What Home Means To Me

My name is Prarthana Monani. My parents, who immigrated to Canada for a better life, grew up in India. Their parents grew up there. Their grandparents, great grandparents and even before that grew up in India. So, it was difficult for them to go to Canada and raise their children, me and my sister. My parents came from India. India is so much different from Canada and is so littered, while Canada is much cleaner. Not only that, but my parents have been in Canada for 25 years and yet when we recently went to India, they adapted right into her climate and her people. But how they could just see India as a perfect place surprised me. After 25 years in Canada they should see how much better Canada is than India. But it's their place, their country. The very country that they grew up in, the place that they lived in for the majority of their life, the place that our ancestors have lived in for thousands of years, the place that means something to them, the place that they call home. “If you moved to a place that you hoped held a better future for you, and it did, does that mean this is your new home? Does it mean that the place where you are going to raise your child is your new home?” That is the exact thought that my parents had when I was born. They thought that everything was going to change, that they would be here now, that Canada was their future. This is because they hadn’t been in India for 3 years at that point. They forgot the feeling of home. They forgot that no matter where you are, you choose where your home is. But even then, sometimes you don’t choose. Sometimes, it’s your heart that chooses what, where, your home is. Home. That's a funny word, isn’t it? You can live in a place for half your life and call it home. But deep down, it’s not. My friends are here. Canada is the place where I can come home and be proud that I live here. Canada is the place where I can be like “Hey! I live here! I’m proud to be here!” It’s the place where I can come home after an exhausting day at school and collapse on my bed being happy, going “Whew!” It’s the place where I can think of one thing to calm my mind: that I live in an amazing place where I’m safe. I don’t think that home is where you live, were born, work, or play. Rather, I think it’s the place that has a meaning to you, that represents you, and where you are safe from the world. And maybe, the place that can sneak up on you and take a place in your heart. That’s what home means to me