As Greek expats, we bear our home within us. In order to create “homes” out of our places of accommodation in various cities, we bring with us certain objects, reminiscent of our roots and our culture. Whatever can fit in our suitcase of departure. The familiar relics stand in juxtaposition to unfamiliar surroundings and blend into new landscapes, exactly like us adapting as foreigners to multicultural societies. 

We bring our notebooks, the written proof of our earlier selves, the first to be arranged chronologically in our new bookshelves. 

We bring a pocket mirror from Russia, gift from our mother, reminding us that our great grandmother spent her childhood there. 

We bring the laces knitted by our grandmother, not to decorate the house or dower a husband, but to smell her house on them. 

We keep a teddybear hippopotamus to hug our thoughts at night, carry our dreams and relieve our anxieties for the past fifteen years. 

We insist on a broken vase, bought with discount, to remind us the fragility of delicacy. 

We hang a hellenistic mask above our wooden mirror: she could be us, and we are her, every time we smirk with patience and resilience towards the world. 

We keep a symbolic pair of ballet shoes, the first prize of a competition in a hometown long forgotten, or a stone “for luck” and farewell from a mentor, so that we do not forget them. 

How could we ever. 

Then there is a costume from The Nutcracker that does not fit us anymore and is aways a struggle to pack. 

And a pair of earrings, from the first exhibition we visited in the new metropole. 

Old and new, but always loyal comrades.