Homesick? Battle It with These Tips

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Four years of life abroad are drawing to a close at this post’s writing. The weight is heady. These past nine months have been tougher than all the rest of the time in one particular way: the almost daily presence of homesickness. It had never affected me before. Not for a moment. It started two weeks after I arrived here in Piura, Peru.

 

You might remember the post I wrote for long-term travelers about salving the woes of their lot. The bandages mentioned there, though, can’t cure homesickness, which A ShelterOffshore calls “expat flu”. Homesickness, the post says, often leads to physical ailments, “a result of the body collapsing after the stresses, strains, excitements and highs of” moving abroad. Well, it literally did just so in June when a flu wracked my body for a month. A colleague, a five-month veteran of life abroad, now goes through the same thing.

To help others stave the depths to which my “flu” has plummeted my spirit, I have compiled some tips a little more holistic than bandages.

 

New friends helps curb the pain of homesickness

 

1) Establish a routine. It’s up to you to determine if this is an all-day thing, a once-daily practice, or even a weekly schedule of activities. The routine of having a long-term, stable, full-time job gave such happiness when I arrived here, since I’d craved that stability for years, helped to disguise my growing need for that same stability– in my own country. To combat that pain growing in my heart, I devised weekend plans. During good times they fly out the windows. During needy times, when the pain of homesickness brings me near to tears, they comfort.

 

2) Decorate your residence like home. For me that entails decorating with saris, art collected from my journeys, a wall calendar, a map of Mumbai, too many books to be sensible, and lamps and candles to create variable lighting schemes.

 

3) Get out. No, not in a horrifying Amityville way…With friends. Agreeing to attend a colleague’s birthday gathering a month after I arrived led to numerous more nights out, cherished memories, and friendships that saved me in times of non-homesickness related times. Read what Rachel Wilkerson suggests on her blog.

 

Walking beside strutting peacocks has been a high moment of my time in Piura

 

4) Get Away. My post on bandages on the trials of the long-term traveler suggests taking a day trip or more. That deserves reiteration. I look back and wish I’d done it in China. During my time in Piura I’ve taken a few trips. Next week brings the start of more, a trip to the beach resort town of Punta Sal, then a trip to visit friends and the arts scene of Lima. These approaching trips have caused me to forget about counting the number of days until my return to the US. Instead I linger in thoughts of seeing friends, hanging out in my favorite cafes, and showing my beached whale of a bikinied self on a beach that Hemingway once fished near.

 

5) Watch Some Home. Previously, my computer provided requisite visual entertainment via Netflix, downloaded movies, and DVDs. When I began watching local cable on the TV in my room, relaxation washed over me like a warm blanket.

 

Take a trip for a day or longer

6) Don’t Lose Site of the Present. What are you doing so far from home? Why did you leave? This isn’t a request to bash your country but an opportunity to look at the big picture. When able to quell my homesickness the littlest things fills me with delight. The way a restaurant’s sign reveals meaningful cultural iconography. The Christmas lights the flash and blink on windows throughout the neighborhood. The ability to speak the Spanish learned so many years ago in a hope to one day be able to do it abroad.

 

I wish you well with overcoming your homesickness. If you have tips that I haven’t included here, please let me know by replying to this post. Most of all I hope you do not let being homesick force you to abandon your dream of life abroad. Can you imagine how you’ll feel if you give in to it and leave before it’s your time?

India: A Marriage That Couldn’t

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“Mere cherra gora hai; mera dil Hindustani hai.”
– Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts
With no exes do I have bad relations. Instead I have nothing. You, India, however, have carved the exception into my heart. You were my new Mecca, the center of the world’s beauty. Your voice called for months and months before I traveled thousands of miles to meet you. You lifted me from a lingering, loathsome winter. But that visit wasn’t enough. You chanted my name for years after, your voice beckoning until again I lay within your embrace and we shared a billion heartbeats lovely as the saris of Rajasthan.
Krishna and Lakshmi        Image Credit
I hadn’t yet seen the blackness within that Brahmin body, until that second visit. How could I remain wed to a criminal who would steal my very existence? The escape was narrow. Our differences too vast. Now, from the other side of the shore, you still call, you still waft your scent to me from kitchens or summer trees, permeating my skin. I have found others, found more comfort but never the heat or colors, the rush or the sustenance.
Could I find another love like that of India? One that works? One with love and chemistry, with admiration and respect? Maybe later. For now, I carry it with me like a tattoo. Bharat mataji…God Love India. 

Chinese Haircuts for Americans

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A couple months after I moved to China, I made the brilliant decision to go blond. My efforts to assimilate were moot. I couldn’t fit in; my white skin and height were a pink elephant in the room. I couldn’t stand out; the Chinese stared and screamed “Haro!” at the sight of Westerners. If the Chinese were going to stare at me they might as well have a reason.

 

For those of you who’ve ever wondered salons abroad are like, first consider something. Where do the Latinas go? The Asians? Where do the urban girls get their weaves done? There’s a reason we all go to different salons: our genetic code gives us a wide breadth of hair types. The girls in my barrio might be able to Velcro on some extensions but what’s the likelihood she can do a fine weave?

 

A Chinese man encouraging yet more starting. So I gave it right back to him.

 

There are things we take for granted in the West:

  • symmetrical hair cuts
  • a keen understanding of which products to use
  • an understanding of when to use them
  • an ability for one person to do this
  • getting in and our of the salon in less than four hours.

 

First, the stylist failed to apply a toner. He had to bleach it twice. He didn’t understand my words but he understood my screaming, “It’s burning!” He relied on an assistant to do one side of his hair while he did the other. Then, he left a skunk-like stripe of my coffee brown hair, adding again to the hours he worked. Finally, this orange-haired woman left the salon.

 

 

My hair had a dynamic of its own for the near-two years I lived there. Eventually I’d been able to die it back to a natural-ish color– it wasn’t orange anymore; then it was Asian black. Therefore I went from looking like a fruit to looking like a vampire. My hair began falling out later because of a fake Chinese prescription for my thyroid medicine and/or bad water quality. Clumps of hair remained in the shower drain.

In the end, staying in the US for a few months in 2011 returned my hair to normal. Thanks to a legitimate prescription, nontoxic water, and trained stylists.

 

For more info on salons abroad, see the original post from my China blog. Or look here to see if the Peruvians can do gringa hair.