This was the first time I felt really grown up. It made me feel like myself, because I was all I had to define myself - not my surroundings, history nor duties. Just me, all alone.
And it was the first time I felt exotic. Everything I did had meaning because it was something I had never done before, and I was by a different language and culture. It gave me energy like I had never felt before. That kind of exoticism is impossible to find in one's home...
Unless one returns to that home after being away for a long time, after growing, changing, learning, and slowly shifting toward a new version of oneself. Then, at that moment of arrival, one's eyes have changed such that the whole world - old and new homes - has the same amount of thrilling and stimulating excitement as places never before seen. But the real benefit - of returning home, is that it is home, and that will never change.
