There's no place like home

Home is where the heart is. 

I originally wrote this a little while ago as a reflection of 2016 and opening up for 2017. The topic, I think, it's an always ongoing process, so here's to these feelings and the journey to discover home. One which I thought I had already understood what it meant before but then 2016 truly has brought a whole lot deeper meaning into it. So here's a little look at how 2016 set me homes. 

The beginning of the year was the beginning of my new journey. I just started applying for school, applying for scholarship, and thinking about embarking on a new phase. I didn't meticulously planned it. It was a now-or-never thing. I didn't prepare any back up plan. Just jump right through it. I just knew it had to work. It had to. There were few bumps in the road, sometimes I really felt like giving up or having second thoughts that may be this is not the path I'm supposed to take, but eventually things fell beautifully into place. I got accepted into the school I wanted and I got a scholarship to pursue it. It was a blessing beyond belief. That's the first milestone to the journey. Nothing yet related to finding homes, but it is the root.

Along the way, I started to meet new people. I was away from home for a quarantine of the scholarship programme, there I get to know new friends and those new friends become new family, they become "home" on that week I was away from home. I don't know how long those kinds of friendship that is formed on a time-frame kind of basis would last, but at that time that's your comfort of home. Then also came the time that I need to resign from my work-place, it was then I realised, the team I worked with and spent every working hours and every overtime hours kind of become also my family. They've hold another definition of home. It's like waving goodbye at a half-piece of you whilst holding on to the other half-piece in the other hand.

Then it was time for me to leave my friends and my family, my actual home, to pursue my dreams. It was not easy, trust me. I tried to cover up all the tears of saying goodbyes with laughter. I basically couldn't say good-bye at the airport cause soon I'll start bawling. It was also a scary thought to be in a new place, alone. But, no. Universe always have a surprise for you. In Norway, 10 937 km away from home. I have found another home, people that makes you feel loved and right at home. People that takes care of you and take you in their life, if not by fate, by choice. 

Close to the end of the year, I went on my first multi city-multi country trip. I met different people and traveled with different group of friends. It's then when I realised, when you're away from home, on that mini nomad portion of your time, you'll never feel alone -no matter where you are- as long as you're close to "home", those you invest your love in. Finding a home is a journey in which you'll discover yourself on the way. I'm still looking for it everywhere I go, every time. Because for me, home is a feeling. Home is where the heart is. Home is where love is, as Elbert Hubbard quotes the love you give away is the only love you keep.