Waiting for the warmth

After a long day of studying, Laila reminisces about her childhood in Jakarta.

On one of those chilly early April nights, I laid in my bed waiting for warmth to arrive.

I had finally ended another day of juggling the onslaught of work from both my seminar and my internship. My phone was tucked away to give my eyes a break from the dryness of staring at screens for fourteen hours. So, there I laid face up, stuffed tightly under two quilts, while I watched the shadows of branches that were stretched like taffy as they swept my ceiling.

Amid the low humming of the wind outside, I closed my eyes and a very old memory slipped me a note.

I unfolded it.

I saw myself laying on my back on the floor of my childhood home in Jakarta. I was seven and bored, the way children typically are during summer afternoons when both parents are out, and their brother is off adventuring in his own world.

Back in Indonesia, we typically left the front door and windows open during the day. My living room morphed into one large lung that breathed in rhythm with the balmy breeze, smelling earthy and carrying the promise of rainfall. Within that cavity I laid, feet kicked up on the sofa and finding relief from the heat of the afternoon sun on the ceramic tiles that were always cool to the touch. On afternoons like that, I passed time by devotedly studying the way the trees in my front yard fanned and folded between each other, while I baked gently in the rays of the sinking sun.

Grief suddenly swarmed in and tore at the tail ends of that memory. The Netherlands is where I’ve found myself, built a life and career, and forged friendships I might never find anywhere else. Indonesia on the other hand is one of the last places I could call home, especially since my family now lives in Singapore.

And yet, there was no denying where my skin and bones truly belong.

My sawo matang skin, the deep brown tan of my ancestors, that used to protect me from the harsh equator sun, now clashes with the grey Dutch skies. As a result, I bartered the warm rays for vitamin D pills. My flat nose, meant for the moisture-rich air of tropical weather, is now perpetually irritated by the gusts of harsh winter air. And most starkly, my figure that was molded to radiate heat outwards, now always scrambles to absorb as much heat as possible into my persistently bluish toes.

At moments like these, I wish I could cleave myself in two so my external being could run home to Jakarta and my internal spirit could remain in its home in Rotterdam. Alas, such miracles belong solely in fables.

Ears now also cold from the pool of tears, I continued to lay silently in the deep, fragrant dark, still waiting for that warmth to arrive.