Back home, people don’t go to other people’s homes without warning. If I want to visit a friend or vice versa, there will be a series of messages that go back and forth beforehand arranging the ‘intrusion’ so that no one will be alarmed by an unexpected knocking at their door.
You even get repeat warning messages from online stores that give you an increasingly narrow delivery window so you know the precise times during which you’ll have to pretend that you’re busy doing things around the house other than waiting for said delivery.
Despite several years living in countries where showing up to ones house is not considered as unwelcome as an actual burglary, I still become rooted to the spot in panic whenever I hear a knock at the door that I wasn’t expecting.
One example of this is right now.
There has been a small Filipino man knocking on my door whilst calling my name for upwards of 30 minutes.
Could I answer the door? Probably. Will I? Definitely not.
Aside from the fact that it took me so long to recover from the initial shock that by the time I regained the ability to do so it would have been weird. And also the fact that I feel he has been there for significantly longer than a socially acceptable amount of time. I have come to realise that the human behind the door is the very same human that turned up at my door last night and professed his love to me via the medium of Filipino love ballad.
It was an awkward evening that began with me being chastised for my lack of religious belief, the lack of organisation in my closet, and the bags under my eyes. And ended with me being serenaded in a language I don’t understand for several hours. With a short interlude in the middle that included my visitor telling me that he was in love with me (despite us only ever having exchanged small talk at work prior to this) and me trying to kindly yet firmly inform him that I have no romantic interest in him.
Previous unexpected knockings on my door have included one of my students at a previous job showing up to barge inside every room, cupboard, and draw of my apartment so that she could ‘see what white people’s homes looked like’. And an ex roommate who wanted my protection from our third roommate who was throwing knives at him in the kitchen.
So is it really that strange that I don’t enjoy my space being invaded without warning? Am I the weird one?
Any Which Way 