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On Home

A few months ago, I was sitting on one of the small stools in the kitchen, the ones that make you feel like a little child again, waiting for the water to boil. I was making tea for my dad and thought how cool a feeling that was, to be home again, doing home-things in a warm kitchen where everything was as familiar as it was leisurely. But later, in a different city, in a place just called home, a place that I have to remember by numbers - fourth right turn, third house on the left - a place I have to recognize by signboards and which I sometimes pass over in the dark because I miss the gate, a place where almost-strangers let you in when you ring the bell; I waited the same wait, standing and waiting for the water in a newer pateeli. It wasn't warm at all; it was just a cheerless, empty, disconsolate feeling. It made me feel low to even think of another place as home. Eating in alien plates, drinking in alien glasses. I never learnt to memorize the house number or the telephone number because it just didn't feel like home.

I drank Cherry Coke today and it tasted the same as regular coke, but the aftertaste was cherry-like. That might have been the most symbolic thing that's happened to me in weeks.

Comments

sam said…
erm...."the most symbolic thing that's happened to me in weeks" .... do i need to point out that this makes your life seem rather sad :p
10:17 AM
decaf said…
Sam, I think that was the point. I guess I should have said the most symbolic thing that I've accepted to be symbolic, because I'm so reluctant to see meaning in things now; it got to the point that you could find meaning in just about everything and anything: from sunsets and sunrises to your new MP3 player.

And of course, I meant that things are just passing by too quickly and that it's only by their 'aftertaste' that I can understand their real significance.
7:37 PM
3rd avenue said…
i dont like cherry colas...
they make me think of medicine for fevers and colds...
3:01 AM
Hasan Mubarak said…
Home's the greatest place to be living in. It's always great to be back at it.

Haven't tried Cherry Coke, however, now, I'll search for it in my neighbourhood store.
6:24 PM
Abbas Halai said…
hey thanks for the kind words mate. appreciate it. and cherry coke is pretty much the same as dr. pepper, no?
2:45 AM
Ali Hasanain said…
Six months ago, I left home for the first time in my life, to go settle on the other side of the planet.

I visited home in Winter break, and it was great, but I actually enjoyed being back here. Because this for now is where I'm based out of, this is home for now. Other students tell me the same thing.

The point is, give it time: it'll become home =)
8:03 AM
sam said…
I came back to comment on this post, not realizing i'd already read it and done that eons ago.

UPDATEEEEE ALREADY!!!!!!!!!!!!
11:23 AM
Anonymous said…
sam, I will. Been busy playing with my new camera :) I hadn't realized it'd been three months.
2:54 PM
Anonymous said…
HOME??????? I don't think such a place exists......you just "live" wherever you're supposed to be at that particular time in your life......otherwise.....there ain't any such thing known as "home".
6:38 PM
dhoop kinara said…
home is where the heart is...though of course much hard to fathom where the heart really could be if it at all is...

your post made me put on walk on by U2...strange huh?

'Home... hard to know what it is if you've never had one
Home... I can't say where it is but I know I'm going home
That's where the hurt is'
6:36 AM
Anonymous said…
seems like your search isnt over...
your journey is still underway :)
home is far from home !
11:03 PM
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