Rahma, I absolutely see you my love, The anguish of parting from your homeland, your friends and family. It shatters my heart. There is such duality of emotion is us, the women that wander from home, and create a home within... it is both a gift and a curse. Your voice is beautiful, ethereal. So emotional. I am writing this with a tear running down my cheek. Sending you much love, Lis x
The first time I ever heard this song was in your voice, in Bosnia...it sent shivers all through me and I still get shivers every time I hear or sing or think of it, which always makes me think of you! A song like that is almost alive to me, like an old friend coming to teach a new thing each time it’s sung. I’ve also been a leaver most of my life and it’s wrenching and exhausting. But eventually a sense of home develops in your core. Your arms are the home you make for your children. The body is a home, shed every seven years. Home, I suppose, is something that grows...sorry for the ramble...loved this piece. Thankyou for sharing your beautiful real and vulnerable voice xxx
I'm really moved by this idea of my arms as the home for my children. I wrote a piece about the body as home during lockdown while pregnant with Nabila, experiencing the strange realisation that my body was home to two hearts. I haven't thought about my body still holding an element of home for my children now they're outside of it. Beautiful 🥲 Thank you for sharing ❤️
Somebody wrote to me after reading this piece and shared the most beautiful story of the presence of Kam Laka Min, the qasida of departure, has had in their life. I know you have a version of it that you have recorded. I'd love if you could share the link here so that it can live with this piece 🙏
I also have a song memory of you from that Bosnia trip. It's the two part harmony you taught us about slowing down. It's become ever more relevant in my life. "What am I rushing towards? What am I rushing for? Slow down and savour" I actually shared about that song in the comments of a substack piece somewhere here on Substack. I think it was a piece by Lauren Barber of The Mother Well.
Also the pure joy of singing Britney and Kylie and even Eminem with your fantastic accompaniment in Mostar! Another great memory 😂😂
Those were the days!! Ah thankyou for reminding me of that Slow Down song, that was the song I sang in my last baby's labour...how songs have been connected to memories in our lives!! Sounds like a whole blog, or a book, ahhhh too many cool ideas!!
I have in fact recorded Kim Laka Min, it's one of the few songs I've really done nicely with percussion and everything, you can find it and even buy a copy here (shameless plug lol):
100%! With storytelling I was taught there is a triangle (I imagine almost a dancing triangle) made from the teller, the audience and the story itself. The three things interact with each other and you can never really predict what will happen each time. I can only imagine a song to be the same kind of living, interacting entity.
I haven't even read the article yet - and just the title and subtitle make ME want to cry. "What if I stayed?" is a background theme song to my life - and one particularly relevant over the next 9 months as we decide whether to stay in our current country.... We don't want to, even though it is the easier choice. It's agonising not knowing sometimes, and at other times, the not-knowing just sits as a low level buzz of limbo land uncertainty. Both are deeply unsettling to me. Okay...I'm off to read this now that I've processed your title!....
Read. Firstly, thank you for your voice. Haunting and beautiful. Secondly, staying is a new adventure, much MUCH harder than leaving, but a worthy one in itself. After 20 years of LEAVING every few years, I STAYED in one place for 9 years. It was hard, but it saved me from too much leaving which was no longer serving me...and brought me my lifetime husband love and my child. Staying was so good for me, thought highly uncomfortable. Then we left. And this time I've stayed for 4+ years, and I want to leave at milestone 5 years. But the next place, I want to STAY, really STAY the way a tree needs to STAY where it's planted. But I don't want to stay here - and precisely because I don't want to, I fear life will force it on me. I want just one more LEAVING so that I can STAY out of my own free choice. "Just one more"... usually doesn't work out that way...but here's me hoping!
Thank you for your words! I look forward to reading more as you settle in your new place, as I look for escape hatches from my current one!
Oh Vanessa, the tree is the exact image I hold😭 Rooting deep to reach tall... but yes, then it's easy to feel a real pressure to make sure it's the right place. It sounds like your staying bore beautiful fruit!
There must be so many layers to your story, Rahma... I see you ❤️. “How do you even know if you want to stay”, is the question that haunts my brain these days. One of my friends is talking about her “forever home” and I’m thinking I don’t think I’ll ever have one of those...
Thanks for sharing that question Susan. It's really got me thinking... and also sparked another seemingly unrelated question around what we carry with us. I have a friend who has moved around a lot but her home always looks and feels like her home, whatever house it is in. I wonder what it is that she carries with her that means her presence in a house has such a clear feeling... I wonder if that's available to everyone.
