On Going Home

Having lived in the States for more or less six years, it is not uncommon to find myself nostalgic of my home city. On disembarking at Hong Kong International Airport, a sign "Arrival" hanging from the ceiling strikes me as familiar yet so foreign. It is a bright-blue sign. Neither of those letters, however, reminds me of the States nor England. From the font type of the letters, the colour of the sign, my native language under the English word "Arrival", they generate in me a sense of excitement and delight. But why does such a place where I had lived for the first sixteen years of my life provoke in me such genuine pleasure? Perhaps it is because it offers convincing evidence of my having arrived at a place which is of great sentimental value to me. It reminds me of a simple fact: I am home.

The day before I take off from Houston every summer, I usually stay up the whole night in order to be able to sleep on the plane. My insistence on staying up, however, may be worthy of some degree of suspicion because sleeplessness always happens to be my symptom on the plane. Perhaps it is just a terrible excuse, an excuse invented to make up for my intense excitement of going home and my reluctance to take sleeping pills.

After having an unpleasant breakfast at McDonald, I find myself on the plane patiently waiting for the pilot's announcement. Plugging my earphones into my iPod, it is playing Michael Buble's "Home". As soon as every soft tune of the song charms my ears, I notice an unbearable weight is pulling down my eyelids.

I wake up from the state of nothingness. The pilot is announcing that the plane will arrive at Honolulu in less than an hour. As soon as I become conscious, a charming lady seated next to me offers me a gum. This particular occasion suddenly reminds me of Fight Club. In the film, Jack (Edward Norton) reminds us that everything on the plane is single-serving. So on this plane, I meet my single-serving friend. Strangers on the plane may talk to you for various reasons. Conversations may start off by the offering of a gum or a book that you are reading. The reasons are totally random. On this occasion, perhaps my single-serving friend just longs for some company out of boredom. From our conversation, I know that she is a student who is always passionate about science at the University of Boston flying back to her home, Honolulu. She explains to me in the minutest details about her hatred of the urbanity in Boston and how she longs to go back to Honolulu whenever time allows her to do so. Her descriptions about the palm trees, the clear skies, the white beaches, the diversity of fauna and flora, all these hint at why she is a biology student. A while after her effortless talking, she is finally interested in me and asks what I am studying. For the first time in my life, I fail to notice the confused look which suggests my eccentricity from her. Time passes by mercilessly when one wishes to exchange information through the lumpiness of language. As soon as the plane lands, we walk out of the gate door together and that is when she says, 'see you around'. This expression is probably the most polite form of saying goodbye. The word "around" invites us to the paradox of the possibility, however slim, of running into each other soon and at the same time sadly offers conclusive evidence of us never seeing each other again.

Driven by the precaution of the tasteless single-serving meal on plane, I decide to lunch at a pseudo yet the best French restaurant in the airport. As soon as the waitress takes me to the corner table, I begin to observe people who are lunching around me. If observing people fascinates me, it is perhaps because it is one of my main sources of inspirations of what to write. I do not feel ashamed of my eccentricity when curiosity demands it. There is no practical reason for my scrutiny of people's behaviours, but only that I often harbour a confused wish whether I could be one of those pioneers who discovers hitherto unfathomable truths. The restaurant is located at one of those corners in the airport. This geographical location enforces the atmosphere of loneliness. No one is talking. Everyone is either reading his book with a glass of red wine or busy emailing his business partners with a half-finished sandwich. I gaze past one another at the serving counter. At that moment, I am sure my trivial existence is of no significance to anyone. I believe I am seated among insentient creatures.

I look at the menu, choices are limited, it leaves me no room for reflective delight but to order a Chicken Spaghetti. While awaiting my order, there is a gentle feeling unfolding within me, namely, loneliness. This is, however, a pleasant form of loneliness. Rather than being embarrassed by laughter and fellowship, I inwardly derive a masochistic pleasure from the presence of an analogous feeling. I am eating in a place where conversational poverty is acknowledged and the longing for friendship is brutally celebrated.

My order arrives. Unexpected, the sauces are not built on compromise. The sauces blur the distinction between the chicken and the spaghetti hence the disruption of flavour. Neither the chicken nor the spaghetti stands out. Slices of chicken are not arranged in order. The amount of cheese and spaghetti leaves no sign of symmetry. The dish reveals not a sense of simplicity and cleanliness. For the first time, I crave for the single-serving meal on plane.

It is about time to board the plane so I pay the bill and rush to the gate door. The unpleasant meal, however, is unable to diminish my excitement of going home. I get on the plane, embarking on the journey to my final destination.

During the unbearable thirteen hours, my neighbours snore effortlessly, flight attendants serve diligently, and movies are shown continuously. I spend most of my time reading, listening to music, and drifting in and out of consciousness. There are times when we are disturbed by the air turbulence. Occasionally, during air turbulence, while our pilot reminds us of tightening our seat belts, I secretly wish for disasters. If disasters suddenly become my wishful desire, it is perhaps because I am too impatient with my boredom. I wish to derive a peculiar form of pleasure from disasters. Nevertheless, it never happens. I wake up from the announcement that the plane will arrive at the Hong Kong International Airport in fifteen minutes.

I pick up my backpack, say goodbye to the pilot and flight attendants, walk out of the aircraft, looking up at the bright-blue sign, silence becomes an excuse for my inarticulacy of the feeling of excitement and delight. I am glad that I am home.

The journey of going home may be considered our outlook on life. When we travel or go on business trips, we often find ourselves ending up in different airports. During our stay at airports, there may be periods of anguish, self-hatred, and boredom. Flights may delay. Severe weather may render us inevitable to stay overnight at the airport. Souvenir shops may be unforgiving, bringing out blemishes and offering a lack of variety of choices. Despite of all these miseries, we nevertheless manage to get on our plane. During the journey on our plane, we may experience air turbulence or if we are in bad luck, a disaster. On the other hand, we may also meet strangers, strangers who may be able to share our interests and fathom our soul. We have our flight attendants who never forget to serve us meals and when in need, some junk food and a cup of water are offered to fulfil our hunger and quench our thirst. We have our pilot who always reminds us of taking precautions when possible danger is necessarily to be confronted. By the time we get out of the plane, anxieties are consoled and worries are solved. Because we reach our final destination.

Imagine all these little things happened in the airport and on the plane are the things that you may encounter in life. If transition at airports stands for different stages in life, our flights being delayed for adversity, having an unpleasant meal for uncertainties of future, the pilot for our fathers, flight attendants for our mothers, strangers we meet on the plane for the people we meet in life, air turbulence for obstacles, no matter what we encounter and what we do, we are still excited about approaching our final destination. At this point, Freud's theory of death instinct cannot be more obvious. However happy we are in different places, there is always one unchanging fact. We all long to be home. We all came into existence from the state of nothingness. In the end, we return to nothingness. Our existence is our journey of going back to where we belong.

Next time when someone close passes away, rather than letting ourselves burst into tears and mourn at the funeral, we should celebrate his death and be glad that he is finally home.

W