Finding Home

Nottingham might not be as quaintly English as Lincoln with its shiny cobbled streets and old toffee shops, nor as flippantly grunge and artistically gritty as Bristol – definitely can’t compare it to the magically majestic Edinburgh or the chaotic mad land-of-the-fast walkers-and-shovers-move –aside- where-did-all-the-polite-Englishmen-go-London ...

It may not be haughtily beautiful like Oxford or Bath, nor situated along the coast of ancient white cliffs from the era of dinosaurs, not hipster like Norwich nor posh like Brighton –

Still, there is something about the city that makes me quite happy we have chosen it as our tempoary home.

It’s got a quirky mischievous character, somewhat hidden between the standard high street stores and the more grimy alleys with shops nursing cracked window panes and sad wayfarers looking for spare change to buy a bus ticket or perhaps more likely, another beer instead –

You can always expect a place to be much bigger than it seems from the outside – a small suspicious path marked by an overflowing bin leading to a courtyard with arty shops, a cafe and a wall covered with orange butterflies and black flowers, strings of fairy lights twinkling like a reflection of the night sky; a narrow doorframe flanked on both side by tall thin crooked buildings opening into a large hall with high roof beams and windows in the ceiling to let in the blue of the sky ... bars with music venues tucked into corners, terrace gardens with potted plants and benches, cafes with lofts to read some poetry out loud and of course, the manmade caves below some of the older pubs, I mean an open mic night in an actual cave with the musty secretive cold air emanating from old stone and pent up emotions of writers and would-be-might-be writers, all candle lit and slippery stepped? Not too shabby.

Slowly, painfully, thanks to an open (if quite mercurial bipolar) heart, Google maps, some good friends and scribbled lists and itineraries, Nottingham has become, well, kind of, almost, home (right after Karachi, Lahore, St. Louis, and Islamabad ...).

Autumn is a good month to appreciate England – even though the days have gotten short enough to induce panic, (eek, only five hours of daylight left – if you can call it daylight when it’s so frickin gray outside and the sun is like a moody teenager sulking behind closed doors/clouds).  The panic is followed by a fatalistic lethargy that seeps through the entire body as soon as the sun disappears, gloomy voices muttering it must be time for dinner and bed now but really, it is just 6 pm –

The beautiful Fall/Autumn colours, however, make up (partly) for these terribly long nights. 

One of my favourite haunts (also TripAdvisor’s no. 1 recommendation for Nottingham!) is Wollaton Park. 

Almost twice as big as London’s Hyde Park, Wollaton Park is beautiful.  Another unassuming entrance (if you take the bus to the park), you push open a gritty door in what appears to be a cast away standalone archway from a castle, try to avoid the eternal muddy puddles of rain and then walk into a vast, unending, unruly garden with a path stretching ahead, lined on both sides with tall trees.

And this time of the year, the trees are even more magical – almost ethereal, an array of colours, the time of the year all the trees shrug off their study usual greenness and don their favourite colours, yellow, russet, red, or maybe a bit of each, like people dressing up for Halloween or a carnival parade ... And like anything that lasts for a short period of time (rain in Karachi, sunshine in England, your first crush, a cup of clove tea, the aftertaste of chocolate ...), it just feels so special.  Red leaves always take my breath away, as do lines of trees with yellow foliage blending one into the other so you can’t tell which branch belongs to which tree.

And then when the sunlight falls over the yellow trees, like a lover’s embrace, they light up gold, mesmerizing enough to make you forget all your worries, relaxing your shoulders like an expert masseur’s fingers might, filling you up with that serene emptiness that never lasts for long but is so precious while it does, an airy lightness, contentment you can breathe in and out through your nose.

There were as many dogs as children running around excitedly, the runners, the cyclists, the couples, the solo photographers, the solitary readers and the sun was generous enough to warm us all. There is a mossy muddy path between thickets of trees, it goes around the lake, and up to a cafe where you can fulfil your consumerist needs and buy that cup of coffee that is an eternal need on sunny brightly cold Autumn days (cemented by our trusty FOMO-fuelling social media and every possible romantic comedy produced) and then on top of the hill rests the beautiful stately Wollaton Hall (another Nottingham bragging right – it was the Wayne Mansion as seen from the outside and featured in the Batman movies!) – a little greenhouse, and benches scattered around for you to sit on and stare at the beautiful grounds, the private golf course, and the resident deer nonchalantly feeding on some grass while irksome students take selfies with them. 

It has been two years in Nottingham now but I would be lying if I said that’s what comes to mind when someone says “home” – I miss Pakistan quite painfully, and pictures of Islamabad’s shiny roads and green hills, Karachi’s mad lights and gritty gray Seaview, of doughy crispy parathas and strong hot chai in small stained glass mugs, even pictures of chaotic dirty streets and busy bazaars full of men who I know would leer and women who I know would jostle – it all pulls at my heartstrings and makes me wish I could snap my fingers and be sitting in my mum’s lounge or on a plastic chair at one of Karachi’s outdoor chai dhabas talking with old friends...

Even though.

Every now and then, maybe at a friend’s house when her toddler learns to say my name, or over a holiday-themed coffee with a colleague-turned-mate, maybe when I look out at the neighbour’s tree that leans over into our backyard with its beautiful pink-orange leaves, so striking that I always pause whatever I am doing to just look at it for a few minutes, or when I’m sitting on a bench soaking in some sun and gazing at the yellow orange finery of Wollaton, every now and then, little old Nottingham feels like home.