HOME

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I’ve grown to know places like people. Should I be lucky to experience them during all four seasons, only then may I get a grasp on who they really are, and even then, they flourish and crumble over time. You shouldn’t rush claiming home, but you also can’t deny it. It molds you.

Bonds between humans and land grow increasingly complex as time passes. I spend my time evaluating where it is that I feel the most connected- as the daughter of an immigrant from a country I am blacklisted from, and as a descendant of enslaved people who were stolen from their homeland. Home comes into question when someone asks, “where are you from?” even when they really mean “why do you look like that?” I pause, and I am forced to flip through the mental rolodex of the 10 addresses that I’ve claimed in the last 4 years.

The news updates on my phone and the NPR that I listen to while working as a delivery driver tell me that my internal struggle with defining home is, for lack of a better term, a first world problem. From the Rohingya to the Kurds, there are people that have been fighting for their right to dwell for generations.

Nai Palm says that home is where your body is. My friend Suraiya said that home is where the bazaar is. She said that home is a feeling. I’m familiar with that feeling. I know it when I feel it, and I feel it most when I don’t. 

Home is cinematic and poignant, but only when I am the utmost present. If not, it can completely wash over me, unnoticed. So, I’ve done my best to build a home. I’ve filled it with plants whose growth, I can only hope, is a testament to my own. Distance from it only means that I’ll come back with spoils from my adventures, new songs of old sorrows.

Home is neither here nor there. I’ve been home, but there are rooms in my house that I’ve never set foot in- only dreamed about. There are echoes of the oldest love that bounces off the walls and gets absorbed by rugs whose fibers have existed long before I have. Home nourishes me and I dearly hope home knows how thankful I am.

So for now, “I live on the South Side of Chicago.” Maybe after you’ve seen me through a few more seasons, you’ll figure out where I’m from, and where I call home- because I cannot stop thinking about home. I can’t stop talking about home.

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TEXT:
MAYA MANSOUR
UNITED STATES


PHOTOGRAPH:
MEERA
UNITED ARAB EMIRATES

HONEY, I'M HOME

As the Yemeni diaspora in the UAE makes up quite a sizeable chunk of the population, many continue to find ways to get a taste of home despite the ongoing war and conflict.

There is a bus that comes from Hadramout to Abu Dhabi once a week, carrying passengers and kilos of specialty Yemeni food products like Honey, dried fish, locally produced canned Tuna etc.

The bus ride is a somewhat risky journey where it passes through security checkpoints, crosses Oman and finally arrives to Abu Dhabi 30 hours later. I decided to follow my father and brother who went to pick up some goodies sent by my uncle. Some of which, is the ever so quintessential honey that Hadramout is very well known for.

Enjoying the intensely sweet and musky flavor of Hadrami honey is something that allows us to re-connect with the idea of home and celebrate the pride of our produce.

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PHOTOGRAPHY:
SHAIMA AL TAMIMI
YEMEN/UAE

MULTIPLE

موطني بين صفوف المشموم و أماليج المجنونات

موطني بين صفوف المشموم و أماليج المجنونات

•••

There were reasons 
why you felt like home,
but more 
as to why you were not 

- labitule



 

•••

Even when you build your own fortress
using your own pieces,
there will always be these small gaps
that you wouldn’t know how to fill
and some people
will have the ones that fit just right;
they will close those gaps
until you find what you need 

- reinforcement; 



 

•••

And I have found out that I, 
despite a state of surrounding peace, 
am discontent
and lack a place 

to call home

  • belonging

 


•••

I’m still waiting for you 
to come back to me

when you’re better,
and me

when we’re both right for each other 

because that’s the thing
about people like me-
we always have a place
to call home
for people like 

You.

______
TEXT:
JEILAN TURKISTANIA
SAUDI ARABIA

ART:
YOUSEF
KUWAIT

AIR[LOOM]

•••

Air[loom], is a collaboration with artist Rashed Al Falasi. Relics from our family are shown wrapped in a sterile fashion. In the process of safeguarding these possessions, the possessor is thus distanced from accessing them. The inability to come into contact with these objects mirrors the inability to come into contact with the physical manifestations of family identity. While within reach, the valuables denoting history, family, are rendered distant. This visual essay reflects that home is manifested in material belongings, but that those very physical objects do not ensure an ownership of identity. The tension between identity and ownership, physical objects and belonging, are all colliding themes that are played out in this series.

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PHOTOGRAPHY:
MASHAEL ALSAIE
BAHRAIN
RASHED AL FALASI
UNITED ARAB EMIRATES

