From Emmelina, France

01 January 2020

Emmelina, France

Port Saint Foy Et Ponchapt is the village on the other side of the river, the green half of this postcard. it's where I settled in 2012. 2003-2011 I lived in Connemara and it rained all the time. After my divorce, I decided I wanted to try somewhere with a little more sunshine. I was headed to Portugal but stopped here for a while. I started lessons and realised that I could learn French, despite my dyslexia, despite all the teachers I had in the UK who never thought I could. I now have a French husband, 2 stepsons, and a family that accepts me for who I am for the first time in my life. I am at home. I have quit my piano teaching and built my own business from scratch. I can be proud of who I am here.

Emmelina

This postcard is one of several collated as part of collaboration between Dr Michaela Benson and the Migration Museum. A selection of these appears in the Postcards from the British in Europe installation in Departures, the museum's current exhibition exploring four centuries of emigration from Britain, bringing Britain’s emigration story and its emigrants into the national conversation about migration

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