My Song of Choice
I chose Duaje Atdheun Tend by Erza Muqoli, which translates to Love Your Homeland. The girl who wrote and sang it was nine years old at the time. This serves as an example of how an individual expresses their affection and yearns for a location that resides in their heart, yet does not actually inhabit it because of war and/or exile.
“Do ta dua vendlindjen e babit tim
Edhe pse linda larg atje diku ne mergim”
“I will love my fathers homeland
Even though I was born far away in exile”
Consequently, this displays the affection one has for a land they are connected with, even if they weren’t born there. Also, coming from a nine-year-old only carries a deeper meaning of how one migrating to another country and leaving their homeland behind effects the second generation.
Experience
My first time listening to this song – I felt a longing. At the time, I was about fourteen years old. However, I heard it when I was visiting my family back home. It felt very full circle to me because I understood and really connected to what this nine-year-old was singing about. Something that I always looked forward to, and still do, is visiting my family back in Kosovo in the summer. Even though I was born in America, I can’t help but feel disconnected from this place and long for the homeland of my parents. There is strong melancholy and a sense of grief when I listen to the song. It is almost like I grieve a life I could have had if my parents hadn’t left their homeland and moved to America. In a way, I feel like because my parents passed away many, many years ago, and I don’t have any other family in the states that it only heightens the feeling of longing and grief. So, whenever I listen to this song it gets associated with heaviness and grief. In a way, I am still grieving many different things, most of all the what-ifs.
“Do ta dua vendlindjen e babit tim
Edhe pse linda larg atje diku ne mergim”
“I will love my fathers homeland
Even though I was born far away in exile”
These lyrics evoke a sense of longing, sadness, and yearning. It is something that I really don’t know how to explain; it is one of those feelings you get when something you love is taken away from you. In this context, the thing being taken away would be one’s homeland. However, from time to time, the desire for it subsides when you return to your homeland for a visit, only to depart once more.
The Albanian language is very difficult but very beautiful; that is why the translation of the song doesn’t even hold a single ounce of weight to how powerful it really is. The piano alongside lyrics just evokes an emotion I can’t begin to explain – listening to this song only makes me want to go back to my parents’ homeland once again.
Technology
Some things that are prominent in the song would be the I Voice and the Dream of the World. Throughout the song, she is speaking in first person, which makes it more touching as it shows her experience and adds to her authenticity. Moreover, the definition of Dream of the World is “a narrative that moves between two worlds,” and I do think when you understand the lyrics, you move between two different worlds – the one as one who lives in exile and the what-if possibility of living in their homeland. I think these both go hand in hand with how the song evokes a certain emotion out of the listener.
“O ska ma mir se ne Prishtine
sa her un jam ktu
sdu mu kthy , sdu mu kthy”
“Oh there is no better place than Prishtina
Every time im here
I don’t wanna go back, I don’t wanna go back”
These specific lyrics are a testament to how one person can be living two different lives, belong to more than one place, and yet have their heart belong to a place that isn’t profoundly their “home.” You can respect where you came from and how it led to who you are now. This also co-aligns with the technology Poetic History profoundly found in lyrics:
“Ti do te vishe ne vendin tend
Aty ku babi yt shtatin ka zon
Vendi yt eshte vend plot dashuri”
“You will go to your homeland
There where your father got his stature
Your land is a land full of love”
Even though you love your homeland, you weren’t born there, so you have to be able to constantly relearn where you came from in order to keep your culture and its traditions, which only strengthens your identity and connection to your parents’ homeland.
However, even though it is not on the list, I do think there is a level of immersion shown in the video. Throughout the whole video, the girl who is singing is looking down at her piano. I do think this adds more to the video and song as a whole. If she were looking at the crowd and camera she would be breaking the wall, which would allow us to connect with her, but because she does not do this, we connect more with the song and are allowed to immerse into it the same way she is when using her piano to sing it.
To be honest, I hadn’t listened to this song in quite some time because of my emotional connection with it, but when this assignment came up, it was the first idea that came to mind, which is weird to me. I say that because it is something that I associate with such melancholy and sad memories, it is almost bittersweet to listen to it and reflect on it.
Featured Image
Still of Erza Muqoli. Koha Television HD. KTV. 2015. All Rights Reserved.
