What And Where Is Home?
“The place where one lives permanently, especially as a member of a family or household.” – definition of
“Where is your home?”
We have been asked this question so many times in our lifetime and we are sure many of you answered the same question numerous times as well.
And now, being on this continuous journey around the world, with no fixed plans whatsoever, we hear it more often than ever, as we meet more and more people.
All curious to know where we’re from and where we’re heading to. And to answer this question suddenly becomes a challenge.
Our conversations with the people we meet will always include one of the questions: “When and where are you going back to?”, “Where do you live?”, “Where will you go after this?”, “Where’s home?”, “Where do you plan to settle?”.
This raises the question – are we homeless?
“(of a person) without a home, and therefore typically living on the streets.” – definition of homeless by Oxford English Dictionary
Thinking about the answers we usually give, we realize that they are never precise. As we are moving continuously with no permanent residence how can we tell where is home? By definition, this is supposed to be a “place where one lives permanently”.
But we left what used to be our permanent home for an indefinite period of time. Where does that leave us? We struggle to give answers, and usually, these answers are tailored by the surroundings in which we find ourselves at that very moment in time.
The answer will never be the same and there will always be a “but…” involved. So why is that? Do we have a home? Or are we actually homeless?
The world is our home
If we go back in time, we remember meeting people that would say “The world is my home.”, or that “Home is where your heart is.”. Quotes like these, from both famous and anonymous individuals.
Sayings that we understand now better than ever. We gave it some thought and based on our life experiences and after asking ourselves three crucial questions, we came to a conclusion.
But first, the 3 questions:
1. Is it home only if it’s an actual building – four brick walls and a roof?
From the very moment we were born, up until we finished high school, our home was in our hometown. Our parents’ HOUSE was our HOME. It was 100% theirs, bought and owned and that is what we thought a home means, at the time.
A construction that you can call yours. That nobody can take away from you. And that is what we knew we will have one day. That is what everybody fights to have at some point in their lives.
2. Can home be someone else’s house?
After we finished high school and it was time to go to University, we had to leave our parents’ home, if not forever, then at least for several years. So we moved to Cluj-Napoca, 300 km away from our hometown. A 7h train/bus ride.
We rented various proprieties and even though we didn’t own them, slowly-slowly they became our home, for the period of time we lived in them.
However, in our early days at University, when someone would ask us ”Where is home?” we would answer with no hesitation Falticeni, our hometown. So we were not quite connected to the place where we were currently living, as we would be to the place where we grew up and lived for so long.
And even though the property was owned by our parents, we felt we have the same rights as they do to call it OUR home.
– social expectations –
In our minds, the time spent at University was just a transition period, one that would help us develop and give us enough knowledge and resources, which we would later use to build a successful career and one would hope, a decent salary.
All so that we can build our own family and our own HOME – that roof over your head which everybody needs and wants so badly.
By the time we knew it, University was over. During those years, we rented numerous places and we got to experience what would have been the first step in figuring out that home is more of a state of mind, rather than something physical.
But did we realize this at the time? No, we didn’t. Our minds were molded in such a way that all we knew was that the goal in life is to work hard enough to be able to buy or build a house. Only then, you will have a home.
And so we waited for that career to knock on our door as soon as the years of study were over, but it never showed up. Not then, at least. And we were eager to see things happening, to see that days don’t go by without any meaning.
– it’s time to move again –
So off we went. This time, to England. First, it was only to work in order to travel around the UK. The opportunity arose so we didn’t think twice before we said yes. Similar to the “Work & Travel” program for students, which we had already tried while in University (Greece & U.S.A.).
In what seems a blink of an eye, 7 years had past and we were still in the UK. With the status of tenants and not actually owning a home there, these places became our home away from home.
So now, when people would ask us “where is home?” we’d be rather confused.
In the first few years, the answer would still be the name of our hometown. However, after a couple of years and after settling in better in our adoptive country, we started calling “London” our home.
Our hometown would still be somewhere in the back of our minds. Not completely forgotten and it seemed like it would always be ready to pop-in as soon as the subject arose.
