Immigrant whānau across Aotearoa have frank conversations covering love, ancestry, home, food, expectation, and acceptance.

Conversations with My Immigrant Parents is a series that crosses language, generation, and expectation to bring you immigrant whānau having conversations they normally wouldn't.

Co-hosts and producers Saraid de Silva and Julie Zhu travelled Aotearoa, meeting families from 11 different countries, sitting in as they spoke to each other about love, disappointment, what home means to them, and where home really is.

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In Tūranganui-a-Kiwa, Tongan grandmother Liliani and her daughter Kesaia find that even though they talk every day on the phone (and have for 17 years), they have more in common than they thought.

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The views expressed in this episode are personal and do not reflect the opinions of the participants' employers.

When Liliani Waigth migrated to Aotearoa from Tonga as a 21-year-old in the 1970s, she had no idea it would be another 15 years before she went back.

"I hop out of the plane and it was freezing cold. Coming from a country that's so warm, coming over to New Zealand, it was foggy and I thought, 'Oh, my gosh, what am I doing over in this country over here.'"

Staying initially in Auckland where she had family, Liliani soon met her Pālagi husband and moved to the East Coast. She was one of the first Tongan migrants to settle in Gisborne, where there were only a handful of other Tongan families she knew of at the time.

Liliani had two daughters and two sons; her first daughter, however, passed away as a baby. Her daughter Kesaia now lives in Wellington and works as a principal research analyst of the Waitangi Tribunal for the Ministry of Justice. In her 60s now, and retired, Liliani talks with Kesaia on the phone every day, and has done so for the last 17 years.

Kesaia's dad passed away when she was 13, and Liliani largely raised her three kids as a single mother. Despite this, she had strong reservations when Kesaia fell pregnant with her first child while unmarried. Through this conversation, mother and daughter discuss how different expectations in the countries they were raised in have influenced their approaches to marriage and motherhood.

"My mother, she always talked to me about those kinds of things, you know? If I go with a boy or have a boyfriend, and you go and have... you know, have a baby or something like that, that is really-," starts Liliani.

Kesaia finishes her sentence: "Really bad. I don't think anybody here really cares that much. For me - because I left home at 17, there was no culture, there was no community to really disappoint. So I didn't sort of worry about that."

This episode covers expectations of Tongan women, grief, and how different generations perceive the notion of sacrifice, all with Kesaia's five-month-old Raita gurgling in the background.

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Joseph and Grace Trinidad talk about making their "own little Philippines" in the Hawke's Bay, why Filipinos love competition, and what it means to be both queer and Catholic in 2019.

Content warning: This episode also explores themes around mental health.

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Many New Zealanders may be surprised to learn of the large Filipino community in the Hawke's Bay. It's a well-organised and tightly-run ship, with elected presidents responsible for running events, including games for Easter, Valentine's Day pageants, Halloween festivities, and of course gathering together en masse to celebrate the birthdays of the many children and grandchildren across various families.

The Trinidads - made up of son Joseph, his sister Elyx, and their parents Grace and Jose - moved to Hawke's Bay 10 years ago, and are active members of the community. Jose was a farmer in the Philippines before selling his livestock to come and work in the New Zealand dairy industry. He worked as an 'Overseas Filipino Worker' for three years before he was able to bring the rest of his whānau over.

His son Joseph recalls the transition as a 13-year-old from the bustling Philippines to rural New Zealand: "It was cool to move to a different country. I can be a different personality and no one knows who I am. But the biggest change was we had such a busy life in the Philippines, where we'd go out every weekend, go to the city, go to the mall - we wouldn't come home until 9pm and here... everything closes at 5pm."

Joseph now lives in Wellington with his partner Max, and works in a call centre. He travelled back to Hawke's Bay to record this podcast with his mother. Grace was a professor in the Philippines, but struggled to find adequate teaching work here. She currently works at a pet-food packing factory.

In the episode, Grace and Joseph talk about Filipino accents, Joseph's coming-out experience, and sexuality and freedom in the Catholic Church.

"Remember when you were in the hospital, telling me that you are gay? What was the first thing I told you?" asks Grace.

"You don't care. And you already knew," replies Joseph.

"Even the wider Filipino community knows that I'm gay. And I don't know what they say behind closed doors, but they've always been nice to me."

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Francisco and Vibeke are parents to teenagers who regularly switch between Argentinian and Dutch cultures. They talk about why coming from different countries means navigating more than just language.

