Going Home - Part 2

"My home is not a place, it is people."
- Lois McMaster Bujold

The taxi worms its way through the crowds at the airport and slowly enters the traffic. It is almost midnight and yet the roads are crowded – ah what a wonderful change it is to see a city that never sleeps. There is a palpable aura in the streets – something that I cannot place my finger on. Here and there, I spot speeding vehicles filled with young men and kids whooping with joy, their screams peppered with the noise of fireworks…….the aerial display robbing the sleep from the eyes of my kids and leaving them mesmerised in a trance like state.

For a moment, I wonder if the city is celebrating the return of the prodigal daughter (erm, in case you are wondering, c’est moi)……and then it dawns on me, India has just won the Cricket World Cup and hence the festivities and the partying. I have been away too long to partake in such jubilations but still couldn’t help smiling at the exuberance displayed …… it was hard to stay unaffected by the national pride exhibited on the streets.

So much has changed during my absence and yet so much hasn’t – I am still hanging onto my dear life in the rollercoaster ride of a taxi while it weaves in and out of the traffic maze. Gone are my own reckless driving days on the back of a two-wheeler albeit a 50cc motorbike; today even within the confines of a car, I cannot stop sweating at the negligent driving and the sheer volume and speed of the oncoming traffic.

For someone who experiences heavy doses of “reverse cultural shock” every time I fly back to India, I usually find the first few days unbearable…..or rather my body “protesteth” a lot; however the saga of my repatriation continues despite the whiny protests of my senses. Since I decided to stay overseas and make my home elsewhere for my kids I believe I have sometimes successfully alienated myself with my choices and have lost the rights to object to the disparity I find between the two worlds I occupy. Regrettably, a few of us are living our lives in transit, as mere spectators, no longer having the luxury of belonging to…….neither to the country that defined us nor to the country that we have adopted.

It is with such conflicting thoughts I enter my childhood home – a place still abounding with my memorabilia, fondly cherished and treasured by my parents. Nothing has changed much within the house in the last four years or perhaps ever since I moved out of that house over a decade ago – time is frozen here. However I could not say the same of my parents – sadly I discover that time and separation has etched a different story on their visages. But our visit, especially that of the kids have brought a huge difference in their otherwise routine life, fraught with loneliness and solitude. I can visibly see that I have added a few more years to my mother’s life, especially when her ailing heart had almost decided to give up on her a few weeks ago prior to our visit. Very soon the house is filled with raucous and joyful shouts of the kids, voices of visiting friends and relatives, phone calls and mobile ringtones……the days pass too quickly in the warmth and safe confines of my family’s love and attention.

Before long it will be time to leave and with a heavy heart, we would bid each other painful farewells. My parents’ agonising wait for another homecoming trip will commence. As for me I will return to a world, where I will be forced to put on the mantle of the adult and deal with reality that is not always kind to me. It would be a long wait before I can become a child again in my parents’ house. To my dismay, I am very much painfully aware of the fragility of our lives and I realise someday my home will be bereft of the people who care for me and my own family. I would lose the focal point of going home then…….but till then these trips will always be a ritual of my life.