Today we’ll talk about home — that idea of home. When I first had that feeling of home, what it was about safety, fear, and that sense of belonging.

I grew up in Kozhikode in Kerala. I don’t really remember the first house we stayed in. I think much of my memories from that time, the early seventies, are probably from pictures and stories that have been told and retold. I don’t even remember when my sister was born. She is five years younger than me, so I don’t remember what happened when I was five years old.

When I think about my first home, what comes to mind is a black-and-white photograph. My dad had a Kodak Click 3 camera. In that picture, I’m sitting in front of a Bullet motorcycle he had. My mother is standing next to my dad, and behind them there is a house. I don’t know where that house was. If I remember correctly, it should have been one of the quarters where my dad and mom lived. My dad was a doctor at the Calicut Medical College, and we had quarters on that campus. It could also have been a rented house nearby. I don’t really have any memories of that first home beyond those black-and-white images.

When I think about safety from my early memories, it was mostly when I was with my mom. I think for us as kids, being with our mother is probably the safest place we have. Until last year, when my mom died, even at the age of fifty-three or fifty-four, being with her felt safe. That kind of safety is difficult to explain. As a human being, you just feel safe when you are with your mother.

I had a lot of fears growing up. I feared ghosts. I feared darkness. I remember being in second or third grade, living in a house my dad had bought, a two-storey house. Sometimes my mom or dad would ask me to go and get something from the first floor. I would sing loudly. Initially they didn’t understand why I was singing. I am not a good singer. I would sing loudly, go get the thing, and run back. Eventually they realized that I was singing because I was afraid. The only way I could counter the darkness, the only way I could go into a room without light, was by singing loudly. Did I think ghosts would hear me singing and run away? I don’t know.

I was afraid of ghosts and darkness for quite a long time. I think it started making sense to me that ghosts don’t exist and there’s nothing to be afraid of only when I was around sixteen or seventeen. Until then, I was afraid.

Even today, when I think about where I belong, I have lived outside Kozhikode, my hometown, since around 1997. That’s almost twenty-eight or twenty-nine years. But even now, when I ask myself where I belong, I feel I belong back there. I don’t know if that is the case for everyone. There are people who have left their country, taken citizenship elsewhere, lived there for years, and built families there. Where do they belong?

For me, when it comes to belonging, I always feel that I belong in Kozhikode. At the same time, I have lived in many places. I’ve lived in Iran. I’ve lived in Dubai. I’ve lived in Bangalore. I’ve lived in the US. A part of me exists in all these places. We are part of a scattered generation. We cannot belong to just one place. We are geographically distributed, and our sense of belonging is also distributed.

When I think about Iran, that was a time when I was in second or third grade, trying to understand the world. When I think about Dubai, I remember sixth and seventh grade. Later, I also went back to Dubai in the late nineties to start working there. That is a different version of me, a different connection, a different sense of belonging. Bangalore is where I started my career. Virginia is where I first came when I moved to the US. I lived in the UK for about six months to a year. And California is where I have lived for the past twenty-three years.

I belong to all these places. But if someone asks me where I am from, I think I am from Kozhikode. That is where I always wanted to be. I never wanted to leave that place. But sometimes you leave thinking you will come back. Even today, almost thirty years later, I still think I will go back and live there.

I know things have changed there. My memories of that place are probably from thirty years ago. I know I cannot reconstruct that time. Many people I knew are no longer alive. The kind of social relationships that existed then don’t exist now. I don’t mean that in a bad way. Things change. Progress happens. Sometimes we like the progress, sometimes we don’t.

For people living abroad, time doesn’t change back home in the same way it changes for us. That is one of the biggest challenges when people return to their hometown after many years. They carry an idea of home from decades ago, and then they go back and feel everything has changed. Of course it has. You can’t expect your hometown to remain the same, waiting for you to return to your mother’s lap.

People change. Places change. Even today, if I don’t have at least the hope that I might return to my hometown one day, I think I would go insane. People ask me why, if I want to be there so much, I don’t go right now. Sometimes you live in a place because you’ve lived there for a long time. Leaving becomes difficult, especially as you get older. The family you’ve built, the people in your life, they are all here.

But the idea of going back remains. For me, that idea has a lot of significance.

We all live with memories, and we try to reconstruct those memories wherever we go. But for some memories to truly come back, you need to be physically present in those places. I went to Dubai after twenty-five years. The city had changed, but being there brought back memories — the smell, the sounds. Music can also take us back to different parts of our lives.

This is a reflection project for me. I’m trying to reflect on what got me here, what thoughts were in my mind back then, and what thoughts from back then are still with me. Sometimes in life, you need to try to find yourself. I think this entire project is about me trying to find myself again.

I’ll see you all next week. Thank you.