Home is where the heart is

I couldn`t agree more ... gone are the days when you are solely known by the place you are from. Home is where you feel at home, it does reside neither in a person nor in a city. I remember my Canadian friend in Manchester (where i went for my degree) asking if i adjusted well in the city and i said, yeah i am completely at home, which surprised her. What i didn`t tell her that there are places in Pakistan where i would not feel comfortable venturing out alone and that alone makes that city more of a home than any other place.

in this globalized world, when more and more people are leaving their hometowns, home is not permenant, it moves with you .....

You are lucky, who at least feel at home in a hotel apartment. There are many who find themselves uprooted even in their ancestral homes. It`s all psychological, how you adapt to the changing situations. These are challenges of a fast moving world. Don`t surprise if you find someone telling you that after the day`s hubbub he returns to his home at the aerodrome.

Samar

home is where the heart is....and my heart is in Bombay....though i am myself away in some middle eastern country ttrying to make something out of my life.

as they say...be it ever so humble, there`s no place like home!!!!

rgds,

devkant.

One of the most important concepts in German culture is that of a “Hutkleiderbugel”, or a place (hook) where you hang your Hat upon entering your home. It is considered a very sacred place for a German. For Gypsies, being at home is to be on the move. Every culture places importance to the concept of Home, but defines it differently. It is nice to see that the author of this article is at home wherever he happens to be at any given time.

To me, Home is where one gets buried at the end of the life – so the ass can rest in peace, for once, after a long and tiring journey.

Home is where memories of your child hood are formed..

if you are not nostalgic you will be

``Whats the use of being a king if you cant be at home at the end of the day``
i would like to add further whats the use of being king if u cant openly walk on the road, if u cant go freely to shopping mall, if u cant sit in the CHOWK to eat samosas, pakoras, fruit chart and dahi bhallay, in simple words whats the use of being a king if u cant live freely a happy ordinary life?

A great article!
Home really is a state of mine. (I meant to type `mind` there, the `mine` was a strange freudian slip typo). But yes, a sense of ownership in a location, and feeling comfortable in surroundings does make it home.
I`ve experienced this myself when I`ve referred to my guesthouse room as home, despite the majority of my belongings being in a completely different country.

Some people swear by putting up a couple of personal effects, some by some personal habits (a yoga session, morning jog, etc).

The sad thing is when a person does not feel at home in places where they originate or would ordinarily, like samar1982 mentioned in #2

This article inspires interesting questions. I am still confused about where my home is.

For now, I live in an apartment. Sometimes I think, if I buy a house on mortgage, I might find my home. Sometimes I think, if I go back to pakistan, I will find my home. But then, I might not feel home there because of the shit-free life I am used to here.

I feel that if you leave a country with a rotten soul like pakistan at an age of 23, you are making yourself homeless for the rest of your life.

But definitely, Pakistan (place where I grew up) is my dearest past home.

For me its a matter of the values I identify with and where I feel most comfortable. Even a visit to Canada last year felt awkward, although nothing much changes when crossing over into Canada. It just feels right when returning from a voyage.

Re: # 8 what about when you feel more at home somewhere a million miles from where you ought to feel home? In a people and culture and climate so vastly different from where you have lived all your life.
People are strange :)

abskii

Not strange at all. Quit being so silly.

(I am not sure if a smiley is needed at the end there. Please add one if you need it.)

Re: # 10 Can`t completely understand the point in `ought to feel home`. You feel home when you feel like you do. There are no shoulds, woulds, oughts. Your culture is what you feel is your culture. While almost always, you will have influences of your culture of origin but you are never condemned to belong to any specific culture by any morality. Your culture is a combination of the influences you volunteer to incorporate and the new dimensions you create yourself.

For example, it is a part of my culture of origin to say a phrase which translates into `peace be upon him` after somebody says the name of the prophet of islam. I invented it to be my personal culture to say `piece be upon him` (what type of piece is not specified). So you see my point, your culture is your culture and nobody else has it.

Re: # 12 Yes I see what you are saying, thank you. I think what I meant is when you do feel so out of place in your country and culture of origin (which, when you return to, people say `how does it feel to be home again?` and you can`t find the words to explain that you feel more at home on the road...)

But I do agree with you. :)

Re: # 11 Hello kaalchakra! Sometimes a smiley is needed to confirm the tone of a statement. In a longer piece of writing the tone is evident, but in a short comment it is not always so.

#13

``you feel more at home on the road``

I liked this part.

When I went to pakistan to visit a few months ago after many years, I stayed with my relatives and staying with them was a mess. You cannot force them to change their ways for your short visit but you yourself can never be comfortable with that. So, yeah, I felt more at home on the road some times.

I feel that if I am to return to pakistan, I will have the responsibility of creating a situation for me in which I don`t feel awkward. I cannot just have a bunch of expectations and then complain when they aren`t honored. After all, there is no god up there with a job to fix things for you. A broken thing is a broken thing until somebody fixes it.

Re: # 15 In a way you just move on, and what was home is no longer. After living away at university for so many years, moving back to my parents home was very difficult. Only by moving out again did things improve.