My nine year younger sister was adopted and arrived at the airport with an orange Air India blanket and a small suitcase. In those days the flight attendants looked after the children during the flights, and the new families would meet up at the airport to collect their new family member.  My sisters suitcase had an interesting smell of incense and exotic-ness. I was ten years old and an only child. My parents wanted more children and weren’t able to conceive. At this moment, in 1974 in the airport, my life changed, and a new world opened. A world so different from the ordinary Swedish everyday life.

In my childhood I was loved and cared for, and my family was rather “normal”. I was quite a shy child, often dreaming of travelling to other countries. A longing to visit the exotic place where my sister had come from, arose in me. Over the following years, we had visitors coming from India, to see how my sister was doing i her new home country, and they were very kind to me too.  My best friend, who also had an adopted sister from India, and I used to pretend that we traveled to India.