Can you be homesick at home?
I am homesick and I have my legitimate excuse. I am away from home, family, friends and all the things which make me tick, which make my blood boil and which bring a smile to my face.
But there are some people who are homesick at home, like this father and daughter duo.
Have we ever sat back and thought of Bahrain's forgotten sons and daughters, people who pay allegiance, love and loyalty to a land, they have never lived in but heard tales of from their parents?
People who now have a home, but whose undying love to the homeland grows stronger by the day?
People who are torn between the reality of their daily lives and the imaginary land of Dilmun, my homeland, the land of the infidels who worshipped a bull's head, whose relics an MP is so much in a hurry to get rid of to erase from memories our flirtation with civilisations before the dawn of Islam?
The unconditional love of Bahrainis to Wonderland never ceases to amaze me. It is real, raw and in your face.
Why would Bahrain want to import more "Bahrainis" when its own sons and daughters declare their love to it with every heartbeat? And why is Batool still alienated, now that she is finally home, among family and peers and people who have showered her with flowers and chocolates at the airport?
What is more lonely and sad? Being homesick when you are away from home or feeling homesick when you have finally reached a home that pulled you to it in your fantasies, until you woke up one day to see that it was all just a dream?
20 February 2006
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5 comments:
Can you be homesick at home?
Silly, I don't know if it works that way in Islam, but in Christian devotional literature it is a recurring theme to see Heaven or Paradise as, essentially, Home, but a better home without war, strife, discord and - dare I say - without bigotry. C.S.Lewis put that in a very succinct way in the last book of the Narnian Chronicles, where he showed that the Heaven of the English children was England, not as it was, but rather as it should have been or as God meant it to be. I reckon you are able to apply the same idea to Bahrain.
The emotional draw of country is very strong, indeed! The story of the father and daughter you link to is tragic. I returned to Canada from the US so my son would grow up a Canadian. It took my grand mother three trips back to England between world wars and the Depression to finally decide she was a Canadian. Perhaps, someday Bahrain will find its way as a country that is worthy of the loyality it citizens show it.
" feeling homesick when you have finally reached a home that pulled you to it in your fantasies, until you woke up one day to see that it was all just a dream "
Is a scary thing !! and so depressing , like all yr expectations & hopes that u have made before are vanished !! a VERY bad feeeling !
CheeeerZ!
Thanks Dar. It is scary and depressing .. especially when u finally arrive home ;)
I stumbled over here trying to find out if anyone else is homesick while at home. So I guess your answer is yes, you can be achingly homesick while at home. And it doesn't mean you want to die and go to heaven. Sometimes it just means you don't feel like you belong. Maybe it means you dream too much. Or perhaps you're being called back to somewhere you've never been.
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