hello everyone it's Mara here again and
I have a question for you.
what does home mean to you?
home can mean a lot of things to a lot
of people. I mean what exactly is home
anyway? Does home mean the house, the
house that you live in
or the house that you grew up in or
maybe it's a future thing? Maybe your
home is going to be the place where you
settle down and you have your family and
you raise your family.
Home
doesn't necessarily have to be a
physical place either.
Sometimes home is where the heart is as
the old saying goes
sometimes
some people don't feel that they have a
home at all. They feel no sense of
belonging to any one particular place
because nowadays people can move an
awful lot.
Some people who are very very young
maybe even your age, well they might have
already lived in three, four, five
different countries - maybe even more.
Sometimes parents travel when they work
so they might spend a few years in one
place and then they move to a few years
in another place and then a few years in
another place and there is a sense of
Rootlessness. We don't really know where
we might come from.
Other people feel that they have many
different homes.
I am one of those people I think.
I certainly feel that I have a home in
Kenya because that is where I grew up.
I feel very comfortable there. I feel very
safe there. I feel very very happy there
But when I was 13 and I moved to
Scotland. Suddenly Scotland became my
home and I love Scotland very very much
and I feel very happy here and very safe
here and very comfortable here. So I am
one of the lucky people where I feel I
do have different homes.
Sometimes home can just be a transient
Place. You might be in this particular
place but you know you're not going to
be there for a very long period of time.
It's a stepping stone to the new place
and that's okay too.
But home is definitely a very very
special special word and for a lot of
people it means an awful lot.
You’ve heard of the term a homebody. That's
somebody who likes to stay at home
somebody who is very comfortable
Not really having to go very far away at all
and if they do travel and go on holiday
they're actually quite glad to come back
and be in their space where they've got
all of their things around them and they
know where everything is and they know
how everything works and there is a
sense of familiarity.
But I have a little story for you.
It's about
two men
and one day these two men found
themselves in a little marketplace.
Now these two men lived on a mountain
and as they were busy talking to some of
the people in the marketplace, well, man
number one started to tell everybody
about his home.
“Oh the mountain is beautiful, the mountain
has lovely green grass - rich and juicy - so
all of my cows can graze quite happily.
It has rolling slopes and sometimes my
children they roll down that hill and oh
my mountain is beautiful. I love my home.”
But the man next to him said, “What?
I don't know what you're talking about
because I live on that mountain and
there are no
lovely rolling green lush grassy hills there.
No, my cows struggle to find
something to eat.
There is jagged rocks here, there and
Everywhere. It's not safe, it's not
Comfortable. Sometimes it's stormy and
the wind blows it blows and it rains
like crazy. No the mountain it is my home
but it is not an easy place to live but
I love it very much and I'm used to how
things are there.”
And of course man number one says “you
don't know what you're talking about!
that mountain is beautiful. It is sunny
almost every single day. It's perfect!
It is heaven, heaven on earth!”
And the two men they started to get into
a little argument and it was only when
an old wise woman came along and said
“You two!
You, man number one, live on the west side
of the mountain
and you man number two live on the east
side of the mountain, so even though you
both share the same home you both live
on the same mountain, each of you
experience very very different things.
So yes, you both have
very unique experiences of that mountain.
But that mountain is still home.”
So there you go - a tiny little story
about how
two people can live in exactly the same
place but have very very different
experiences of it.
I have a little activity for you to do
and for this activity you're going to
need some paper and you're going to need
some coloured pencils. So have you got them
all ready? Have you got yourself sorted
take a little minute take a little break?
Here - you can put me on pause. Go gather
your things and then come back.
What we're going to do now is that we
are going to draw. We are going to draw
our imagined home so I want you to think
of a place that you think will make you
feel very very safe, very very
Comfortable, very very happy. So what are
the things that bring you joy?
Think about it. You're going to be
drawing this map, but this map
doesn't have to look like the maps
that we're used to. Let this map become
something out of your imagination.
