a tribute to home...

What is it about this place we call home? What is it that a mere slur against the very name makes our blood boil… The place where many of us were born and many of us spent more than half our lives….what is it that a mere song or a tale brings back rushing moments of the joys and sorrows we felt?

Our escapades, our near scrapes with the authorities…the overnights, the walks along the airport road…the memories of meeting in Lulu centre…Annual day and Khareef festival—the highlights of the year…the numerous picnics, the field trips….the Jabals, the camels…bus rides…sports day… the choir!!

Yet, we yearned for our freedom, from the oppressive environment, and yet the heart craves to go back to the place where we once “were.”

A photograph, a place, a person brings back so many memories that tears well up and we ache to return home, return to the place where we first learnt to walk, where we made our first friends, where we made our best friends, where we discovered our talents, a place where we lost the people dearest to us, where we found the people dearest to us….

The bonds we created there were the strongest ever…people who dint matter then have become so much more important to us today…a random person from school adds us on FB and we immediately accept, an attempt to move closer to where our heart is…

Salalah, the heart of Oman, the oasis in the desert, our home… has become our haven, a place to heal, to recuperate, to bask in the memories of our childhood, to go back to the time when life was innocent and childlike, when we dreamt of bigger things, bigger places….we’ve reached where we wanted to…but our heart is still stuck where it was…

Some may call it a fool’s paradise, which practically speaking, it may be, but I’d (and many of us) rather be a fool than let go of my home…

Catharsis...Part 2

I'm so bored... m home alone...and normally I'm most comfortable being with myself .... but i guess the only thing i can blame this restlessness on is the fact that I'm no more used to being alone for so long, and its getting to me.. to top it all, all my friends are busy and m not keeping too well... so now I've become bitchy and cranky and taking it out on people who cant help it... Im not liking my self right now :(

there is so much i can do but Im either too tired or too lazy... feeling sick being home all day... not used to it.. its high time i went out... not now obviously given that its 1230 am. this has to be one of the most boring Sundays of my life for sure.....

Catharsis...Part 1

There are times when I just feel like writing whatever comes to my mind….I mean if I actually record whatever I think in the entire day, each day would fill a book. Sometimes I wonder at the capacity of my mind to think so much. There are times when the feelings, so closely connected with my thought stream, overwhelm me to such an extent that I actually want to vent out. I feel like writing, verbatim, what I’m thinking, but it just never comes out right. So frustrating

We’ve been having continuous counseling lectures ever since our third semester ended. In a way they’ve been a learning experience, especially as far as the practical aspect is concerned. And I realized that somewhere just talking to a third person about any problem in life, and being accepted and attended to wholly, makes me feel so much lighter. I don’t remember when introspection became a big part of my life, but I know that there are times when I’m feeling very uncomfortable and wonder why, and then I introspect, peer into my mind and try to detect whatever is disturbing me. Off late, I’ve come to realize that I haven’t really had a very happy childhood. Somewhere I feel I just “was.” If you ask me what I remember most vividly about childhood, I wouldn’t have a thing to say. Coz somewhere I really don’t remember anything significant. As I’m writing this, a million memories come to mind, but somewhere I don’t feel satisfied that any of these are THE one.

I’ve realized that I tend to be extremely self critical. I feel that most things I think or feel aren’t right, but then it’s ok as long as I don’t act upon or express those feelings. But somewhere, another chord strikes in my mind, where I feel that maybe its normal to feel this way, maybe others think in the same manner, and like me, don’t express it. Its weird, but its true.

If I were to describe myself, I’d say I’m a person who seems very cool, calm, and confident on the outside, but somewhere inside, I’m a lost little girl. I’m not perfect, nor am I a very imperfect person. There are extremely nasty sides to me that I always curb because I know that thinking or acting in those ways are not correct. Somehow I feel that I have begun to analyze myself and discover my true self more, and u know what?? I’m not liking it. I don’t like who I am on the inside. Hey, I’m not ALL bad. I do have good qualities: I can love and give and care, I am a loyal friend, helpful, Independent, responsible… I have talents, I’m fairly intelligent.

Somewhere it crosses my mind that maybe, just maybe, I expect too much from myself. That I’m so intent on being the perfect person that I expect to be, that I forget to concentrate on the real me. There is a therapy in psychology wherein it is important to be able to strike a balance between the real and the ideal self. Somewhere I think that I need to do that. Bring what I am to people closer to what I feel I actually am….