Ten Sounds You Miss from Your Hometown, Part One

My vast work-in-progress moves ever nearer to completion. The narrator is living in exile. He has been thinking about the sounds he misses from his home country.

Here are the sounds I miss the most: the chatter of the liitraavn in Rezistanzskvaar, the two-stroke clatter of Noorskii-SEATs, the jingling of the signals at pedestrian crossings, the chiming of the bells in Klokksskvaar, the breaking of waves on the Valtikkzii shore, the clunking of the otiis-mekanismis in the Berkmanis department store, the whine of the locomotives’ electromechanical motors, the four-note fugue of the train’s public address system, Tiia’s voice and those of my family, Jovaa and Valeriia, the sound of my own language, its cadence and intonations… 

It got me thinking about the exiles I know – and there are quite a few of them – and which sounds they miss the most, or vice-versa, those they don’t. 

So I asked my wife, the Colombian illustrator, Catalina Carvajal. It seemed the obvious place to start. And this is what she told me. 

Her grandmother’s voice

Aeroplanes flying low overhead on approach to the airport

The prerecorded voice of the tamales-vendor, advertising his wares

The whistle of a mobile sweet-potato oven

Comforting conversation coming from the TV downstairs at her mother’s house in Bogota

The marimbas of street musicians

The sound of departing underground trains on the Mexico City metro

Her friends babbling in the background at a dinner party

The noise of the crowds in downtown Mexico City

The clattering plates and chattering clientele of the cantinas 

In the coming weeks, we’ll be hearing from other exiles about the sounds they miss.

All text and images © PSR 2017

In Manchester

In Manchester. It’s a beautiful piece of perfect pop by the band, Wire. Here’s a link to it on YouTube. It’s also where I was, last weekend. In all the travelling I’ve undertaken in recent times, I haven’t explored my own country much. Last weekend, work took me to England’s northwest and a return to the city of Manchester and its university. 

I had a little time to re-acquaint myself with the city centre. Victorian Gothick abounds. The Museum, the cathedral, the University, the City Hall… 

My accommodation was nothing short of astonishing. I stayed at the former Refuge Assurance Building, a marvel of redbrick and Burmantoft tiles, marble and brass. It demonstrates a commitment to the aesthetic that we rarely encounter now, a testament to lost crafts and foundries. My little not-so-smart phone isn’t up to the job of reflecting the architectural splendour of the building, but it did its best. 

 What an amazing city… It just goes to show that England isn’t just about London, as some people seem to believe. If it weren’t for the political climate here – it’s even worse than the meteorological one – I could almost fall in love with my country again. 

All text and images © PSR 2017