 |
| Cycling several miles outside of Iowa City, I come upon farmland fairly similar to the landscape of the Shenandoah Valley. |
 |
| Within the first several weeks of settling Iowa City, I found myself helping to cook pizzas for the celebration at my new church. |
 |
| My housemate, Barb, and I after church. |
 |
| The Iowa City Amateur Radio Club helped me set up my radio station, launching an inverted-v dipole antenna into a backyard tree. |
 |
| A jolly bunch of HAM Radio operators. |
 |
| Patients for whom we make dentures are often the most gratitude-filled; one such thankful patient gifted an orchid that now decorates my operatory. |
 |
| I hosted a Russian dinner to connect with a lovely family in the community. |
 |
| The spread looked akin to that which my mom might offer...so I would say dinner was a success! |
 |
| Driving out to Chicago, I enjoyed reconnecting with colleagues from the American Academy of Developmental Medicine and Dentistry. At this year's conference, I facilitated the inaugural Institute in IDD track and was confirmed as Secretary of the organization's Board of Directors. |
 |
| Exploring Millennium Park with some of the Institute Scholars. |
 |
| Receiving a gift package from the Richmond CMDA chapter with kind notes reminds me of the phenomenal fellowship that I still have in Virginia. |
As I begin my third month of residency in Iowa City, I
ponder how I’ve begun to feel at home and what has contributed to this sense of
belonging. On a larger scale, I think about the construct of home and how it
may be both an expression of and influence for our identity. The context for my
thoughts includes the lives of my mother and grandmother, whose 80th
birthday will be celebrated in the coming month.
I would have to emphasize connectedness as the cornerstone
of defining a sense of home even as I admit that it has been exhausting though rewarding to initiate and foster both professional and community connections
for the past 2.5 months. Belonging to a new place in a new way changes the way
I introduce myself and reminds me of the bilateral nature of identity and home.
Knowing that I will value and enjoy Iowa City as my place of work and life
definitively for only 3 years, I find Pico Iyer’s description of home and
journeying helpful:
“Their whole life will
be spent taking pieces of many different places and putting them together into
a stained glass whole. Home for them is
really a work in progress, it’s like a project on which they’re constantly
adding upgrades, improvements, and corrections.”
“For more and more of
us, home has really less to do with a piece of soil than, you could say, with a
piece of soul” (person, song, etc)
“When my grandparents
were born, they pretty much had their sense of home, their sense of community,
even their sense of enmity assigned to them at birth and didn’t have much
chance of stepping outside of that. And nowadays some of us have a chance to
choose a sense of home, create our sense of community, and fashion our sense of
self…and maybe in so doing move beyond some of the black and white divisions of
our grandaparents’ age.”
“I’ve always felt that
the beauty of being surrounded by the foreign is that it slaps you awake; you
can’t take anything for granted. Travel for me is a little bit like being in
love, because, suddenly, all of your senses are on the setting marked “on.”
Suddenly you’re alert to the secret patterns of the world.”
“The real voyage of
discovery consists not in seeing new sights but in looking with new eyes.”
-Marcel Proust
“Where you’ve come
from now is much less important than where you’re going.”
“Home is not just the place where you happen to be born. It is the
place where you become yourself.”
“The day without
technology seemed to stretch for a thousand hours. It was really all the
freedom I know when I’m traveling, but it also profoundly felt like coming
home.”
“I do think that it is
only by stopping movement that you can see where to go. And it is only by
stepping out of your life and the world that you can see what you most deeply
care about and find a home.”
“Movement is a
fantastic privilege…but movement, ultimately, only has a meaning if you have a
home to go back to. And home, in the end, is, of course, not just the place
where you sleep. It’s the place where you stand [still].”
