In September 2006, our family of four arrived in a place they will call home in the years to come. That place earned its ‘city’ status nearly two decades later. As a young teenager then, it was hard to ignore how this city had zero physical resemblance to where we had arrived from. The air felt different in a breath. Even the sunniest of days couldn’t match the warmth of a tropical sun on my skin. Everything needed getting used to. What makes an unfamiliar city feel at home over the years? Certainly, familiarity is a feeling that really does take years, eighteen years precisely in my story, and I’m only thirty years old!

What is familiarity, exactly? Maybe it is like a perfect tune to a song, often going unnoticed and taken for granted. It may also be the feeling of having those who stand by you no matter what. Friendships that are as good as family. Because the sense of solidarity is what you need. There is yearning for those shared feelings and life experiences that are simply unique to you. If familiarity wasn’t a feeling of a place, it had to be what those people you surround yourself with brought with them.

In my story, there is one place I think of time and time again when thinking about my life so far, growing up in this city. It’s the beautiful Peace Pagoda. The memory of our very first visit to this temple is rather a special one. On a late summer day in 2006, my family were on a long walk to find our way to the temple. Our journey started from the shopping centre in the city. I was thirteen, my only sister aged eleven; and with us were our parents.

We were greeted by the head monk, Handa Shonin. Finding that we were newcomers to this city, he started to fill our rucksack with some food items offered to the temple. Knowing that we had walked all this way, and since it had started to rain very heavily outside, he drove us home in his own car without a second thought. We were beyond humbled by his caring nature. A seed of hope about our life in this city started growing in our hearts.

For eighteen years since, the temple at Peace Pagoda has been the centre point of our familiarity. The ‘bean-throwing’ festival that welcomes spring, the flower festival, then the anniversary ceremony every June to the lantern floating ceremony for Hiroshima Day every year. These are the occasions that have redefined this special feeling of familiarity. We have even come to fall in love with the seasons and continue to find joy in them. Since moving across lands and oceans, slowly but surely this city has now become our home. And finally, familiarity, I think, is the most comforting feeling that your chosen place and people closest to you can give.