Do you think you would like to have a forever home? I sometimes fantasise about it but then wonder if it would be satisfiying for me 🤷🏻♀️
Rahma, I absolutely see you my love, The anguish of parting from your homeland, your friends and family. It shatters my heart. There is such duality of emotion is us, the women that wander from home, and create a home within... it is both a gift and a curse. Your voice is beautiful, ethereal. So emotional. I am writing this with a tear running down my cheek. Sending you much love, Lis x
You get it 🥲 Thanks for this beautiful comment. Holding the vision of the home within ❤️
The first time I ever heard this song was in your voice, in Bosnia...it sent shivers all through me and I still get shivers every time I hear or sing or think of it, which always makes me think of you! A song like that is almost alive to me, like an old friend coming to teach a new thing each time it’s sung. I’ve also been a leaver most of my life and it’s wrenching and exhausting. But eventually a sense of home develops in your core. Your arms are the home you make for your children. The body is a home, shed every seven years. Home, I suppose, is something that grows...sorry for the ramble...loved this piece. Thankyou for sharing your beautiful real and vulnerable voice xxx
I'm really moved by this idea of my arms as the home for my children. I wrote a piece about the body as home during lockdown while pregnant with Nabila, experiencing the strange realisation that my body was home to two hearts. I haven't thought about my body still holding an element of home for my children now they're outside of it. Beautiful 🥲 Thank you for sharing ❤️
Somebody wrote to me after reading this piece and shared the most beautiful story of the presence of Kam Laka Min, the qasida of departure, has had in their life. I know you have a version of it that you have recorded. I'd love if you could share the link here so that it can live with this piece 🙏
I also have a song memory of you from that Bosnia trip. It's the two part harmony you taught us about slowing down. It's become ever more relevant in my life. "What am I rushing towards? What am I rushing for? Slow down and savour" I actually shared about that song in the comments of a substack piece somewhere here on Substack. I think it was a piece by Lauren Barber of The Mother Well.
Also the pure joy of singing Britney and Kylie and even Eminem with your fantastic accompaniment in Mostar! Another great memory 😂😂
Those were the days!! Ah thankyou for reminding me of that Slow Down song, that was the song I sang in my last baby's labour...how songs have been connected to memories in our lives!! Sounds like a whole blog, or a book, ahhhh too many cool ideas!!
I have in fact recorded Kim Laka Min, it's one of the few songs I've really done nicely with percussion and everything, you can find it and even buy a copy here (shameless plug lol):
https://medinatenour.bandcamp.com/track/kam-laka-min
It's also a song that has lodged its roots firmly in my heart...again, songs are surely quasi-living beings right?
100%! With storytelling I was taught there is a triangle (I imagine almost a dancing triangle) made from the teller, the audience and the story itself. The three things interact with each other and you can never really predict what will happen each time. I can only imagine a song to be the same kind of living, interacting entity.
"SONG MEMORIES"...OK I've named it now, it exists XD
Rahma, you write so beautifully- this is the most poignant piece of work - very moving. Sending you love
Thank you Debbie 🤗
This is such a gorgeous reflection Rahma and it was incredibly beautiful and moving to hear your voice, it gave me goosebumps.
Thank you Laura 🙏
Brought a tear to my eye too Rahma! Especially hearing your voice, beautiful words, love you xxx
I haven't even read the article yet - and just the title and subtitle make ME want to cry. "What if I stayed?" is a background theme song to my life - and one particularly relevant over the next 9 months as we decide whether to stay in our current country.... We don't want to, even though it is the easier choice. It's agonising not knowing sometimes, and at other times, the not-knowing just sits as a low level buzz of limbo land uncertainty. Both are deeply unsettling to me. Okay...I'm off to read this now that I've processed your title!....
Read. Firstly, thank you for your voice. Haunting and beautiful. Secondly, staying is a new adventure, much MUCH harder than leaving, but a worthy one in itself. After 20 years of LEAVING every few years, I STAYED in one place for 9 years. It was hard, but it saved me from too much leaving which was no longer serving me...and brought me my lifetime husband love and my child. Staying was so good for me, thought highly uncomfortable. Then we left. And this time I've stayed for 4+ years, and I want to leave at milestone 5 years. But the next place, I want to STAY, really STAY the way a tree needs to STAY where it's planted. But I don't want to stay here - and precisely because I don't want to, I fear life will force it on me. I want just one more LEAVING so that I can STAY out of my own free choice. "Just one more"... usually doesn't work out that way...but here's me hoping!
Thank you for your words! I look forward to reading more as you settle in your new place, as I look for escape hatches from my current one!
Oh Vanessa, the tree is the exact image I hold😭 Rooting deep to reach tall... but yes, then it's easy to feel a real pressure to make sure it's the right place. It sounds like your staying bore beautiful fruit!
There must be so many layers to your story, Rahma... I see you ❤️. “How do you even know if you want to stay”, is the question that haunts my brain these days. One of my friends is talking about her “forever home” and I’m thinking I don’t think I’ll ever have one of those...
Thanks for sharing that question Susan. It's really got me thinking... and also sparked another seemingly unrelated question around what we carry with us. I have a friend who has moved around a lot but her home always looks and feels like her home, whatever house it is in. I wonder what it is that she carries with her that means her presence in a house has such a clear feeling... I wonder if that's available to everyone.
Do you think you would like to have a forever home? I sometimes fantasise about it but then wonder if it would be satisfiying for me 🤷🏻♀️