Thought For The Day : Hiraeth

 

Thought For The Day:  

when my Mum was in end of life care she had forgotten her home, the house where I grew up, and she clearly mourned the loss of her home in Manchester. I tried to explain that she hadn’t lived there for over 50 years but she seemed upset at the fact, so I left it and assured her when she got better we would go.  

I also recall sharing with a rep for a company I worked for that I missed my family holidays in Fleetwood where my grandparents lived and he said it being in his area ‘Whatever you do, don’t go back!’ 

That there is a word for this feeling astonishes me but a maudlin mourning for a place that no longer exists is “hiraeth” (Welsh in origin I believe from my dear ‘cousin’ Geoff!) seems to summarise it nicely!

Similar to the Portuguese or Brazilian saudade (sodade)

hence Casaria Evora - Sodade

I came across the music of Cape Verde and Cesaria in New York back in the late nineties and working for a SF based art publisher we stopped at a really rather cool corner bar and I had to ask the bartender what the music was that was playing, she gladly obliged and it was this . . . . . . . . 

 

Cesaria Evora - Sodade (from the great 1992 album Miss Perfumado)

"Ken mostro-b es kaminhu longe?" ("Who showed you the faraway path?”) in Cape Verdean Creole