Where is home?

The farther you go from home, the more you become patriotic and more you become aware of who you are and where you come from. I remember in 5th grade our private school principal Ms. Oyuntsetseg, D. told our classmates about the meaning of motherland, and how she wished to educate us to become individuals who not only possess excellent knowledge and foreign language skills but intellectuals who have deep sense of patriotism and love for the motherland. She was one of the true intellectuals in Mongolia whom I was bit intimidated, greatly astounded and respected dearly since I was a little girl. After one fight that occurred among our classmates, she reminded us all that in this world we are all divided into different circles that creates our identity and builds this "we as one" sense.

First, as one classmates we are one circle that should be supportive of each other, outside of that circle it is our hometown the place we grew up that distinguishes us, beyond that circle it is our country that identifies us as Mongolians that we should always be loyal to and after all, the biggest circle is the mother earth that we all as human beings belong to. She also held a PhD in Music Theory and it never goes out of my mind how she said that there will be a time that we as kids will appreciate Mongolian Folk Music once we move abroad and experience the diasporic existence of being away from our roots.

5 years being away from home, I still am very proud of my nationality and I still embrace my ethnicity wherever I go. However, I come to realize that the ‘American education’I acquired and the diverse group of friends I made acquaintance with throughout the past years have eventually made me lose my childish jingoism and somehow diluted my sense of deep “nationalism”. I find myself the more I travel, the more I get immersed into different cultures. I could identify myself with all the previous cities I lived and as time went by I found myself developing a new sense of appreciation to different cultures and I even began to develop sense of patriotism to that new culture that I was living in. I see the US as my adopted homeland, and I see Hawai`i as my second home. There is no country like US that welcomes people from all different corners of the world with both arms open, and there is no place like Hawai`i that feels more homey. I was never treated as a foreigner in Hawai`i, and the fact that we all share the Aloha Spirit in Hawai`i no matter where we came from identifies us as the people from a “happier state.” Polynesian people’s warm hospitality, their great respect for their kupunas (elders) and their sense of appreciation to their nature and to their beach is astonishing.

It makes me wonder what exactly motherland is and how much we owe to that? If we see motherland in the modern context of sovereign states, all nations were born in 1648 with the signing of Treaty of Westphalia. After all, the idea of nationalism indeed is a very superficial concept that is created to make people be loyal to the authority. Professor Howard Zinn also quoted that: “ Nationalism is a set of beliefs taught to each generation in which the Motherland or the Fatherland is an object of veneration and becomes a burning cause for which one becomes willing to kill the children of other Motherland and Fatherland.” I agree with him to some extent that the idea of nationalism is used as a tool to spur hatred, racism and chauvinism to some. During the Cultural Revolution of Mongolia, my grandparents were falsely convicted of treason and have been imprisoned for many years and shot. Despite the ridicule of being a political rebels’ kids my grandparents remains loyal to the party until today. Some people are taught to love the motherland more than their brothers and sisters and even their parents. And in some cases the motherland gives nothing to those people who stayed loyal; nothing but hunger, shame, calumny, denunciation and humility! So, by being patriotic is it the government that we are showing loyalty to, is it love for the one's soil that we grew up on, or is it the mighty history of Mongolia that keeps us as one?

Aristotle said: “I am not an Athenian or Greek, but a citizen of the world.” Maybe I too, do not want to identify myself to any geographical references and I too prefer to be a wandering global citizen. I am sure things would be so much less complicated if there were no borders to divide us. Perhaps that is what John Lennon had in mind when he was “Imagining” about no countries to die or kill for, and when Thomas Paine declared the world as his country, all mankind as his brethren and doing good as his religion. Being the free spirit me, I am drawn by my endless desire to discover new places, meet with new people and to get to know this world. Maybe when I become old and feeble, Mongolia will be the only country that will be my shelter and my fellow Mongolians will be the only people that would still take me with both arms open. In the meantime, I hope I will be able to find the true meaning of motherland and see if it is really “sweet and loving to die for the motherland” as Wilfred Owen wrote.

Now, after going over what i wrote above it reads like a ludicrous jumbled thoughts wandering everywhere from my 5th grade memoir to my grandparents' story during socialism. However, i have to admit that all these thoughts of nationalism and motherland spurred from my simple nostalgia of missing my life in Hawai`i. The fact that i miss Hawai`i instead of the town that i grew up as a child really made me ponder upon where is my place called home? where is my circle? and where did my sense of nationalism fall into? I still do not know, or maybe i am just hiding it from myself...

I miss Hawai`i dearly and i wish someday i will be walking along the Hukilau beach and see the sunrise over Laie again...