Elisabeth

Finger got infected. Not fun. I'm still in a bit of pain, though it comes and goes. Mainly discomfort and a slight fear this injury might have permanent damage.

In other news, I finally got my bank sorted and got my debit card in the mail today. This means I can start booking my trip to Belgium in October, something which I am really looking forward to. Before I came to Liverpool, I was so certain that this is where I belonged, so convinced that I would not feel even an ounce of homesickness, that I would be happy and vibrant and everything I was in Belgium and so much more. But I am not. I look for myself, but cannot find seem to find me. I miss the real Hanne, the Hanne who is careless and happy and bubbly and confident. I miss the Hanne my friends see and love. I cannot seem to adjust, truly adjust, and be myself in a whole new environment. And though my homesickness has not showed its roaring head for almost two weeks now, I can feel a new bout coming up. Every day it creeps a little closer, making me long for my friends, my home, the places I feel comfortable and confident at. My very dear friend Elisabeth is coming over this weekend and I am more or less afraid that by the end of her stay, I will want to come with her, hide in her suitcase, leave this country and go back to where my heart (still) is. This might be where I belong, but I still feel lost, in this world, this city and the company of those who barely know me. I miss long conversations in the Reynaert, making funny noises and weird dancemoves in the kitchen of Herman Servotte, discussing the hotness of Ortwin De Graef in the MSI, smoking shisha on my balcony, dancing the night away in the Seven Oaks, reading on the train journey to Brugge, sitting in the Snuffel with a beer and friends. I miss speaking Flemish, being found funny, reading subtitles, opening up the curtains in my room and lighting it with the afternoon sun. I miss foam mattresses, having my own sink, my brother's hand in mine, walking along the canals in Brugge, European vacuum cleaners, people to talk literature and history with, feeling a part of a group. And I miss my cat. I miss my cat so much, so much, so endlessly much.

Though I thought I was cured from homesickness, it seems to have kicked in again. And it will probably only get worse, now my friends are coming over. I am so longing for my visit to Belgium in October, I am afraid I will not want to come back.

If I still miss home so much, if I still haven't seem to have found my way, if I still long for the company of my friends and feel so misunderstood by those around me, then how can I be certain this is where I belong? How can I go on claiming this is the country of my dreams? I have lost my faith, and don't know if I really want to stay here. I might pack up and leave, and never look back again.

But you know what I hate the most of all? That so many people told me I would be homesick, so many people told me I didn't know how it was to live in England until I lived there for real, and I just laughed it all away. "This is where I belong". Is it? I don't know anymore. I am lost and alone, and no one to turn to who can show me the way.

(And then the homesickness hit home again.)