Wednesday 1 April 2009

What will it be like?

I’ve been musing over what it will be like to return to England. I can’t quite take in that in a week’s time I’ll be on my way. I picture scenes of greeting my family, who I have not seen for two years, with big hugs, and returning to familiar places and ways of life. But will it seem familiar any more? How will it be…
…to drive a little car on busy roads after driving a Land Rover on dirt tracks?
…to walk into a shop and have to choose which brand of margarine to buy, after only having one choice?
…to walk into a supermarket, after using shops that more closely resemble a village corner store? …to pay with plastic rather than cash?
…to walk down a street without being called out to, blending into the crowd?
…to drink water straight from the tap rather than from a filter?
…to be able to put a frozen pizza in the oven instead of making it all myself?
…to be ignored by people walking by rather than receiving friendly greetings as I go?
…to be reunited with people who were close, knowing that I have changed and that they too will have moved on?
The truth is, England doesn’t feel like home anymore. It seems like another world I once read about, my only connection with it now being through emails, letters and the BBC website! How will it feel to walk on English soil once again? Will it then seem like Tanzania is just a dream?
I think one of the hardest things about living here is that nowhere will ever feel completely like home again. I love Tanzania, but it’s not my culture, I can’t feel completely at one with the place. And yet I’ve absorbed something of this place into my being, and so England will never quite be my home again either. Where does that leave me?!

2 comments:

Carole said...

"Sigh"

Liz Wisbey said...

Right now, and I'm on many other occasions to come, it leaves you on a bus in the middle of a 12 hour marathon! Pole sana! We'll be praying for you from our big quiet house... M