Contemplations in Hong Kong About "Home" and Things I Miss

My annual visit "home" is a strange journey, for in South Africa I do not have a "home" in the traditional sense of the word. It is probably better to say that their are homes, in the plural sense, but that is not a complete truth either. Rather, there are many people in whose homes I will make myself at home for a couple of days at a time, until I return to my "home" in my guest country. Thinking about this "home"-topic, I always think of the essay "Nowhere Man" in which the author admits his strange impartiality to all places, never a patriot of any place, but also at home everywhere. I resontate with that -- I feel equally at home and foreign, equally comfortable and uncomfortable, where ever I go. Another half truth, of course. There are places where I'm more comfortable (or uncomfortable) than others. I'm definitely more comfortable here in Hong Kong than I was in Kungmin, Mainland China; defintely more comfortable in Seoul, Korea than I am in Johannesburg, South Africa; definitely more comfortable in Potchefstroom than I am in Cape Town; definitely more comfortable in Luang Prabang, Laos, than in Polokwane, Limpopo; definitely more comfortable in Harajuku, Tokyo than in Bangkok, Thailand; more comfortable in Bangkok than in Richardsbay, KZN. If being "at home" equates the place you feel comfortable, then there is little doubt that homeliness is a very relative concept.

In my little 3m x 4m room here in Tsim Tsa Shui, in Kowloon, Hong Kong, I'm pretty comfortable with my wi-fi, double bed and cozy duvet, my tablet, and books (both paper books and electronic books: philosophy, short stories, martial arts, religious, poetry). The fact that the shower's water is not as boiling hot as I like it, is probably the only discomfort I'm experiencing at present.

"I'm a citizen of the planet" sings Alanis Morissette.

I decided to visit Hong Kong again because I've missed it. I've longed for it as for an old friend I haven't seen in a long time. It happens. As an expatriat people often ask me if I miss South Africa. An honest answer is no. I miss people in South Africa, I miss the energies of specific places in South Africa, but I do not miss South Africa as a whole. I miss sitting in a coffee shop in Luang Prabang, but I do not miss Laos. I miss feeling at home amongst the freaks in Harajuku, but I do not miss Japan. I miss that little jazz cafe in Apgujeong (Seoul) that closed recently; I miss my childhood friend Keith McKenzie with whom I was only friends for a year; I miss some of my Taekwon-Do students that I ony taught for a couple of months; I miss Jackie Horn, another childhood friend whom had the most beautiful singing voice; I miss my mother in front of the organ; I miss the big bath tub I had in the commune I lived in during the final year I worked on my master's degree thesis; I miss taking drives from Richardsbay to Kloof, Pietermaritzburg, with my friend Garnet that now lives in the UK; I miss dancing on New Year's Eve with my brother's ex-girlfriend; I miss the trees I climbed in as a child; I miss all my cats that had lived up their nine lives; I miss easy access to deep one-one, face-to-face, conversations with my best friends; I miss double cream Greek style yogurt; I miss innocence; I miss my grandmother's apricot jam tarts; I miss kissing soft lips; I miss characters from The Death Gate Cycle; I miss the smell of horses; I miss the old lady that made chamchi-kimchi bokkembab (Tuna and Kimchi stir fried rice); I miss the feeling of a man's stubble on the back of my hand; I miss South African achar in red pepper oil; I miss the Chonin Exam in Naruto; I miss drinking chocalate milk while sitting on the beach in Mtunzini; I miss smelling a women's neck; I miss my childhood flights of fantasy when I imagined myself being a unicorn, or a black panther, or an elf; I miss eating whitebread peanut butter and apricot jam sandwiches with a glass of freshly milked milk; I taking swims in the farm dam with my dog Tiga; I miss seeing flying peacocks (we had peacocks on our farm when I grew up); I miss thunderstorms in the Transvaal; I miss hugging trees while I still was a pantheist; I miss writing songs on my guitar; I miss running and sliding on a rugby field on a winter's morning when it is covered with frost; I miss taking piano classes; I miss getting excited about the actual good news of the Gospel with someone else that really get's God's character; I miss eating mango and coconut desert in Hong Kong (the last one was a lie since I've had it two times since being in Hong Kong -- that was part of the reason for coming here again); I miss the beautiful summer clouds and sunsets in the Laeveld; I miss playing Legos; I miss Dawie, Die Kabouter; I miss dancing with my mother in the kitchen; I miss the excitement I felt when I learned about Postmodernism and recognising myself in it; I miss; I miss lying on the roof of our farm house and looking at the stars; I miss the overlapping character sketches in Catch-22; I miss being able to do the splits; I miss a world where some people do not try to controll or rule over other people; I miss bunny chows; I miss working on my fantasy-adventure novel "Lightning Twins"; I miss first snow, first blossoms, first kisses, the first shaky steps of a toddler; I miss such things.

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