Things don't have to be to scale and the roads
don't all have to be in exactly the
right place. You could draw a tiny little
mountain and a great big waterfall if
you love waterfalls. If you like cars and
living in a city then maybe you can have
bigger roads and you can just play
around with your imagination but use
lots of colour, use patterns, really make
this place, this picture that you're
going to draw the perfect vision of home
that you have got.
So think about what is important to you
in your home. What would you like near you?
Now for some people they might say I
really want a very very good school near
my home because when I go to school I
want it to be very close so I don't have
to walk very far.
Other people might think hmm I don't
want my school to be too close because I
love love riding my bike and if I can
put my school right there on the other
side of a forest then I can cycle
through that forest every single day.
So
you might have a school important to you.
You might have, you might be want a
little hospital near you in case
somebody that you love gets unwell.
Maybe you want a park. Maybe you want a
forest or a mountain that you can climb.
Maybe you like swimming pools. Maybe you
like swimming in the river or maybe you
are an ocean person.
Whatever that is,
place it somewhere in your picture.
Position your home close to something
that you love, yeah.
Then think about all the things that you
like doing.
Maybe you could put in a skate park.
Maybe you love going to the cinema and
you want a cinema near your home.
What else could you put in there?
What sort of things do you like doing?
Do you like playing sports?
Do you like football? Do you like tennis?
Do you like maybe having a little youth
club nearby?
Maybe you need somewhere where you can
just hang out with your friends, you can
talk and you can chat and you can laugh
and you can tell stories.
Maybe if you were like me you might want
somewhere where in the evenings you
could light a little fire, roast and
toast your marshmallows and then tell
each other stories.
What are you? What is going through
your mind right now? What would you put
there?
Now the other thing that makes home
important is of course the people.
Who do you want near you? Who do you live with?
Are you living with your mother and
your father? Are you living with your
elderly parents? Are you living with your
Grandparents? Are you living with friends?
Who are the people that you feel very
very close to? Who do you think are the
people who would protect you when you
need them. Who are the people who would
support you when you needed them?
Imagine who are these people.
They might not even necessarily have to
live with you. Your best friend might
live next door and maybe you might have
a little zip wire head straight through
their window and into their room.
You could play around with this and
invent whatever you like.
But what does your home mean to you?
Think about how you want to feel when
you walk home or how you are when you're
inside your home.
Maybe the inside of your home is an
extremely important part of who you are.
For some people it might be outside.
Sometimes it doesn't really matter at
All.
Certainly when I'm thinking about Kenya
I know that the outside is definitely
more important than the inside, but in
Scotland because it's a little bit
Chillier, I do spend a lot more time
inside and so the inside does become a
little bit more important to me. Maybe
you like different lights. What do the
lights look like? Are you going to have
great big massive woven lamps outside as
street lights? Maybe you like a little
bit of bling bling. So are you going to
have any bling bling anywhere near your
home?
So just take some time, take a good chunk
of time, and just draw out all of the
things that you think would make your
Hom. Tthe absolutely most perfect home in
the entire
World.
When you have finished that then maybe
it would be nice to share that with
somebody and then you could talk them
through it. You could say, “well I put my
house here because I wanted to be quite
close to the swimming pool so that when
I finish school I can run and have a
little swim” or maybe you could say, “I
chose this forest because I love animals”
and maybe you could have a monkey in the
forest who knows this is your dream home.
And you can have whatever you like in it
so have some fun. And you know something?
Maybe your idea of home might change
over time and so in a few years maybe
you could do this again and see if
anything has changed at all.
But in the meantime
Where we are now? Where we are living
right now at this moment in time. It is
our home for the moment and the only way
that you're going to enjoy your home is
if you put something into it.
Use your energy. Enjoy the place that
you're in. Make the most of it. Make
friends and build a little small
community around you and when you do
that
you can be home anywhere.