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The Blaha/Brethouwer whānau live on Waiheke Island and have roots in three different countries: Argentina, Holland, and here in Aotearoa. Dad Francisco migrated here as an adult; Mum Vibeke was born in Aotearoa but grew up in Holland; and their teenage children, Kika (14) and Felix (17), were born in Auckland.

Francisco left Argentina because he saw no place for himself in a system he saw as rigged, with a corrupt military government. He hopped on a boat with little clue of what he was going to do, and spent the next few years working on boats in the Pacific, eventually finding Aotearoa through a serendipitous weekend.

"I was in Tonga and they asked me to bring a boat down to New Zealand to do survey, which is like a warrant of fitness. So I arrived here and I had a very good weekend and I decided to jump off the boat and never ."

Vibeke, on the other hand, feels she's left a large part of herself in Holland.

"I left New Zealand when I was three years old, so I had no real memories... I'll always feel like I'm going to be almost split in half. When I'm in New Zealand, I miss things about Holland, and when I'm in Holland, I really miss things about New Zealand. I've now literally lived half my life here, so I'm completely torn forever."

Many threads in this episode explore the cultural differences between Dutch and Argentinian people, the difficulties for kids of immigrants raised in multiple cultures, and the privilege of the family being perceived as being more 'ex-pat' than 'immigrant.'

Kika points out how often she doesn't get recognised as being from an immigrant background: "Until I say, 'Oh, my dad's from Argentina,' or until they see a photo of him - because you're tall and big and dark - people don't think about the culture, or the history, or, 'Oh, what if this chick has some super cool... what if she can speak Spanish or speak Dutch.'"

"I feel like I have to try and present that culture a lot more, and I really want to because it's something I want to have presented and I want to have a part of me."

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The Solomons thought leaving South Africa meant leaving entrenched white supremacy. They discuss how much of this they still found in NZ, and what they are learning about gender and queerness.

Content warning: This episode also explores themes around mental health.

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The Solomons are South African by birth and, in their own words, South African in their hearts. Parents Derrick and Lynette moved their three kids to Aotearoa in 2003 in search of more safety and less entrenched racism. In this episode, they speak with their middle child, 28-year-old Tammy.

As with several families in the podcast series, Derrick was the first family member to arrive in New Zealand, spending some time making arrangements before bringing the rest of his family over. He is of Khoisan heritage, an indigenous tribe of South Africa, so he has indigenous whakapapa as well. This led him to spend a year learning Māori when he first arrived in the country.

The terrorist attack on March 15th changed the family's view of New Zealand being the safe haven they'd believed.

Tammy describes hearing of the attack for the first time online: "When I found out, I felt terrified. I called you guys and everything, and we were so on edge because this was not meant to happen in New Zealand. Like, we escaped that hatefulness towards people being different."

Derrick chimes in, "In the back of my mind, we always knew that something was going to happen. I always thought that New Zealand was too complacent in certain ways, you know? They eventually afterward said that they were looking in the wrong area where a threat was probably coming from, but that was a shock for myself."

However, racism wasn't a new experience for the Solomons before the Christchurch attacks. It's something they have encountered from both New Zealanders and white South Africans who have immigrated here.

Lynette explains, "Just living our normal life day-to-day here, I met a New Zealander, and she said to me, 'Ah, so you are a Coloured.' So I said, 'Excuse me? Where did you get to hear of that term?' and she says, 'This white South African said there's a lot of Coloured people here.'"

Derrick adds, "A lot of the Afrikaner people that moved from South Africa to New Zealand... they still carry their racist views over to this country, and that is very sad."…

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Sue left Korea with one life in mind, but ended up with something very different. Mum and daughter Bokyong talk divorce, starting over, and why rural towns can be kinder to immigrants than the city.

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Sue Kim immigrated to New Zealand from Korea with her husband 24 years ago, and almost immediately fell pregnant with daughter Bokyong. The family moved first to Auckland (which Sue initially thought was a small town compared to her hometown of Busan) before moving to Dunedin, and then briefly settling in Balclutha, where they were one of three Asian families in the entire community.

"I started learning English, but a few months later I realised that's too hard, so I gave up. I decided to just mingle with the next-door ladies instead of going to language school. My English at the beginning I learnt from the next-door neighbours in that sort of way," says Sue.