I guess, at that time, we were still having second thoughts about where we would choose to settle. And then, it didn’t take long and we realized that we’re not going back to Romania any time soon.
So “London” and “England” replaced our hometown (Falticeni) and Romania completely, in this sense. And to our surprise, we didn’t have to own a house to call it home.
We were living with rent, but the place became our HOME. Both our minds and hearts agreed on that.
3. Can “home” be a hotel room, a tent, a car, or just an open-air space, somewhere where you can sleep for the night and where you feel safe?
Then something of major importance happened. We chose to travel around the world, for an undetermined period of time. But that meant leaving our home in London with no idea of what the future would bring.
The world seemed so big and it was quite frightening to think about whether we will have a safe place to go to at night or not. And yet, we gave up our room, our home in London and bought two one-way tickets to see the world.
Now, almost 17 months into our journey and the world seems much smaller and not as dangerous as we initially thought it will be. We have realized one very important thing.
Our home took different shapes during these few months: airports, cars, tents, strangers’ houses, friends’ houses, hostels, hotels and so on. However, there is one very important aspect that didn’t change.
– The one without which a home cannot be home, and that is “us” –
No matter where we are in this world, and no matter if we move from one place to another every single day, the place where we choose to rest for the night, or where we go to find the peace and quiet that we need, becomes our home.
When we say “let’s go home”, we think and feel that home is where we’ll go to at the end of the day. We don’t think of our parents’ house or our room in London.
Home – a state of mind
Nor do we feel the need to have a physical, fixed place anymore, somewhere in this world. A place that’s ours with papers and from where we won’t have to move. A place which in its very essence it is merely…a building.
And yes, that building can be your fort and it can offer you so much safety. But at the same time, it is so fragile that it can be brought down to pieces or taken away from you in the blink of an eye.
And that’s how we understood that Home is actually “YOU”. You and your family or you on your own. Your home is where you are and where you feel safe.
It is not home anymore if you are not there. Thus
Home is where you are
As long as you understand that you don’t need to spend your whole life paying for something that requires much more energy and money than you can actually produce.
And we’re not saying you shouldn’t buy a house, build a house, find your own place, that place where you can escape and where you feel safe if this is what you want.
But just know that if you can’t be one of those who own, it is not the end of the world. The most important thing is to find your home within you and be happy with your life.
Don’t ever compare yourself to anyone else or feel like you need to compete with anybody. Don’t go for the bigger, the better, the most luxurious, just because others do.
Unless you know you can really afford it, and that is what YOU want. Think for yourself and don’t forget to prioritise!
High standards
We all set up some really high standards just because we think it is the norm. And these are the “perks” of being part of society. But ask yourself: is less than what others have not enough for you?
Is it worth to work your whole life only to pay a mortgage, being caught up in the future, forgetting that the most important time in life is “NOW”, the present moment?
After all, it is the only moment that is guaranteed. And of course you have to be prepared for the future, just don’t let yourself be completely sucked into it.
Stress can ruin a home, while less stress will strengthen its walls
And as contradicting as it may sound, even we would like to own a house in the future.
Hoping though, that we will follow our present mindset and use the minimum amount of resources into purchasing it, refurbishing it or even building it.
Looking back on how we’ve managed to survive so far without owning a house and still felt like home everywhere we lived (short or long term), we would try to invest as less amount of time, money and stress as needed to finalize this process.
The answer
On this amazing journey around the world, our home took various shapes: airports (for as long as three nights in a row), small cars, big cars, camper vans, trains, buses, strangers’ houses, friends’ houses, hostels, hotels, each and one of them became our home at some point.
Were we happy?
Of
We guess we’ve learnt to ADAPT and thanks to this we look at life from a different perspective. Change is difficult, but it teaches you to focus on what’s truly important in your life. Most of all, you learn that the important things in life will remain constant, despite all the changes.
Now, what’s our answer to the question “Where is home?”?
Home is wherever we find ourselves in this world, because it is in our very own person.
And today, as we write this post, we are in our home (hotel room), in Muscat, Oman.
