1. “Home” is no longer a clear-cut concept. Asking ‘how does it feel to be home?’ is likely to be met with a blank look and, at best, a muttered half-truth or at worst, sobs.
2. Feelings change in direct relation to the ticking of a clock, so any question which relates to said feelings (how does it feel to be back? do you feel the cold? do you fancy a cup of tea?) probably means the answer has already changed 4 or 5 times before your voice even has a chance to inflect the question mark.
3. A big part of the brain still operates in a foreign language or some mixed-up version thereof, franglais par exemple. Therefore common words and phrases like ‘toothbrush’ and ‘go for a walk’ are blanked out and one speaks in structures of sentences bizarre.
4. A big part of the body still carries the habits of the etiquette of the other culture. When we need to walk past each other in the street, you will politely move over to your left as I politely move over to my right only to discover you’re still in MY way. At which point, it becomes a game of chicken. May the best foreigner win.
5. Everything is relative. Every situation is open to comparison – it wasn’t like this where I was, when I was here before it was like that, I never used to see this, I always used to do that… The possibilities for difference and discovery and naming of difference are endless as well as the ways in which those differences are important or not. “Left-hand side of the road, Left-hand side of the road, LEFT-HAND side of the road…”
Tomorrow… a few survival tips (for all involved!) on dealing with a ‘Returning Medium-Term Missionary’ who might seem a bit weird.
my small corner 