I have always prided myself on the fact that I never get homesick.
As of today, that statement is no longer true.
It’s past midnight and I could not go back to sleep. I should not have taken that early evening nap. I finally decide to get my laptop out and read to get my eyes tired, but before I can open the file, Arjay’s message pops up on YM.
As we talk about AP and other mundane things like we usually do, it suddenly struck me that I will be spending my birthday in a strange land. Then I got struck with an overwhelming pang of loneliness that opened the floodgates also known as my tear ducts. And it shows no sign of stopping.
Now I get the loneliness that my friend Chu, working in Thailand, always talked about.
I know I’ve only been here for a few days and that I have some close friends here, but I feel like I’ve lost everyone else.
Sure, I experienced working in Manila, far away from the home I knew for two decades, but that was different because at least I was still in home soil. At least all my friends were reachable at the cost of 1peso per text. And at least I was surrounded with plenty of friends that I got to talk to over lunch or merienda or dinner.
But now…I write long emails and don’t even get responses from everyone. Not that I blame them, of course they’re busy. And of course not all people like to write as much as I do.
But after spending three years drowning in emails, I guess it’s a bit disconcerting to check your inbox every hour and not get anything but spam.
But as Arjay said, these are just birth pains related to my coming here. Someday this feeling will go away. But for now, I just have to cry and hope I don’t get puffy eyes tomorrow or else, how do I explain them to my interviewers?
“Men?” she echoed. “I think there are six or seven of them in existence. I saw them, several years ago. But one never knows where to find them. The wind blows them away. They have no roots, and that makes their lives very difficult.”
-The Little Prince