Did I return or leave home?

I left Manila. It's been more then 24 hours since I left the country I call home: the Philippines. My friends, my family... and my person. All that is left behind and I am back in Munich. Alone.

Being alone is never a problem in Manila... I can spend hours in the condo by myself feeling perfectly fine. But when I am here, I feel lonely very fast.

This is the house where I grew up. This is the first place I should think of, when I am feeling lost and I want to go to a place that feels like a safe harbor. But it's not.

Whenever I leave Manila, I feel like I have to be so much stronger, because there is no one here to catch me if I fall. Funny enough, I am never "depressed" in Manila even though it would be fine, because my best friends are there to support me, to keep me from hitting to hard on the hard-floor of reality. I only get sad and frustated in the worst moments. The moments where I am alone at home, it's pitch-dark night in Manila, so I can't even call around the globe to hear that voice that can save me right now, that's usually when the pain hits me. The pain of not having found someone to love yet, or the pain of having found someone, but not being loved back. 

I never knew another home then the one I am in now... but I realized that it's not the physical things that matter. It's not the things I see, or the bed I sleep in, it's the people who surround me. Of course, I love coming back to my old room, seeing the whole pictures on the wall, and sleeping in my bed... but the older I get, the more it is something more emotional I seek. 

When I am in Manila, I feel like I AM someone. And better even, I feel like I can ME. So whenever I am too tired to go on, too tired to take another breath, I fly home. Tank up on my energy so I can go back to work, to life, to friends and family. Home is where I put all the broken pieces back together so I can live a normal life wherever I live in that moment. Home is where my "person" lives. The one person that doesn't judge, that can tell me anything without me being offended, the one person that loves me and that I love unconditionally without being my family. My best friend, my sister, my person.