Update: Where the Heart Is
Kerning Cultures
Kerning Cultures Network
4.9 • 529 Ratings
🗓️ 5 November 2020
⏱️ 47 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
For his entire life, Maysam has lived in Dubai. His parents are from Syria, a place he hasn't visited since he was a young child. If you ask him, the UAE is his home. But on paper it isn't, and likely never will be. So what do you do when your home can't be your home forever?
This episode was originally broadcast in March 2018, and last week we called Maysam up to hear what's changed for him since the story aired.
This episode was produced by Hebah Fisher and Alex Atack, with editorial support by Dana Ballout, Percia Verlin, Laura Saab, Razan Alzayani, and Jackie Sofia. Sound design by Alex Atack and Fady Garas. Mixing by Mohamad Khreizat.
Support this podcast on patreon.com/kerningcultures for as little as $1 a month.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | I learned how to walk here, you know? |
| 0:03.2 | I ate food from this land. |
| 0:05.4 | Like, I swam in your oceans. |
| 0:07.0 | I played in the desert. |
| 0:08.3 | Everything about my life is associated with this land. |
| 0:13.1 | And having no sense of permanence here really complicates that. |
| 0:17.8 | And I sometimes wonder if, let's say, for whatever reason, they grant me citizenship, would I be able to call this place home? You know? Is it just that? Or is it more than that? I don't know. I don't. Do you feel a sense of connections to Syria? Not at all. Like, f***ing, not at all. |
| 0:39.3 | Hey, everyone, it's Hibba here. |
| 0:45.3 | While we're busy working on our winter season, which is going to be epic, we wanted to |
| 0:52.3 | share with you today an update on a story that we produced a few |
| 0:56.1 | years ago, actually, back in 2018. It's till now a story I think about every time somebody says |
| 1:02.4 | the word T-CK or a third culture kid. If that doesn't mean anything, it will in a second. And the |
| 1:09.1 | story is called Where the Heart is. It's about a man named |
| 1:12.5 | Meisem Farage and how his life has been shaped by where his passport says he's from, which is |
| 1:17.8 | Syria. But Syria is not a place he really has a connection to. He grew up his whole life in the |
| 1:23.6 | UAE. So it's a story about identity, about love, about family, and it's one of our all-time |
| 1:31.3 | favorites. We've polished it up a little and last week actually called Mism to ask him where he is |
| 1:37.7 | in life now. So you'll hear an update at the end of the episode two. But first, the full story. It comes to us from producer |
| 1:46.4 | Alex Aetak. So our story today is about my friend Maysam. My name is May Sam Farage, Assyrian, |
| 1:53.0 | born and raised in the UAE. He works as a video producer and also a skateboarder. Hi, my name is |
| 1:58.6 | Maysam Farage. I'm going to show you guys how to trick. This is Mesaam in an old skating video from the 2000s. I basically grew up on these videos, went down a total nostalgic rabbit hole re-watching them while I was making this episode. Okay, so first of all, if you want a tray flip, you're going to have to be able to at least pop shove it and kickflip well anyway just |
| 2:19.0 | explain to you quickly how I know may sam we were both brought up in Dubai at the same time and we know |
... |
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