A REAL SENSE OF HOMECOMING

Time really flies – we have been working in Cambodia for over three & a half years now. Each time, when Grace and I came back to Singapore for holiday or meetings, I always felt a huge sense of excitement and eagerness to be back to familiar homeland Singapore. Not that we are not enjoying our work in Cambodia – we are. But nevertheless Singapore is where roots belong; Singapore is where we grow and it is also Singapore which makes it all possible for us to root deeper, climb higher and spread our branches beyond the shores of Singapore.

So homecoming, despite having done so many times in this 3.5 years, have never lose its special meaning and appeal for a oft-home-sick Singaporean like me.

But Grace would always reason that home is where she is. So no matter where I am (Singapore or Cambodia), so long as she is around, that is home – that will be family. I wouldn’t agree more; but yet, I would counter by reasoning that home would be more complete if we were to be back to our own Blk 557 Pasir Ris St 51, which has now become the temporary property of our tenant; hence making us trespassers of our own flat if we try to enter it without permission… Sigh, sadly! We haven’t entered it for a good number of years now (despite that the details of our flat and my favorite activities in it remained firmly etched in our mind).

18 Sep 07 – For the first time, Grace and I were separated for the first time, the longest time in our 6 years of marriage – a good 18 days. Grace had to be back to Singapore to prepare for her delivery of our first child (oh how excited, despite apprehensive too, were we) while I remained behind in Cambodia for work. And I can tell you, I can now empathize with any baby or child who has separation anxiety with her parents, because that was exactly (maybe not exactly lah) the same anxiety I felt when I was about to be separated from Grace.

So on 6 Oct and then again on 25 Oct when I came back to Singapore to reunite with Grace, the feeling of homecoming took on an even greater significance. And I begin to remember and appreciate Grace’s words much better, “Home is where I am!”… Her message was finally driven home.

Now the worst separation in my life (so far I think), is on 9 Nov, only 6 days after our baby was born on 3 Nov, when I had to go back to Cambodia all alone. It was difficult, to say the least. I couldn’t wait for the next 13 days to drift by as swiftly as possibly because I really want to be back with family, now that the unit is complete with our first bundle of heavenly joy and delight.

So finally on 22 Nov night while I was waiting for departure at Phnom Penh Airport Departure Hall, alone myself and unknown to the many other waiting passengers, I felt a REAL sense, a very authentic & un-faked sense, of homecoming. It was a homecoming like never before.

So at the Phnom Penh airport, while many affluent Cambodians were catching the Water Festival Holiday season (which started the following day on 23 Nov, when the fateful drowning accident of the 5 Singaporean dragon boat team members took place at Tonle Sap, a river which I had to cross everyday to work) were leaving home for Singapore for a holiday getaway, I was coming home for my own getaway, right into the heartland of my Singapore homeland, and into the warmth and love of my very own family. THIS IS HOME indeed!

Experiencing homecoming,
Eli-yah


Afterthought

But as I reflected on the spiritual significance of this personal experience of mine, I wondered if I would have been as enthusiastic and eager with my heavenly homecoming as with my earthly homecoming? Have I, in my embrace of my earthly family (a blessing and heavenly inheritance indeed), diminished my desire like Paul’s “desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far” (Philippians 1:23b)? Or have I yet to learn from the fathers of faith of bible times who “were longing for a better country – a heavenly one” (Hebrews 11:16).

Relearning homecoming,
Eli-yah