There's No Place Like Homes

A while ago in Juba, I noticed a new store in the area near the IAS office—Chinese Supermarket! When I stopped by I was gratified to note the authentic long strips of plastic hanging in the doorway, a staple of Chinese business establishments, especially stores and small street restaurants and cafeterias. Once inside I was greeted by the old familiar smell of Chinese shops—herbs, soy sauce, garlic, dried fish, plastic stuff. I say “old” because it’s been a while since I’ve been back in China (2009). My Chinese friends in Mundri once asked me when was the first time I’d been to China. I said 2003 (though I think it was 2004, actually), and he said, “Oh, when you were 15?” I said, “Nope. I was 20.” (Which would have been true if I’d gotten the date right.) “Never!” he said. “You cannot be more than 24.” Which shows that not ALL Asians are good at math (because if I had been 15 in 2003, then I should be 25 or 26 in 2014, both of which are more than 24, the age that I cannot be more than, according to my friend Li). But when flattering a girl, it’s more important to keep the numbers low than to pay attention to Math.

Inside the Chinese Supermarket, two chubby middle-aged Chinese ladies screamed instructions at the South Sudanese men carrying in large heavy bags of various types of rice.  I know that they were not really angry or saying anything rude—that’s just how it sounds to people who don’t speak Chinese. Though I didn’t find candied, dried sweet potato strips  or meat-hair frosted red bean bread (crushing my vague hope of satisfying one or more of these cravings that China gave me), I did take note of the various sauces and vegetables that I could possibly buy there in the future when traveling back to Mundri where I have a kitchen to cook. And I decided to buy “fragrant fragile walnut meat biscuit” because, of course I did. When I asked, “多小钱?” The lady jumped back in surprise and we had a nice chat in between her yelling more instructions at various people.

As I walked out of the door of the Chinese Supermarket, I thought to myself, “Everyone needs to go to China and fall in love with it because then, wherever you are in the world, you will always get excited to find a Chinese shop in the middle of someplace you never expected it to be—you are guaranteed moments of excitement and nostalgia in your life forever after!”

A couple days later I was invited over to a new friend’s house. She’s from the Netherlands and she invited two other Dutch people and a Swedish guy to join us. We talked about ice-skating and European royal families. My role in the conversation was to talk about how I get a special thrill from leaving cups of water outside overnight during the winter (if I’m ever in the US over the wintertime), and finding it out there the next morning all frozen—nature’s magic trick! I’m always impressed. I also showed off my knowledge of Dutch words gleaned from  Indonesian “westafel” (sink) and “rok” (skirt). They were awed by the depth of my ability to speak their language. Definitely awed.  And then at the end of the meal, my friend brought out “speculaaaaaaaaaas”! (I added some extra vowels to show my excitement and also because, since it’s Dutch, there are definitely going to be extra vowels in there, and this is as good as I can guess for accurate spelling.) Speculaaaas (or Speculoos) are ginger-flavored cookies, often shaped like windmills. The sisters and I always loved these ubiquitous (in ex-Dutch colony Indonesia) packaged biscuits. I thought to myself, “And also, everyone needs to fall in love with Dutch ginger cookies because you get that same thrill that you get from finding a Chinese store on a random street in South Sudan when your friend busts them out for dessert.” And then I realized that I could keep going like this with countries and places and languages and foods that I love and get excited about seeing in unexpected places.

As a most-of-my-life long expat and TCK and general wandering traveler, I’ve nodded my head solemnly over articles that talk about how you can never go back to the place you loved because that place will always be different from how you remembered it. Really, it’s not the place that you want to return to, it’s the place and the time and the people who were with you and the life stage you were in, etc. That’s true of course—it is sometimes sad, but always true. And it’s really just a fact of Life in this World. BUT! It is also true that the more places you let yourself love, the more you will find pieces of moments and memories in places and times far from where you were.  And the speculaas will taste sweeter because one bite reminds you of buying them in the market nearby your house when you were in junior high and your older sister was back from boarding school craving them.  The smell of spices in a market in Khartoum will throw your brain back to the time you wandered through Souq Hammadiyeh in Damascus, looking for adventure. And the feel of walking through plastic flaps to get into a store will transport you back in time (for real it was 10 years ago, I am old) to walking through the cafeteria doors to 首都师范大学 (Capital Normal University) where you spent a summer studying Chinese and living with a Chinese family.

