Home or Away

Before it all happened. I don't know if we lived in the contours of hope or hopelessness. We knew that the game was stale, tired and habitual. Like tea left too long in a pot, its aroma, once rich, now a bitter aftertaste. But most of us did not mind. We sat in halls, roadside cafes, and our living rooms, watching, commenting and sometimes scoffing. Always wishing and dreaming. We did not really act. We did not do anything, at least not in the complete sense of the word. We were not inactive either. But our actions were more of a whisper. Not the needed scream.We observed. Nodded to the right turns, complained to the stuffy ears and noted the tides. We shared the memes and returned to our routine, cemented by the acceptance of failure. Deep down, we had a vague hope that things would be fine. Later, someday, somehow. We hoped.

The days came. The hopeful days. And I was not at home.

I was tucked between the stone walls beside Butts Wynds. The name amused me, and sometimes, it also disoriented me, just like things back at home. It rained daily but with no drama. Summer, they called it. Scottish summer.The cold wrapped around my skin in a slayer of its own. I was writing my dissertation, reading thousands of pages, sipping bad coffee and listening to the winds blowing from Swallowgate. My head was in that room, but my mind was far back home.

In me, hope was stirred. And I saw that hope can demand to be seen. Or so I thought.

I saw all that my friends recorded. I saw the news on my timeline. I tagged and pushed the hashtags. The next day, I took the train to the embassy. To join the others and make the noise. To take part in this revolution. To do what we can amidst all the shouts, the singing, and the agency. The pictures came in. And the news moved around. Images of placards and bodies. The streets were filled with people that I laughed and argued with. The people who, like me, wanted to be always at home. The people. Their voices rose, and so did the guns and the bullets. Then silence. Here I am, wrapped in a hoodie, carrying my flag, but in a foreign land, where the wind bit but did not kill. My safety and freedom were more respected by foreigners, ones with dark pasts.

I wished to forget the moment. To go back to the unclear moments. When I did not understand the urgency. Because the gravity was now stuck, glued with pain and anger. Why wasn't I there? Why am I safer here? Can we actually rise and turn the page? Can we make a difference?

And yet, in all these. One thing remained constant. Was it a feeling of shame or relief? I was afar. I was safer. I could tweet and repost. I could call out the regime without trembling fears and with a steady breath. No boots were chasing me down the streets or a loaded gun pointed to my head. No blood on the tarmac near me. Just rain. And wind. Maybe a quiet shame of safety. And this, safety, should not be shameful.

The names were stuck there. Shot. Missing. Dead. Silenced.For the moment, I thought the names would make me hopeful. That we would say they died for something.

Did we win?

Did we lose?

Is winning and losing even part of this?

I don't know.

There may be something that we got. Some aspect of solidarity.A brief, powerful scream that the deaf felt the vibration. Or maybe that is just my hopeful thought. My optimistic side. Because, at times, I think that we lost it all long before this. And we had those people on the streets for nothing.I'm not familiar with this either. But there is something that I know without doubt. I lost a part of me. The innocence that lets him survive. I don't have it anymore.

Now. I am made of rage. It is not loud or violent. It is a quiet, smouldering rage. Rage covered in a silent scream. I look at uniforms, and I see ghosts. All 'joined in 2024' are agents. I read headlines and wait for the blood between the lines. I see guns, and my body shivers. I avoid laughter that feels too free or too happy. I no longer wear my flag braceletBecause I know, and we all know, that at any moment, someone might vanish, and the country won't even blink.What is hope? Where is hope? I cannot lie to myself. I do not know the answers to these questions.

I sometimes read about people asking the right questions. And a flick of hope would shine for a second. Previously, the same people spoke of matters even worse and clouded the light that had shone earlier. Suddenly, it is all gone. I hate the idea of hope. Because every time nothing happens, it feels like forcefully shedding the scab of a healing wound. Peeling it with cruel fingers, bleeding the wound again. It is this same vicious cycle; feel, believe, bleed, number, and then feel again. I am tired.

I am not home yet. I am in a borrowed space. Another quiet room where the radiator hums and no one hears my cry. The streets are foreign, but the feeling is what I long for. A sense of safety at home. I float here. I want to wait here.

I long for home. Not just the place. The one where I am most grounded. Most loved. Most secure. Most appreciated. To the land and people, that is what we long for. To speak without translating my analogies. To laugh freely. I long for home.

And still, I long for home. I don't know if I'm ready.That is the strangest part of it all.This aching for a place that I have no hope for. The yearning for a place that killed its greatest hopes.Maybe I am carrying a burden of too many questions and not enough answers.I fear that this might be a disillusionment. I fear the weight of being expected to belong when maybe I no longer know how.

So, I sit in this middle space. Not exiled. Not returned. I hold onto the fragments of home. The friends who did not die. The bold who have not given up. The ones stronger than me. I try to make something out of this, to find meaning in what a home should look like. I think of something we can build in our hearts and take it out to everyone. It is a stubborn refusal to forget. It is the audacity to crave joy where we rarely have it in its proper form.

I don't know. But I am still here. Between guilt and gratitude. Between hope and despair. It may not be over yet. And a little bright light might light up the hope. Maybe.