To me, the sense of home is a kind of feeling. It is not a kind of furniture, not a specific location. It is a feeling that makes you feel relaxed and comfortable. It is a feeling of belonging and you can never have at other places. 

To me, people are the key point of home. Surrounded by people who you love and trust will make you feel like you are at home the most. 

I am an international student from Taiwan. When I first came to Vancouver, I felt really lonely and depressed. It rains a lot and I know nothing about the city. I grew up in Taiwan until I’m 19 years old. All of my friends and family are back ‘home’. To me it is difficult to get used to somewhere else than my hometown because to me it is my only home that is irreplaceable. It is also difficult to get used to living somewhere people speak a different language, have different lifestyles, values, education background and tastes. 

However,  I started school in Canada and I started to make friends. Moreover, me and my neighbor in my residence became best friends. We take the same class and we have lots of fun together. The group of friends that I have will go out and eat or cook together during the weekend. We share our different traditions from our homes, instead of our differences separating us. One Saturday night there were five people in the car on our way back to school. At that moment I felt like this is home. I learned that home is with people that make you feel like you belong and you have someone to go to when you are upset. They are people that you can trust and want to spend time with. When you have all that, it is home, it is family. No matter where you are, even in a car you can feel it. 

I love cooking. I started cooking when I am in highschool and I know what I enjoy the most. When I came to Vancouver, I brought my favorite kind of noodles and mix it with a simple sauce that I invented back home. Everytime when I am homesick I would cook a bowl of noodles and eat it and watch a movie. So a sense of home could be a taste that is familiar and when you eat it it can always remind you with “the place” in your head. So home can be tied to ingredients, food ways and lifestyle, habits, which are connected to specific places, like Taiwan for me, but now becoming more globalised too. 

To me, a sense of home could also be a kind of smell that you love and are used to. I am always a big fan of collecting essential oils. I believe that it is relaxing and good for your body. There are different kinds for different needs. When I want to sleep well I would use lavender essential oil. I like to use rose essential oil for bath because it is good for the skin. Moreover Mint is helpful to treat headaches. I have an oil diffuser at home and I would choose a different type of essential oil depending on my mood. It makes me relax and to me it is one of the benefits when I go home. 

A sense of home is what we need in life. It is what motivates us to work hard and fight in the world we live in today. It is one of the best things in life as a human. We all need a place that makes us feel belonging and feel like we are needed. It could be where our family is, or where the people who are like family. It could be a sense of smell and taste and most importantly it is something personal that are subjective. Of course it is tied to certain cultures and these are tied to certain places, but it is also mobile and can be reimagined in new spaces.  The most important thing is feeling like you belong and are free from being judged, so sometimes this means it’s tied to a place where people share your cultural values and lifestyle, where you fit in. You get to decide what it is to you. Home is where the heart is, and I would say home is where the heart is safe.