Now Sue works as a high school teacher in Ōtepoti, teaching Korean and Japanese. She also wants to learn Chinese so she can communicate with Bokyong's boyfriend and his family. Aside from her day job, Sue also serves as principal of the Dunedin Korean language school, helping local Korean kids stay grounded to their culture and language.

Bokyong is currently studying Law and Science at Otago University. She has a younger brother called Jahoon, who is 21. When Bokyong was about 13, her mum and dad got divorced. Bokyong feels part of the marriage breakdown was to do with how differently her parents adapted to living in New Zealand.

"One of the biggest differences between you and Dad... Obviously, you had basically forced yourself to learn English, then becoming a teacher, and so you're using English every day and you're meeting new people every day. Then I saw Dad... struggled quite a lot, especially with becoming familiar with English, and just finding a community. I don't think he ever felt at home in New Zealand."

Sue describes not knowing at the time how to leave her 14-year marriage: "It was just really heartbreaking, and I felt really sorry for him. I learnt later why I was really stressed and sad about my marriage life, but I couldn't do anything, and I didn't know what to do. It was always financially very tight, and life was very, very tough, but I didn't know what to do."

In 2018, Sue got remarried to a Pākehā man named Ken, despite believing she would never be in another relationship…

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Aliyaan (13) and his mum Masooma are Pakistani Muslims living in East Tāmaki. They discuss being a migrant kid, the March 15 terrorist attack, and how their lives have and haven't changed.

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Masooma Mehdi arrived in Aotearoa at age 13 (the age her son Aliyaan is now) from Karachi, Pakistan. Aliyaan is in his first year of high school and joins this conversation as the podcast's youngest participant.

Both mother and son have experienced attending school as a Muslim kid in a country with very little visibility of Muslim New Zealanders. Though decades apart, their experiences have been similar, with ignorance and a lack of empathy around religious practices combining to ostracise and exclude them.

"I felt quite lonely, I remember... It used to be really depressing, and that's why I would just wait for school to finish, and just come back home," says Masooma.

Aliyaan agrees, "I know a lot of other Muslim kids have been called things like ... Just because I'm Muslim, doesn't mean I'm part of ISIS, because that means if you're Christian, you're part of KKK."

The white supremacist attack in Christchurch on March 15th deeply affected their whānau and community. This episode features mother and son delving deep into a reflection of how they first heard of the attack, their concerns for their community, and how they felt going to visit Al Noor Mosque themselves in the aftermath.

"We didn't know how New Zealand was going to react. Most of us Muslims, as soon as we heard about the attack... the very first thing we were like, we hope it is not a Muslim who has done it."

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The Muzondiwa family left Zimbabwe at a time when it was difficult to buy even bread. They talk colonisation in Africa and Aotearoa, and whether finding a "true" cultural identity is possible.

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The Muzondiwa family left Zimbabwe about 10 years ago, with mum Nyembezi arriving here first, for two years by herself.

"It was very difficult, to be honest, to move over here without your family. I got so skinny because I could hardly eat. Every time I sat down to eat, I would think of my kids back home because there was nothing over there, even in the supermarkets."

As a registered nurse, Nyembezi was able to work hard to save enough money to bring her husband Amos and their two daughters, Shalom and Takunda, over. Their third child Ben was born here in Aotearoa. Amos is now a pastor; Shalom is at university; and Takunda is in her final year of high school. This episode features a conversation between Nyembezi, Amos, and Takunda. Amongst other topics, they reflect on how it feels to go back to Zimbabwe.

Amos reflects, "Unfortunately, now every time you go back, things are worse than they were last year. It's always a huge disappointment each time you go back and so-and-so has died and you have missed being together in times of crisis. And there's always that sense of, people think we don't care."

Takunda chips in, "We, like, left them."

"Yeah, like, we have abandoned them... and even though nobody is saying that, you kind of feel it," adds Amos.

After many years here, the Muzondiwa family have a lot to say about the 'tools' colonisation employs to keep communities operating on a tier below their European counterparts. This episode dissects frankly the effects of colonisation, and the ways that diaspora children try and search for an authentic version of their cultural identity, which, as Amos explains to Takunda, is in many ways an imagined concept.

"I think it is also important for you kids to know that even when you see me and your mother and probably even my parents, those people that you are seeing are no longer Africans. Essentially, you are looking at a European in a black skin, and we are still negotiating what it means to be really African ourselves."

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