There are 195 countries in the world at this moment in time. Seven continents. Yet somehow, I couldn’t name one as my home.
I spent half my childhood growing up in Germany, the other half in the UK. I have lived in Australia at 18 and Canada at 25. I have travelled to over 26 countries and counting.
At some point, I lost all sense of “home” as a physical place. Nowadays, home is people.
My family in Germany. My friends who are spread all over the world, the majority currently in London.
The closest physical place to home is London, as it is where I spent my “forming” years, my teens and early twenties. However, it is not the place I refer to when I say I’m going home. That is usually wherever my family is.
Sometimes, when I spend longer in one place, it becomes home. Like the ski resort in Canada, I worked at last winter — I eventually referred to that as home. Or the hostel in London that I spent a month volunteering at — the people there became a family and it felt like home, for that time period at least.
It’s interesting, to lose all sense of home.
Because when people talk about settling down or buying a house or anything that relates to long-term plans, they have a certain place in mind. Or at least a certain country.
I have neither. It will depend on circumstances, people I will meet and have already met, my career and hopes for the future.
Every time I visit a new country, I think “This is the one. This is where I will feel this overwhelming feeling of home”. I expect it to click in place, a soul connection.