Friday, March 14, 2008

Hujan Emas Di Negeri Orang

"Hujan emas di negeri orang, hujan batu di negeri sendiri, lebih baik di negeri sendiri"
Malay Proverb

Translation: It may rain gold in someone else's country, and be hailing stones back in your own country, and yet it is best to be back in your own country.
Two weeks. Fourteen days. Three hundred and thirty six eventful hours.
Travelling home has always been a tug at the heart for me. Overseas we may be grown adults chasing careers and pursuing dreams that were promised to keep us happy. Yet our identities are locked over the seas, nestled in our little hometown, or the little taman where we grew up.
Two weddings. One election. Catching up with the many friends who keep the memory of who I am in the stories that we share together. Laughing so hard your sides start to ache. Spending quality time with Mum and Grace and meeting up with extended relatives. Sharing dinner with women who are simultaneously breathtakingly beautiful and fun.
There are two threads that hold Malaysia together: the people and the food. And it is the beauty of the tapestry that is woven with these threads which makes it hard for me to leave the country each time.
Sometimes people get the idea that we are the lucky ones, overseas, living the good life. Sometimes they're right. But deep down we know who the really lucky ones are.

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