July 29, 2006
Torn between home? and home.I wrote this post some time ago, had forgotten about it...
Everytime I need to get out of my apartment, for anything, I need to make sure I’m looking Fine - something that really annoys my mom. The minute she asks me to go pick up something from someone waiting down, get some groceries or fetch something from the car, I have to either change into something sober or do my hair.
Well no, it isn’t a girly habit, its just because, every time I step out of the house I just have to meet someone I know. There are people all over this place that know me, and I’d be conscious if they saw me untidy or dressed like I just got out of bed.
The reverse happens when I go ‘back home’ (as many comparatively recent Indian expats refer to it as) to
Usually I walk my way to work – a fair 15 minute walk through Karama. On the way, I am waved at by some relative/ friend passing by in his/her car, smiled at by some shopkeepers whose stores I frequent since a child, greeted by some random persons I know, just growing up in this place.
Ever since I’ve discovered Google Earth, I’ve indulged myself in playing around marking places I know. It took me about 15 minutes to spot my house here in
So…..which is actually Home to me?
A place where I was born in, went the same school as both my parents did (yes, in Dubai), grew up, built an identity where people know me, a place I am familiar with or a place where I visit for a month once in 3-4 years?
A place where my entire family struggles to survive, has no definite future, a place we may have to leave any moment some Sheikh decides we must, or a place that we have an apartment of our own – for sure, a place where we don’t even have a telephone number, a place I could easily get lost, but always turn to if I had to.
Often asked this question “where’re you from?” I say ‘
It goes on.. I can’t justify when I say I’m from Dubai, even though I was born here and lived all my life and it’s the only place in the world I know best.
In
So do I have a place?
I feel appalled when something like the bomb blasts happen in Mumbai. I do have relatives and friends there, but somehow its not the only reason. People I know wouldn’t want to consider me as a ‘Mumbai-ite’, because I never lived there and don’t even know how to get from one place to another!
In
Thinking about all of this, my future, where I belong, writing this post, I feel all the more confused now. Since I’ve lost interest I don’t think I want to write about this anymore… so that’s it.
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