BROKEN MINDS

SanazKhosravi_TheOtherSide.png

Hello, yes, do walk in, please watch your step that sofa it holds my self-esteem yes a bit in tatters and well, it’s just a cardboard facsimile but only if you look close, no need for that, hurry along now. Here’s the kitchen, all my dreams are in the fridge but the thermostat broke so it’s a bit frozen now, no matter they can thaw if I take them out but what if they thaw and they end up spoilt? Let’s sit at the kitchen now, fancy a cup of sad? I’ve got enough, just right here, oh you like them cold? Not a problem, not a problem we can freeze some for you not a bother I should have a batch I hid behind some of the hope. What? Oh, I would give you some but, well, I like to keep a little of that everywhere for the light now, makes the place smell all nice and bright so I’m a little out at the moment. Oh, right! Let me show you my favorite room. What do you mean you can’t see anything? Look, it’s all books and photos and sometimes a movie or two turn on- what do you mean they’ve faded? Well, yes, they’re a little bit dusty but no need to sniff your nose at it really, a little dusting and it’ll be colourful in no time if I could just find the duster and power on the energy in here because honestly there’s been no time and frankly there’s no point in doing anything with the energy is off and it’s the worst during a blackout but it’ll come back any moment now I’m sure of it. Was working more than fine just a few years ago, really. What? Oh, well, yes. It’s been out for a while. But we’ll do great things again the minute it comes back. Any minute now. I’ll figure it out. Oh! Here’s where I keep the memories. It’s just a bit of a jumble with the filing at the moment but good news is I take a photo of most of them so it’s just a matter of scrambling what the photo was for but great placement really. Also, there’s a lot of the bad ones and they keep pushing the good ones out but I’ve started spring cleaning recently and it’s much better than it used to be, honest. No need to sniff like that I know what it looks like and it can’t be helped, it’s just the way the files were made, if you paid a little more attention. A little less attention on the broken windows though, that was not the intended plan, thank you very much. 

Yes, well, have you gotten everything you need? I’m afraid I have to close up shop, yes, right now, not to be rude but you’ve overstayed your welcome just a tad bit, the limbs are all protesting they’re not sure what to do with themselves and I’d like to go to bed now, there’s the door. Please don’t hit the pot of guilt on your way out, it’s done nothing to you and it’s quite sensiti- all right, all right, none of that. This is my mind and I won’t have anyone treating it less than with the utmost respect. Please leave. Good bye. 

______
TEXT:
JOHARA
SAUDI ARABIA

ART:
SANAZ KHOSRAVI
UNITED STATES


هوس الماضي المتكرر

Lucid Dream

Lucid Dream

بين ذبذات عقلي التائهة، يتجول ذلك المنزل العتيق.

الماضي يخنقني، الذكريات تزداد حدتها حتى أكاد أنسى وجودي. بصيص أمل غير واضح هناك، رغمت نفسي بلحاقه دائمًا، ملهوفة محنوقة، لا أرجو شيئًا في هذه الحياة سوى فقدان ذاكرتي، أو ربما، لا أرجو شيئًا البتة.

أعيش ماضيًا ينسيني حاضري ثم أعيش حاضرًا ينسيني وجودي. حين أنسى أبلغ هنا أعلى مستويات السعادة، حتى أتذكر وجودي بين الحاضر والمستقبل والماضي.

ليست الأزمان سوى مسمى آخر للماضي.

الماضي هو وجودنا، يعيد نفسه دائمًا، مرارًا وتكرارًا، في كل مرة يزداد شراسة ليتحضر لانفجار فظيع ينهي جميع الأزمان.

عندما أحاول أن أعي مدى إدراكي بالزمن يتلاشى حينها كل شيء، نحن عبث. مجرد انجراف آخر لأفكاري. مامن غاية.. تقطع هذه الأفكار موسيقى سيطرت على انجرافي بكل رقي، تُهديني الكثير جدًا، حتى تنقطع فأستانف ذكرياتي السحيقة.

بين هذه الدوامة، تُكتم أنفاسي.

سأذهب لهذا المنزل اللعين، سأذهب لأسترجع كل الذكريات العالقة التي أعيش بداخلها كسجينة. لعلها تتوقف عن الانشغال فلم يعد لتلك الحياة وجود، الماضي لا شيء ثم لاشيء، الماضي وجود منفي، نحن منفيون هناك؛ إذًا نحن نتلاشى.

أستغرقت الكثير حتى أصل إلى منزلي السابق بينما كنت قد ضللت الطريق مرارًا عديدة، كأنما الأمل هو من أرشدني.

ها هو أمامي بكل رُقَعِه، لا أعلم ما تعنيه هذه الرقع ولكني كنت دائمًا أتخيلها حزينةً لألوانها البهية.

أدخل، أتجول في داخل المنزل بلا إدراك كأنني مجبرة على رؤية جثة لشخص لطالما كرهته.

أتناول كأس ماء من جدي المتوفي لأعيش في الماضي بعيدًا عن عقلي وكل أعباءه المتراكمة.

مسلمةً نفسي لهذا الماضي، لا أقوى مستقبل به ماضٍ آخر.

لأعيش بين أعين جدي الشاردة الميتة، قد ابتعدنا كثير البعد عن كل منفذ والمنافذ هي الحياة، نحن بداخل نافذة موصدة مصدأة متسخة شديدة الإتساخ، حيث أغيب عن نفسي قليلًا.

أمقتك يا جدي وسأمقتك، انتظرت الكثير، وبت خائفةً، الخوف تملكني، أنا الخوف وهو أنا. 

أتوسل إليك أن تدعني وشأني، ولست متأكدة،أدمنتك. رغم كونك زائرٌ أشد غلظةً علي من أن أحملك دائمًا.

ثم أقف خالية، مجردةً من كل شيء،من مشاعري وعقلي. قد وصلت غايتي، حيث لا أتذكر جدي ولا يتذكرني.

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TEXT:
BADRIYAH SALEM
SAUDI ARABIA

ART:
SHAMSA RZ
UNITED ARAB EMIRATES