Next month will be my one year anniversary in London. I can’t believe it’s been year. I feel like I have lived here for so long but at the same time I feel like one year is nothing. I was at the Wireless festival last week with my friend from primary school and somewhere in the middle of either Rudimental popping off or Kanye West ranting and actually performing, she looked an me and said ‘How can we leave London?’ I looked at her and said ‘Honestly, I don’t know’. This year alone we have seen Drake, my favourite DJ Kaytranada, gone to Wireless and seen an array of artists we would never see in Australia. That’s just on the music front. Then there are the people I have met, the African events I get to go to, the friends I have made, the place I live. It’s getting quite cozy here! To the point that I forget that Afroklectic is even around because everything seems so normal (Yes that is way I am so M.I.A these days). The novelty of being an Afro-creative has kind of worn off because there are so many people like me around. It’s actually the most amazing thing. I find myself explaining what I do less and less, or I don’t get looks of disapproval when I say what I do. That was my struggle in Sydney.
One of my childhood friends came to London a few weeks ago and she said that she can’t picture me coming home. I was quite surprised about her statement, but it really dawned on me. She was right. As much as I love Sydney and I dream about my return next year at least once a week, I can’t actually picture myself going back and staying permanently right now. Maybe when I am 30 or when I am ready to settle. Right now my mind is already looping locations of where to move to next. I don’t know why I have become fascinated with moving. Moving is emotionally, physically and at time financially taxing. I think 1.5 global moves in my life is more that enough, but my mind is challenging me to see how far I can go.
In all of this, I find myself slightly lost. My connection to Ghanaian culture has been fuzzed slightly. I don’t have the cultural blanket I had in Sydney. I don’t go to an African church here, I don’t go to weddings, or Ghanaian BBQs etc. I have Ghanaian friends but our liaisons are not culturally focused and I don’t live with Africans either. So now I feel like Ghana does not cultivate in me as much as before and it’s because I don’t have the community base I had in Sydney. The best way I can describe that base is like a small-town of a few thousand. In a small town, you are bound to know most of the people because it’s small. If not, you will most likely have mutual friends with many people. You frequent the same places and so forth. Being without the cultural blanket makes me feel a bit naked at time. With the blanket, no matter how many times I turn, I am always under it and connected. If I try to escape it, somehow I will be under it again. In London, I have to chase this cultural blanket. It’s not bad, it’s just new to me and I am learning to accept this new chapter in my life I called it ‘The Disappearance of the cultural blanket’. When I first moved here I wasn’t coping well in this chapter. I was glued to my phone on Facebook, WhatsApp and Snapchat. Getting visuals of weddings and events I should have been at with family and friends or gatherings at my house. I was trying to hold my place in Sydney. Trying to feel like I had only been gone for a minute. I have learnt that this is a new chapter I have to nurture and develop. The chapters of Sydney are closed for now. I can’t hold onto them, because I will miss out on what is here. Since I have learnt to do that, I have enjoyed myself so much more.
Elements of this post have been in my mind for over two months now, but I haven’t been about to articulate my thoughts and I still don’t think I have articulated it enough. Give me time, I might have to do a video about this in the next couple of months. In the meantime time, I found this quote on tumblr last week which I think it sums up my new feelings about moving to London and leaving Sydney behind.
