How easy it is to return – just step on that plane, plug in the earphones, chew the plastic tasting food shapes provided for your mid air nourishment and pass the hours over the Pacific Ocean… then the plane lands, you smile at the immigration official, collect your bags and walk through the gates – your family stands there, bleary eyed at 4am but with their arms open and takeaway coffees at hand. You step into the car and the machine moves over the smooth roads leading to a house that contains all those familiar smells and tastes and sounds… this is the place you call home. The air is clean and you can breathe it deep into your lungs, the water is clear from the taps and you can drink it without regard for cost or plastic waste. It takes awhile to be absorbed and then you realise that the past two and a half years of foreign environments are over. It’s strangely liberating.I’m overwhelmed at the amount of “things” around me, overwhelmed at the thought of all these belongings of mine inside boxes stacked in the garage. After the enforced utilitarianism of backpacking having more than two choices of clothing in the morning leaves me manic and uncertain. Suddenly the value of the multi-purpose is no longer greater than the value of the aesthetic or the comfortable.
Talking contains similarities. After extended periods spent without real conversation on the abandoned roads through southern Chile, to suddenly speak is intoxicating. I watch this huge outpouring of words, each falling on the top of the other, and wonder if I actually convey what I am intending to. Seeing people I used to know invokes an unexplained fear and listening to old music brings a rushing of buried emotions and memories: I am indeed this same person who left here those years ago and I am also not. I think that returning somewhere is a process as complex as leaving and I will walk this new road slowly and see what brings fluidity.
What I have learnt beyond any doubt is that this country is where I belong. I return with the clear knowledge that I will not make a great fortune in my life here; I will not have access to European intellectualism or cheap electronic equipment. I may not even have the opportunity of international travel again. And I choose that. I choose it because this country offers a quality of life that is incomparable with the rest of the world. These mountains, this blue sea, these towering kauri trees and wild black sand beaches are an intrinsic part of my being. I could never leave them. And these people who we call New Zealanders, with their loud over-familiarity and strong accents, the beautiful ethnic mixtures that form our communities: Maori, Chinese, Polynesian, Indian, “Pakeha”, Malaysian… these are my people. Together we share a nation that could lead the world. I am proud to be a New Zealander… and I am home.
3 comments:
Welcome home, Luisa. Yes, that's how it is. At times I, too, grew desperate for a conversation where I could communicate complex thoughts — something more than trying to work out which bus I was supposed to catch (although that was often complex enough).
Good luck with the settling back into life in Aotearoa.
Especially the part about how "multi-purpose is no longer greater in value than aesthetics and comfort"!! And how all of a sudden there are people to talk A LOT to. I remember feeling that way, actually, going home for weekends when I first moved to New York and didn't know anyone. Anyway, so glad you're safe back in amazing New Zealand with your family and black sand beaches around you again. I think there's a very good chance that New Zealanders WILL lead the world someday! XOXO.
So....after all this time ryan decides to inform me that you had a blog documenting your travels. Thanks ryan. This is quentin by the way....:)
Hope you had fun.
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