Iyer’s comments resonate with me particularly because my residential
transitions between places of higher education have been bridged with
cross-cultural trajectories (Honduras/Peru between university and dental training
and India between dental training and residency). With my heritage as an
immigrant, I’ve had the privilege of continuously redefining my home (and my
identity alongside). After a university experience that emphasized servant
leadership in a globally sustainable perspectives centered around the
collective good, I certainly identify more as a global citizen rather than a
patriot of a region, state, or nation. Even while I value the opportunities I
have to visit other lands and experience other cultures, I also recognize the
importance of local rootedness and committing to a local place and its people. The
exhilarating curiosity that comes with opportunities to venture out and
experience new places is always overshadowed by the thrilling comfort of
returning to my very own niche of learning and working.
 |
| I am thankful for the opportunity to have presented a poster at the IASSIDD World Congress (occurring every 5 years). I don't believe I'd bring myself to venture out to Melbourne, Australia anytime soon were it not for the reason. The concept of frailty assessment for those aging with disabilities also emerged from this international meeting as a lead towards defining my MS thesis project. |
 |
| I observed a similar tradition in Lithuania where lovers or newlyweds would inscribe their names on a lock, adhere it to a bridge, and toss the keys overboard to signify the permanence of their relationship. |
 |
| Melbourne cityscape by night. |
 |
| Rainy winter mornings in Melbourne...perfect for exploration! |
 |
| The magnitude of Asian heritage in Melbourne caught me by surprise but I suppose the continent is geographically poised to welcome the culture that is closer than Europe or the Americas. |
 |
| Some important historical figure... |
 |
| Public restrooms I'm used to...but a baby changing station seems like a brilliant idea! |
 |
| Laneways (alleys) in downtown Melbourne have a culture of their own with many cafes, shops, and street art galore....not sure if the shoes on a string are also part of the artistic expression. |
 |
| Findler's Street Station is one of the largest subway stops in the city. |
 |
| A beautiful Lutheran cathedral was the meeting point for my day-tour. |
 |
| The cathedral included artwork depicting the Syrian refugee crisis. |
 |
| Doors to the cathedral. |
 |
| I opted not to pay to pet the koala (who is not a bear but a marsupial!) but enjoyed watching it contently chew at some leaves. |
 |
| Kangaroos are a bit smaller on the south side of the continent but are very friendly as visitors in this sanctuary feed them. |
 |
| Wallabies are smaller cousins of the kangaroo. |
 |
| I enjoyed taking part in the fun of feeding the wallabies/kangaroos. |
 |
| A beautiful bird who knows how to pose quite well. |
 |
| A koala dozing off in tripod secure perch. |
 |
| A sheep dog and its master demonstrate the art and partnership of rounding up sheep. |
 |
| A beautiful coastal plantation that is now a historical site. |
 |
| Plantation garden. |
 |
| I am not sure how to make sense of the quote...I wonder if slaves or servants lived in the little structure. |
 |
| Sheep-shearing. |
 |
| Stunning coastline of the Bass Strait, which I believe is part of the Indian Ocean...that means I've touched 3/5 oceans and 5/7 continents...the remaining two contents (Africa and Antarctica) and oceans (Arctic and Southern) aren't terribly accessible but it's a short list to keep in mind if opportunities arise! |
 |
| Sandy and windy curves to the shoreline. |
 |
| Penguins may utilize these shorelines (the little wooden boxes are placed to facilitate nesting). |
 |
| Photographing the live penguins was not allowed (since the flash may damage their vision, which they use for survival) but a model was shown to demonstrate their petite stature. |
Beyond personal traveling experiences, my understanding of
home is formed in the context of what home has meant for the generations
preceding my existence. Particularly as I prepare for a weekend jaunt to the
Shenandoah Valley to celebrate my paternal grandmother’s 80
th
birthday, I realize that both the purpose of and duty to home has changed for
women across the century. Hearing my grandmother describe her childhood in a
Soviet communal farm community is intriguing. The stories of her child-rearing
years are also fascinating. I enjoyed bridging our stories and common
transition to the States in an interview last year (
The Secret Gardens—and the culture that hides them). What draws me in more than anything, though, is the ways she describes perceiving
and navigating her world as a young woman, educated as an engineer (unlike
women preceding her generation) and seeing her husband of several weeks off
into a 2-year military service term before settling down upon his return to
bear 10 children. My own mother recalls devout letter-writing with my father
during his 2-year military service term, after which they married and moved to
pastor a church in a rural mining village. Wanting to animate my understanding
of my grandmother’s perspective by seeking music from the era of her
young-adulthood, I came upon a 1963 film entitled “I’m walking in Moscow/
Я шагаю по Москве” that seems to
allude to our three narratives (that of my grandmother’s, my mother’s, and
perhaps my own).
