Wednesday, 16 February 2011

Sick of home and homesickness

One of the main reasons I decided to up sticks and move to Kenya was because I was sick of home. This is said with the greatest love and respect to my friends and family - those closest to me know that I don't mean this in any negative way about them or our relationship. It's a luxury and a priviledge to be able to look at your surroundings and decide you'd like to change it - and be able to do so without much difficulty. I feel very lucky to have moved and know that I have the support of family and friends - and that they'll always be part of my life.

At home, I was sick of everything being as I expected it. I had a very nice, very comfortable life. I knew that I could close my eyes and sleepwalk through my days - and that I'd probably open them 10 years later and wonder where all the time had gone. Many of my friends were making big changes in their lives - deciding to marry, buying houses, having children. Whilst they weren't paths I was interested in taking, I was watching other people move forward into uncertain, exciting new futures. Meanwhile I was moving around in a cosy circle.

Now, I'm certainly out of my litte circle. I'm living in an orphanage, just on the outskirts of Nakuru, Kenya. I get up at 5.30am most days and I wash in a bucket (more on that later). Little kids in the street point, laugh and stare as, even though Nakuru is partly on the Kenyan tourist track, muzungos are still few and far between. I eat beans, maize flour and cabbage most days and constantly smell of mosquito repellent. Am I homesick? Not perhaps in the way most people think about it. I've no desire to return home, I don't miss familiar places, activities or luxuries. I love it here - I love the fact that everyday I'm struggling to figure out how to live, work, play. I love the heat and the landscape and the new places to explore and people to meet. However there is always a little ache - an ache that gets a bit bigger when I'm tired or stressed or hungry, or when I talk to people I love whose lives are moving on without me. It's an ache that I wouldn't want to be without and probably the day I can't feel it anymore is the day I'll know it's time to go home.

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