CNN
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She left Germany for the United States in the late 1970s, and built a wonderful life in California, but nearly four decades later, Camilla Delsid decided to return to her home country.
The mother-of-two, who grew up in Southern Germany, has been living near the city of Stuttgart, in southwest Germany, for the past few years. However, she’s far from happy about it.
“California was my home, and in my heart it still is,” Camilla tells CNN Travel, before explaining that she misses the US desperately.
“I wholeheartedly regret moving back here and believe that the US is the best place to exist in this world.”
So how did she end up in California in the first place? Camilla says she never really felt like she belonged in Germany and always “dreamed of foreign countries” during her younger years.
“I grew up very guarded and distrustful,” she adds. “I can’t say I had much of a sense of humor then. I do now…
“It was always really serious. German culture is very black and white and ‘yes’ or ‘no’. You either fit into some box, or you don’t. And if you don’t, that’s a problem for you.”
When Camilla met her future husband, a Mexican American soldier, through a friend at the age of 18, it felt as though everything had clicked into place.
“That was like a prayer answer or a dream come true,” she recounts. “But I was so dumb when I was young, I didn’t really know much…”
She’d been fantasizing about leaving Germany for years, so Camilla didn’t think twice about giving up everything to move to the United States with him, “against the laments” of her family and friends.
“We fell in love,” she recounts. “And after three years or so, he went back to the US, to California, San Jose, and I came as well.”
The couple married soon after arriving in the US together in 1978, and went on to have two children.
“I had a godfather who was very upset with me for marrying a brown-skinned person, saying that I’m messing up the ‘good German gene pool,’” she recounts. “And I told him where to go.”
While she was thrilled to be living in the US, Camilla admits that she “was a bit lost at first,” due to the significant cultural differences.
She remembers struggling with simple things like day-to-day pleasantries because she was so accustomed to the notorious German directness.
“In the very beginning of my stay in California, when someone asked, ‘How are you?’ I just started to tell them my life story,” she recalls.
“I felt obliged to have to answer that question. But it was just, ‘Hello.’ So that took me a long time to adjust to. Realizing that that doesn’t mean they really want to know how I’m doing.”
While living in the US came with its evident challenges, Camilla, who was based in Sacramento, quickly found that California suited her far better than her home country.
She enjoyed the fact that she could make mistakes without feeling judged, and loved that people were “interested in little old me.”
“The Americans were incredibly interested in me and my story,” she says, noting that “Americans are generally inquisitive.”
“I was treated extremely well.”
Feeling as though she was finally in a place where she was accepted, Camilla’s confidence grew, and she began to understand that she was capable of much more than she’d envisioned.
“I realized that I was intelligent,” she says, explaining that her parents had “invested heavily” in their son’s education while she was growing up, and were less focused on their daughter’s.
“We were expected to marry and be taken care of,” she adds.
But although she’d taken to the US with vigor, things were far from smooth sailing when it came to her personal life.
After five years of marriage, Camilla and her husband divorced, and she found herself struggling financially.
“I had to go on welfare and deal with the shame that came with that,” Camilla says, admitting that she started to wonder whether she should have listened to her family and stayed in Germany.
“I was a failure and I thought, ‘I just have to fight now.’ So I fought. I got on welfare which is hard, because it’s really not very much that you get.”
While she found being a single parent extremely challenging, Camilla says that she received a huge amount of support from her friends in the US, and was given the opportunity to go to junior college.
Camilla, who had studied at business school after leaving high school in Germany, went on to gain a PhD, and became Dr. Camilla Delsid.
“I could have never done that in Germany,” she says, describing how the “love and encouragement” of her strong network of friends, including other moms, spurred her on.
“I made the most amazing American friends,” she says, stressing that she would not have “been able to make it” on her own. “Girlfriends, who also had children…
“I learned how to parent in America. I learned that it’s no big deal when you spill the milk. So what? That doesn’t make you a bad child, it’s just spilled milk. Big deal.
“I really learned how to be a good mom from my American friends, who didn’t have war children as parents.”
Buoyed on by the support of her community, Camilla became a substitute teacher and eventually moved into social work.
“When I did substitute teaching, I saw so many children who came from homes and were not healthy,” she explains.
“They would come hungry. They would come not dressed well, or cleaned up… And then I thought, ‘I think here’s my calling…’
“I need to go into social work and work with parents so they learn how to become better parents and stop all these cycles that so many of our families that grew up in poverty are stuck in and just pass on to the next generation.”
In the years that followed, Camilla became part of a movement to improve the child welfare system in the US.
“We worked with families that were willing to work with us, on strengthening them on the many different levels,” she says.
Despite the breakdown of her marriage, Camilla felt rooted in the Golden State. She became a US citizen in 2000 and saw herself living there for the rest of her days. But life had other plans.
Camilla’s son Rafael and her daughter both ended up moving to Germany for work opportunities, building strong careers in the country, and she missed them dearly.
