Homesickness isn't down to the cake......

When the video first began in our lesson last Monday, I really did not know what to think. I suppose it was a mixture of intrigue and confusion as we watched Mainstream and Lament unfold before us. But then as the discussion began there were ideas coming to the foreground which made the plays meaningful, rather than simple collages of what seemed like snippets of random dialogue. I really enjoyed the idea from Mainstream of unstated genders of each of the characters and perhaps this could be incorporated into our performance.

To link this to the idea of "Homesicknesses", it struck me how unstated the idea of "Homesickness" is as well. For example, what is Home? How do we distinguish and define our home? And then, what is Sickness? Everyone suffers from different symptoms of any illness so can we pin point what exactly the sickness of the absence of home actually is? Is it physical or mental sickness that we intend to explore?

I find the idea of Homesickness confusing and thought that this could be reflected many ways in our performances by using the techniques that we saw from Suspect Culture. For example, the seemingly random answers in Lament created an erratic and confused feeling for the opening of the piece which again (for me personally) would reflect my response to the whole concept of "Homesickness". For me, I feel as though I need to develop a personal definition of "Homesickness" and then bring it to the group and see other ideas for defining it.

• "Most people will have felt homesick at some time in their lives, perhaps when they were younger, and it is easy to forget just how overwhelming it can be."
• "Research on homesickness amongst British university students shows that 35% of new students experience some homesickness, and that between 5% and 15% describe the experience as frightening: a few will go on to develop depression."
  (University of Cambridge Counselling Service Website)
  
• "Homesickness isn't the same kind of sick you felt after you had too much cake that time. It's also not like having a cold or the flu. Nothing's really wrong inside your body, but you still might have a headache or a stomachache. And it will probably hurt inside, the way it does when you're scared or sad. You might even cry, and that's OK."
  (Kids' Health Website)

Claire Stainer