it's been a long while. 3rd year is over, i passed, thank God. onto 4th year soon, but just for now, it's the holidays and after an epic journey that involved going to the airport at 4am with no sleep previously, waiting forever at heathrow airport, missing a flight at dubai, rushing from klia to lcct, experiencing heat like proper HEAT... and finally home.
been home for a week now...
but home.
the strange thing about studying overseas is there will be times when you just want to go home. you dream of the comforts of home, the familiarity of home, the luxuries of home, the warmth, the heat, the people, the food. the little snapshots of growing up at home.
but yet, when you come home, you realise what you've been dreaming of, most of the time, was the snapshot of home the moment you left it. and home changes. change can be annoying when all you want is for things to be the way it is. call me fussy but i don't dream of posh restaurants and gourmet cafes in kuching. i dream of the hot sweaty rm 2 or 3 at most kolo mee stall or laksa shop with the wobbly plastic chairs and tables. the ones which serve mee in the same old bowl with the chicken on it, chopsticks that look at least 5 years old. the chicken rice shop that serves simple chicken rice.
but home changes. kuching changes. it is, perhaps for the better, but better can be annoying if all i've dreamt of is the 'good'.
not complaining about air conditioned food outlets though. the heat has changed too. my oh my. or maybe i've changed, but i don't recall kuching being this hot.
but still, i take comfort in things that remain the same. the neighbours chicken crowing, the azan, the early morning newspaper delivery man on his motorcycle, the tropical insects, the frogs croaking, the dogs barking, the sound of rain pitter-pattering on leaves.
but change is not all that is to home.
memory. home comes with a lot of memories. memories of growing up and all the mistakes that comes with it. some sweet, some to laugh at, some not so.
fact is, everytime i'm back home, i feel like a little child. and with that comes childishness. Home time is usually holiday time, so there's this blissfulness attached to it. this feeling where even the smallest things can make your day feeling. but at the same time, there's the feeling where even the smallest things can break your day feeling. it's not justifiable, it's not rational, it's not logical, but sometimes it happens. home brings the child in me out, and as much as i love that child, i hate it. i hate it because i want to move beyond that child. when i was younger i hated people calling me cute, because i didn't want to be a child. i didn't like childishness, and yet i saw childishness in me coz guess what? i was a child. yet i didn't appreciate myself as a child. i grew up and i appreciated myself more as a teenager, a secondary school student and more so as a university student.
the worst thing about seeing myself as a child is i see that timid part of me, that girl that hides behind her mom/dad/brother. i see myself as one that is incapable of loving and being loved. i see myself as socially inadequate. and i see others seeing me as all these.
and yet, God has lift me up, grew me to be more than all these, why am i finding myself coming back to find myself at square 1? why do i still see myself as that timid little girl? why do i not learn to thank God for all that has happened in my life and how He has seen me through it, and how He has watched over my home, my hometown, my home church through all this years? Why do i not see the changes as something He has allowed and something i should thank Him for? Why?
just as i'm typing this, i'm remembered this video.
enjoy.
Charis is God's masterpiece, and you are too. :)
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