“I was in California with my dog, and my kid said, ‘Why don’t you come to Germany?’” she recalls.
“And on bad days, you miss your family so much. You miss your children so much. And so I said, ‘OK, I’ll come and I’ll just check it out.”
After mulling things over, she ultimately decided to pack up her life in California and return to Germany in August 2020.
Unfortunately, her move coincided with the Covid-19 pandemic, which brought about border closures and nationwide lockdowns, and Camilla struggled with the “utter isolation” that ensued.
“It was terrible,” she says.
Once life returned to normal and she was able to truly experience Germany again, Camilla says she found that the country had changed during her years away, and as far as she was concerned, this wasn’t for the better.
“Huge, huge changes. I really don’t even recognize this country anymore…” she says.
“So many things are not working here. People are so frustrated here, and it shows up in their behavior.”
She desperately misses the “friendly American way,” and feels that some Germans are uncomfortable with her “because they don’t know how to respond to friendliness.”
“Call it shallow, whatever,” she says. “But I’ll take a shallow, smiling American over a sour-faced, bitter German, who’s also shallow, by the way.”
Camilla admits that she’s been particularly disheartened by the current political tensions in Germany, where far-right parties have been moving from the political edges to the mainstream in recent years.
When questioned on the political tension in the US, Camilla says that she’s well aware that there are likely “just as many idiots” in California, but she doesn’t feel the same level of despair about the situation.
“I would love to go back and help my friends and my community in California, and be part of an effort to make it better,” she adds.
Nearly five years since her return, Camilla says she still hasn’t “arrived” in Germany, “mentally and emotionally,” and can’t help but long to be back in the US.
“I know it’s not perfect, and life is not better there,” she says. “But my friends are there. And the people are just friendly.”
Camilla goes on to explain that she misses what she describes as the “pioneer spirit” of the people in the US.
“They’re just more open-minded people than Germans are,” she says. “And that’s what I like the most.
“You could really mess up, and you weren’t a bad person or a failure.”
While she enjoys being closer to her children, and having the opportunity to spend time with her grandchild, Camilla has realized that she still doesn’t fit in there, and was much happier in the US.
“I never really wanted to return to Germany,” she admits. “But I did it for my children. I also wanted to give it a really fair shot, and I did.
“I feel as if I’ve really given it my all. And I don’t belong here anymore. If there were a way for me to go back to California, I would.”
So why she hasn’t gone back to California? Camilla explains that she feels as though she has little choice but to remain in Germany as she has a well-paid job there and can’t “financially swing” living in the US anymore.
“When you work in social work all your life there, you don’t make a lot of money,” she explains, adding that her retirement income “isn’t that great.”
“And there’s not a lot of money to put away.”
Camilla points out that her retirement income would simply “not be sufficient to cover both the cost of relocating and my living expenses once I stop working.”
“I have a little savings, but I would have to get into a full-time job in California,” she says. “And I can’t work forever… I have to be realistic.”
She currently works for the government and admits that the way people react to her makes her feel like she’s “a hundred years old” at times.
“It’s almost inconceivable that somebody my age, retirement age, is still working and likes it,” she says. “And in California, I don’t feel that way.”
However, she concedes that after living and working in the country for several years, she’s come to appreciate the “discipline and reliability embedded in everyday life,” despite wrestling with the “rigidity” of German culture.
“I’m cautious not to overgeneralize,” she adds. “Every culture has its undercurrents – deep-rooted values that shape how people think, interact, and solve problems.
“In Germany, structure, rules, and a sense of order run like a vein through the national psyche.
“This has its strengths, especially in fields where precision and reliability are vital. But it can also stifle creativity and adaptive thinking.”
Camilla, who recently adopted a beagle named Amora, goes on to explain that she’s found it hard to make new friends in Germany because of the “generational thing.”
However, she stresses that being around younger people makes her feel somewhat hopeful about the future of the country.
“The young Germans are really cool and nice,” she says. “I like their mentality, and I’m glad to see them breaking away from that post-war brokenness.”
She’s optimistic that “this emerging generation will carry forward the best of its traditions — its thoughtfulness, craftsmanship, and intellectual rigor — while also embracing a more dynamic, inclusive, and open approach to life.”
Reflecting on her decision to move back to Germany, Camilla says that she’s learned a valuable lesson.
“You should never make your children, your adult children, the center of your life,” she says.
“And neither expect from your adult children that you are the center of their life. They have their lives, and I left mine behind in California.”
While she may be dissatisfied with life in the country at present, Camilla stresses that she’s extremely proud of her German roots.
“I love the old German culture,” she says. “My son is in the theater and opera, and I can’t escape all the knowledge I gained when I was just a little child, which shaped me, and I really appreciate all that.”
Camilla is also a huge fan of the “green and lush” landscape of Germany, but ultimately feels as though she is “more aligned” with the US, seeing herself as “American and not German” now.
“American culture and people are the most wonderful there is in this world,” she says. “Warts and all.”
