Where is home

okay

so a few years ago my family and i went

on vacation to singapore

and i went up to this really cute guy

to start a conversation very brave with

me

now all was well and good until me asked

me a very simple question

where are you from in that moment

i was genuinely stumped i had never

realized that

i wasn’t able to answer a question so

simple

obviously i didn’t say i don’t know but

instead i responded with

i have lived in and currently live in

china and by blood i’m from india

now he didn’t seem to think twice about

this but now i had come to the

realization that

i don’t know where i’m from i don’t know

where i belong

obviously he didn’t care but

i was upset and i was annoyed this is

such a simple question

why am i having such a hard time

answering it

more than annoyed i think i was scared

you see

to many belonging is the sense of

fitting

in you are an important member of a

group you are someone other than

yourself

i am not alone in this world i belong to

this group of people

i am from this country but i was alone

now

where did i belong where was i from

i was scared now when

i thought of this i took a lot of time

to think of this question

the thing is how had i gone on so long

without being able to answer this

question you know

our self-identity our social identity is

a sense of fitting in

it’s where we belong in a society and it

is

a root of our self-esteem and our pride

so

now where do i get my pride from you

know i don’t i can’t be nationalist

i don’t do i belong here do i belong

there

how had i gone on so long without

knowing the answer to such a simple

question

you see as a kid i thought i belonged to

both india

and china then i came to the realization

that i belong to neither not fair

see i thought that you know because i

had lived here my whole life i was

chinese enough and i spoke really good

chinese too you know i’m always

impressing people on the streets

but that’s not enough that doesn’t count

i don’t think anymore

and my family and i we go to india once

a year at least

and it’s always so much fun you know we

stay at my grandma’s house the entire

extended family is

all together so much fun so much

laughter

everyone but when my cousins talk about

the latest bollywood reference that i

can’t understand

or when i’m made fun of for pronouncing

something wrong in hindi

i also know that i don’t belong there

now when i go home when i go home to my

family in china

my mom and dad do their best to make

sure that me and sammy my little sister

are always in touch with our indian

heritage we celebrate all the cultural

holidays

and we also try and pass on as many

familial traditions as we can

but when you talk about that roadside

samosa you had with your friends

or the song you heard on the radio i

can’t identify with stuff so

that kind of stuff so it’s not fair for

me to say that this is where i’m from

i really like debating i love to talk

and i can hold my end in a debate about

anyone hitler

stalin mao you name it i got it but

when you talk about indian politics i

don’t know

so much i don’t know so much that it’s

embarrassing and it’s not

fair for me to say that this is where

i’m from this is where i belong

so i present my dilemma to my parents

and i go

you know where am i from now their

simple answer i’m indian so you’re

indian it wasn’t a lot of help

so i call up my aunt my aunt was in a

similar situation like me growing up

because by blood she is indian but she

was born and brought up in the u.s

we talked for a little while and her

great advice cheesy as it is

home is where the heart is i know i know

super cheesy but you know what i laughed

in that moment when she told me

but i think i agree now i don’t need to

pick one

place that i belong to i don’t have to

belong to india

i don’t have to belong to china i belong

to my friends

i belong to my family these are the

people that i belong to and that’s what

matters

in this world of chaos in one year i’ll

be moving i’ll be going to university

and then after that i’ll be going

somewhere else i hope to travel the

world

i don’t know if i’ll come home to china

or if i’ll come home to

india but i know that i’ll come home to

my family and that’s what’s important

so when you get lost in all the chaos in

the world and when life keeps changing

remember remember that you belong to

someone remember that you have someone

to come home to

because that’s what it is important and

like elvis presley said

my home is with my loved ones so that’s

all you have to remember

thank you for listening