I started writing this song in 2012, finished arrangement, lyrics and vocals in 2014, and finally recorded and released it in 2018. During that time period, I had many homes.

What's the song about?

This song is about my thoughts about what home is. Shortly after moving to the US almost two decades ago, whenever I was at the airport either entering or exiting the country, people would ask me "are you going to or coming from home?". I’d catch myself thinking, "is home where I was born and raised or to where I’ve migrated?".

In 2013, I’ve watched this great TED talk by Pico Iyer, "Where is Home?" and was glad to see I wasn’t alone having those thoughts. For a couple of years after that, I collected my own thoughts and turned them into the lyrics I wrote sometime in 2014.

The Writing Process

The writing process started back in 2012 when I was messing around with a cheap acoustic guitar that could barely stay tuned. The melody stuck with me. Months later, I turned the acoustic part into a riff played on the electric guitar and other riffs derived from it. I connected the parts together and did a simple recording to save the ideas. Here’s a video of what that sounded like:


Here’s another video messing with another riff, playing my old friend’s rare Ibanez John Petrucci signature guitar:


After thinking of some vocal melodies for the song in 2014, I wrote lyrics and finished the song’s arrangement.


The Lyrics

Home as I've known it
Through words unsaid
You must always return
Do they wait for you?

If I speak the language
If we look the same
If I was born here
Could I call it my home?

Can I feel at home
at a place, I don't own?
A residence, that is all
We live inside four walls

An address on the phone book
Houses get bought and sold
Your home travels with you
In your mind, your heart, your soul

But I try to find
A place where I'm not down

Home is that place where you're respected,
loved, and cared for
Regardless of what you have,
Of where you were born,
Of where you live

Could home be a state of mind?
Perception changes over time
The place where I can be myself
I can see myself
There is no place like home

Do you know where home is?
Do you know what is it?
Can you feel or see it?
Is it the place you go when you're no more?

The name I put on the mailbox
The pictures I hang on the wall
How well I'm known in the neighborhood
Is this the place where I belong?

'cause I cannot hide
What I feel from myself

Home is that place where you're respected,
loved, and cared for
Regardless of what you have,
Of where you were born,
Of where you live

Could home be a state of mind?
Perception changes over time
The place where I can be myself
I can see myself
There is no place like...

Home
Your home
My home

Do you talk like me?
Do you act like me?
If so, is this home?

Home
Your home
My own

Do you look like me?
Do you think like me?
If so, is this home?

In my life, I have been put aside
Now I want, I want that all left behind
My sorrows drowned in the past
My hopes are on the rise again

Through my eyes I know my heart has learned
Through my heart I feel my eyes have seen
In this place, this place I now stand
I think I may, I may have found my home