your life, as a young adult, and have continued to live your life. Do you feel that in that regard that you are quite different from your contemporaries?

[00:24:15] Jaia: I certainly think that there is an ease with which I move. And it can happen quite quickly that I reckon a lot of my peers would be something that would be much more planned and reflected upon.

[00:24:31] Louise: But also their parents may not be moving around like your mum.

[00:24:35] Jaia: Yeah. Coming from a background where moving around was such a prominent feature of my life and my family's life, the idea of putting roots also becomes something that can be quite fearful, almost something that's like claustrophobic. And so picking up and leaving becomes part of the routine of like a renewal, like a set of fresh eyes, new perspectives. That is what it has meant for my mother, and that is what it has meant for me as well. So there are definitely parallels. It's interesting to see that she has stayed for so long in Portugal now. Surely that's not going to be forever? Because it's like, it's in our blood. Whether it's a question of itchy feet or seeking new horizons.

[00:25:24] Louise: Your mum also used the same word, claustrophobic. After you launched, she went back to Berlin and then she went back to Milan, but she said I couldn't stay there, it started to feel claustrophobic. You've just used that word too. There really is this generational restlessness. And, and you've preempted my next question, which is, do you imagine settling in one place or do you feel that moving countries is in your blood and forever the pattern of your life?

[00:25:54] Jaia: I have different feelings about settling and putting roots somewhere. I see it as something that would give me some sense of stability. At this moment in time, the collection of my possessions is currently spread across three different countries. But I also know that that feeling starts creeping up, that feeling of needing something new, and so at the moment I think it's going to be a pattern that I'm going to keep following, uh, because I also think that it's incredibly enriching.

[00:26:27] Jaia: My grandparents and that first move to Italy is what started everything. The foot they placed in such a culturally rich country is something that I know for a fact, my grandmother, my mother, I, my whole family we really, really treasure. I see it as the start of everything. it's one of the best legacies from my family because it allows me to keep traveling and finding new places and learning new things.

[00:27:07] Louise: I understand that the move was as a result of your grandfather being offered a, a position. And in the sixties, the latter part of the 20th century, Milan was the capital of design. And so that must have been a huge coup for him to have gotten the offer of a job there and for them to move.

[00:27:26] Louise: Their skill and talent in the arts, seems to be a generational skill. Your grandmother was a designer, she'd studied fashion and then your mum has this very creative side. She does this incredible sculpted jewelry and you do some really interesting photography work. I've been checking your Insta account and seeing some posts there. Are you working in the arts these days? Are you a practicing photographer?

[00:27:57] Jaia: We're an artistic, creative bunch. And that reflected on both my mother and I growing up in an environment where art, design, was very prevalent. So I think my visual impressions from childhood definitely influenced my photography and my exploration of the visual arts.

[00:28:17] Jaia: I do work in the arts. My current job in London is, uh, connected to photography. The practice is more connected to personal projects and it's been a development of a self-exploration and all of my moves around the world that I've carried with me since a early teen. I was given my first camera around 12 and inherited some lenses from my grandfather, actually, who gave them to me.

[00:28:45] Jaia: I started using photography as a way to carry all the worlds that I was exploring, taking them with me onto the next adventure. What I definitely inherited from this family legacy is exploring with color. I was always surrounded by very colorful objects at home, partly family taste, but also my grandfather's objects. Color is one of the primary things that he works with. Um, contrasting color, clashing color, but it's so beautifully placed next to one another, and I found that photography gave me my own perspective. It helped me carve my own way of viewing the world, which I often found to be so different from everyone else's.

[00:29:36] Jaia: And so it, it gave a material vision to a sort of abstract feeling of not really having a home, but having lots of different homes. And I'm still in the process of discovering what photography means for me, and I've left it and returned to it. I see it as an another language. Let's call it my fifth language, my fifth way of speaking to the world and translating what I see into something that's tactile and fixed.

[00:30:10] Louise: That's really rather beautiful. Thank you for, for sharing that. So if listeners would like to see your photography and connect with you online, perhaps look at your portfolio of work, where can they find you?

[00:30:23] Jaia: My Instagram is my name Jaia, J A I A and my surname, S O W D E N. So it's @JaiaSowden and my bio says, 'things I see and objects I like.' It's my way of viewing the world. And there is also a link to a portfolio online where there's some more of my projects and other collections of photographs from throughout the years.

[00:30:50] Louise: Thank you, Jaia, this has been a treat for me to have this conversation with you, the third generation. I'm actually thinking I can approach your grandmother now and see if she will be a guest at some point, cuz it, it would be wonderful to have your three voices on this podcast reflecting on the country moves you've all made. So thank you so much.

[00:31:13] Jaia: Thank you, Louise. It's been an absolute pleasure to talk to you and thank you for a wonderful conversation.

[00:31:20] Louise: You're welcome.

[00:31:22] Louise: Thank you for listening today. So you don’t miss future episodes, subscribe on your favorite podcast provider or on my YouTube channel @WomenWhoWalkPodcast. Also, feel free to connect with comments on Instagram @LouiseRossWriter or Writer & Podcaster, Louise Ross on Facebook, or find me on LinkedIn. And finally, if you enjoyed this episode, spread the word and tell your friends.