Kibbeh Labaniyeh

What I'm trying to say is that yes, traveling and living overseas means that you will learn to love things that you might never get/have/see/taste again. I remember this one guy who came out to Indonesia for a visit who insisted on eating nothing but bread and maybe some fried chicken at the hotel buffet. When we tried to get him to try other food he said, "What if I like it and then I can never get it again after I go back to America?" At first, this seems almost logical. And then you realize that he was just a really picky eater trying to find a good excuse not to try anything new. But the truth is that I might never again get to taste Um Mohamed's perfect kibbeh with the pomegranate seeds inside that gave it just the right touch of tang and sweetness to complement the seasoned meat and pine nuts in their crunchy bulgar shell. The first time I had them at her house was after my friends and I had forgotten which apartment building was hers and went around knocking on doors asking for Um Mohamed. This is hilarious if you know that "Um Mohamed" is what you call a woman whose first son's name is "Mohamed." Since many (or most) people in Muslim countries around the world name their first son "Mohamed," we found an "Um Mohamed" at almost every door we knocked on. Eventually we made it to the one we were looking for, and for our trouble, we were stuffed full of the best kibbeh in the world, which I'll probably never eat again. Then other day I got to eat some kibbeh labaniyeh (not from Um Mohamed, but still good) from a Syrian restaurant near my house in Khartoum served to me by a waiter who used to live in Rukkn Ed-din, Damascus (one of the places I lived while I was there) and is related to the owner of the shwaerma shop next door to my apartment. This was a bittersweet moment for us as we excitedly shared memories of a place we loved, knowing that he at least would still be there if not for the deteriorating situation in his homeland.

This store is actually in Khartoum

I wrote that whole paragraph and I still didn't get to point of what I was trying to say, which is that you will miss things from places where you travel. And not just the food--though, mostly the food, because you can make new friends, but you can't make your own kibbeh labaniyeh (unless you are Joanna because she is a great cook, and I am…….not). But the depressing articles and snotty tourist boys who visit Indonesia and tell you that you can never get those moments/places/tastes back are only partially right. You can't get those moments back, but because you had those moments, you are going to have many more moments that you wouldn't have had if you hadn't had those moments in the first place. (That last sentence totally makes sense, I just read it again to make sure.) 

So live your wandering life and cry your buckets-of-tears goodbyes but keep your eyes open for the world-crossing moments when you can be in China and South Sudan and Damascus and Khartoum at the exact same natsukashi moment. 

And now I will make my bonus point: 'natsukashi' is a Japanese word meaning 'the feeling you have when something brings back fond memories' that I learned from my parents who lived in Japan in the 70's. I've never even been there. But they shared their moment with me. Because when you have moments, you can share them with others so that they can benefit from a broader vocabulary because of you. And someday they might thank you for it. Or maybe they will just mention you briefly in a blog post. But that totally counts.

And now I will leave you with some photos of places and people I might never see again from life-changing moments before I go off to Zanzibar with an American friend that I met when I lived in Lebanon who now lives in Yemen before I go back to South Sudan because--international life.

The kid I wanted to adopt from the orphanage I volunteered
at while I was living in China in 2006.

My adopted mother in Shenzhen

My favorite Shenzhen friend's daughter.

My Jordanian mother who let me live with her
while I was learning Arabic

My BFF in Jordan who is also a mumtaztik Arabic teacher

I'm feeling especially nostalgic about Syria right now for some reason…

A scary photo of me carving a pumpkin in the apartment
where I lived in Syria--not knowing that several years later
I would meet a relative of the owner of the shwaerma shop
next door who is now living in Khartoum.

With some of my favorite students--
I don't know where any of them are now.

With my Palestinian/Kurdish roommate in Syria
and her cousin at a wedding in Damascus.
(I am not on drugs here, just anticipating a late night of dancing)

With another friend in a grocery store in Damascus.
I also don't know anything about where she or her family are now.

The ruins of Palmyra in Tadmor, Syria

The ruins of Tyre

My life is so hard.
Let this be a lesson to you.