The plot surrounds three young men anticipating their last
summer before 2 years of military service. One anxiously prepares for a wedding
(that is nearly called off but is saved by the protagonist). A second falls in
love with a record shop clerk, the two for whom the protagonist sets up a date,
establishing a long-distance relationship even as they become separated due to
the impending military service term. The protagonist seems interested in the experience
of romance and relationship that he observes and in which he tangentially participates but
is too curious and adventurous yet for the practicality of settling down,
though he seems to be content with the reality as a future prospect as reflected
in the following verse that he sings while exiting the metro at the end of the
film:
А я иду шагаю по Москве, And I’m walking through Moscow,
Но в жизни я пройти ещё смогу, But in life I’ll still be able to pass
Солёный Тихий океан The salty Pacific Ocean
И тундру, и тайгу. And the tundra and taiga.
Над лодкой белый парус распущу Over a boat I’ll spread a white sail
Пока не знаю с кем With whom I know not yet
А если я по дому загрущу And if I become homesick
Под снегом я фиалку отыщу Under the snow I’ll find a violet
И вспомню о Москве And will remember of Moscow
The description of the first foil character reminds me of my
grandparents’ marriage upon completing their engineering technical training
right before my grandfather left for a military service term, after which they
had some catching up to do as they had developed apart from one another during
the two years. The second foil character’s story makes me think about my
parents’ long-distance courting via letter-writing during his navy service as a
fairly-committed relationship that led to marriage. Though I am far-removed
from the Soviet reality represented in the film and the two generations preceding
me, I relate most closely to the narrative of the protagonist who doesn’t
disagree with either of his friends’ trajectories but seems content to think
about a committed relationship somewhere in the future (and not a fixed concept
at that…spreading a sail on a boat
that presumably still travels along a body of water even if carrying more than
one person). He’s mildly restless due to an organic curiosity that presides his
existence, naturally finding ways to be helpful and fulfilled in the city,
while remaining confidently hopeful that his life’s odyssey of enriching life
experiences is yet to come. He doesn’t deny, however, that homesickness is part
of venturing out and takes comfort in the reminder of home (a violet) that can
be uncovered just beneath the copious snow of the landscape of his future
endeavors. The promise of remembering his home city are what conclude the film
as he exits the metro (and presumably finishes his summer to begin military
service, which may hold the adventures he aims to embrace).
I’ll venture to claim some of the perspectives embodied by
the protagonist, having seen several close friends marry and have children in
recent years as well as transitioning out of my childhood home and now state to
pursue clinical and academic specialty training (and all the adventures and new
experiences that this entails!). Being enriched by my current endeavors, I am
content to envision “spreading a sail over a boat” as a future reality that
needn’t be hastened. On a day-tour during my visit in Melbourne last month, I
was described as “wholesome” within an hour into the tour and “fiercely
independent” by mid-day. This blend of promoting/sustaining health and
physical/moral well-being with a heartfelt/powerful intensity towards a
free-standing self-sufficiency or not being influenced by others/authority is
affirming as I center myself around life projects that bring me meaning in the
context of the common good. As I continue to develop a sense of belonging in my
new place of work and life (and understand how this context becomes a part of my
identity in the process), I also honor the heritage that preceded my existence and
the cherished signs of my upbringing, as commented by a bystander in Melbourne,
that are always just beneath a layer of the busy landscape (like violets under Siberian
snow).
