Ann Marie's Blog

Simple things that feel like home

How do you create a sense of belonging, when you live in a place that doesn't feel like home? 

Whether you're studying or working in a different country, or simply moving to a new city or job far away from familiar people and places, how do you help yourself to feel at home? 

What kinds of activities do you do? Who do you connect with? What do you bring with you and what new things and experiences and people do you seek out? At what point do you really start to feel at home in a new place? What really makes the difference for you?

When I think back to the early weeks of living in The Netherlands back in the 90's (that sounds so long ago now!), I remember a lot of disorientation. Because we were moving with a two-year old, we had been diligent about packing  her crib, blankets, a few books and other familiar items in an air freight shipment, scheduled to arrive the same day we did. We already had the keys to our furnished rental house, so we were able to move right in. But our dishes, pots and pans, and other personal items were on the ocean, scheduled to arrive several weeks later, so we ate a lot of pizza and sandwiches and breakfast cereal during those first weeks.

One evening some American friends invited us for dinner at their house. They had arrived a few months before us, along with their kitchen utensils, so they were able to cook a real meal to share with us. I hadn't realized how much I was missing this until I heard myself thanking them profusely for the roasted chicken and steamed broccoli and rice!!! --- a nice simple meal that somehow seemed extraordinary after weeks deprived of the tools required to prepare a simple meal myself. I suddenly felt more grounded, more like myself, and super excited to start cooking again as soon as our shipment arrived.

So for me I guess one of the things I need in order to feel at home in a strange place is some means of sharing hospitality with other people --- a space where friends can gather to eat and drink and talk, some tools to prepare and serve healthy and delicious food, a corkscrew and some wine glasses. Simple things that feel like home to me. 

What feels like home to you?

 

 

 

12 Grapes at Midnight on New Years Eve

There's a tradition in Spain of eating 12 grapes just before midnight on December 31st, for good luck in the New Year. We were invited to share in this tradition yesterday, with Spanish friends who recently moved with their family to Oregon for a few years. At about 2:55 pm Pacific Time (11:55 pm in Madrid) we gathered in front of their TV, tuned to a Spanish station, to watch the presenters count down to the bells that would signal us to start eating our grapes--1 every second for 12 chimes of the bells. 

The crowd in the room was a mix of expatriate families from Spain and other countries, and a few American friends. None of the Spaniards could tell us "why" they eat 12 grapes on New Years Eve, but they had done it with their families, in front of the TV, at midnight with the rest of the country for as long as they could remember. Now they were in the U.S., continuing the tradition with their own children and connecting through it with family and friends back home. We felt somehow like honorary Spaniards as we enthusiastically popped grapes into our mouths and tried to keep up with the pace of the chiming bells. Everyone was laughing, then toasting the New Year with champagne and hugs and kisses---at 3:00 pm on a cold, sunny Portland afternoon.

Our host left the room to call his parents in Spain, and put his kids on the phone with their grandparents. I didn't hear their conversation, but imagine that there were wishes for a happy new year, and questions about eating the grapes---checking in to share the experience and continue the tradition together, in real time from 9 time zones away.

This experience reminded me of the times we celebrated Halloween while we lived in Holland---driving through a nearby neighborhood with a map of the American households where we could stop to "trick or treat" with our young daughter. When our Dutch friends asked "why" we dressed our kids in costumes and took them out in search of candy, we were at a loss to explain. Like our Spanish friends and their 12 grapes, it was something we had done as long as we could remember, and we had decided to pass the tradition on to our children even while living temporarily in a foreign country. 

There's something about living outside of our cultural comfort zones that seems to make us even more determined to carry on our own cultural traditions, even when we're not sure "why" the rituals started in the first place. Maybe it's not the origin of a particular activity that matters, but simply the fact that it's "our" tradition, and it connects us to the families, friends, and communities from which we came---especially when we're separated from them by a lot of time and distance. 

What are the rituals and traditions that connect you back to your cultural comfort zone? How do you keep them alive and pass them along to your family and friends?