Coming Home Again

I never expected Shihad’s anthem to be “Home Again”. NZ’s mightiest live act released their third album in ’96 and it was a departure from the heavy intensity of their first two releases, defiantly poppy and restless. (It’s a great album to sing along to.) “Home Again” is a touring musician’s thin promise/apology to his partner, a charming upbeat track with no small undercurrent of melancholy. It has become the song with which Shihad are most identified, their ultimate crowd-pleaser.
Kiwis like songs about going away and coming home again. This shared affection comes from a number of different strands in our national identity. It’s most obvious in how our middle-class youth (which is a lot of us) habitually embark on the Big OE, the overseas experience, and take off to Europe (sometimes other destinations) for a couple of years. It’s also visible in the large number of New Zealanders living overseas (the global Kiwi “diaspora“), or the relationship many Maori have with a home marae. The bare facts of geography are also influential – when you’re a big island a long way from anywhere, leaving the island and coming back to it become important concerns.
Which brings me to the Returning to New Zealand pages on the Careers NZ website. This set of information was the pet project of a friend of mine, and I’m pleased to send some eyeballs in its direction.
It’s really just three pages, with supporting docs and links. The first is about preparing to return home, with advice and ideas for people who are ready to come back. Then, unsurprisingly given it’s a Careers NZ site, there’s a page about seeking employment back in NZ – definitely worth consideration, as the job market in NZ is its own beastie, quite unlike those in other countries. Finally, there’s a page on settling back in, the cultural and mental adjustments you need to dig back into the local scene (including “reverse culture shock“).
It’s a good wee resource, and I hope it gets found by people who are about to make the jump back – it will surely be of help. There’s also a short survey for recent returners – you might want to click through if that’s you.
You know, I remember vividly getting off the plane, back in Wellington for the first time in years, and the way the sky looked, and the sharp colours of the trees, and most of all the crazy colourful wooden houses clinging to the hillsides. It was very strange and very familiar all at once, and it was a great feeling. I loved coming home.