Sometimes home doesn’t come back as a place, but as a flower you recognize from your childhood.
Growing up in India, I knew an alarming number of flower names for someone who hadn’t actually seen them.
Ask me to point out a daffodil in real life? Absolutely could not help you.
Ask me why forget-me-nots make me emotionally unstable? I had a TED Talk prepared.
That’s what happens when your childhood consists of an unhealthy amount of books, anime, television and music. Somewhere along the way, flowers stopped being plants and became fictional characters. They carried symbolism, foreshadowed tragedy, represented love interests or occasionally… poisoned someone.
So imagine my surprise when I moved to Canada, looked into my backyard one spring, and realized I’d accidentally walked into my own media library.
Iris: The flower behind the soundtrack
For years, whenever someone said “iris,” my brain didn’t picture petals.
It immediately started playing “Iris” by the Goo Goo Dolls.
“And I’d give up forever to touch you…”
That song had such a grip on my teenage years that I genuinely forgot it was named after an actual flower. The name was emotional damage with a guitar solo in my brain.
Then one day, I saw an iris blooming outside my home.
It felt oddly surreal meeting something I’d known for years but had never actually seen.
Petunia: Harry Potter’s least favourite aunt
I spent years associating Petunia with exactly one thing: Petunia Dursley. The woman who made Harry live in a cupboard under the stairs.
When I first saw actual petunias, my immediate thought was:
“Wait. This is what she’s named after?!”
The flowers are colourful and practically impossible to dislike.
Honestly, J.K. Rowling naming one of her most unpleasant characters after such a lovely flower… the flowers deserved better.
Forget-me-nots: Anime’s favourite emotional support flower
If you’ve watched enough anime, you know exactly what’s about to happen when forget-me-nots appear.
Someone is about to leave.
Someone is about to remember.
Or someone is about to make you cry over a character you’ve only known for twelve episodes.
These tiny blue flowers have become emotional shorthand. They’re small enough to miss if you’re not looking, yet somehow they carry the emotional weight of an entire soundtrack.
I stared at them thinking, “So you’re the reason I’ve cried this many times.”
Every anime fan knows these flowers.
Lily-of-the-Valley: Beautiful… and slightly terrifying
Some people associate the lily-of-the-valley with weddings or spring.
I associate it with Walter White. Thanks to Breaking Bad, I don’t look at those tiny white bells and get charmed by their cuteness.
I think, “That flower has a criminal record.”
I’d imagined them being much larger after seeing photographs online. Instead, they’re tiny, almost shy-looking flowers hiding underneath leaves.
Which somehow makes them even more intimidating.
Never trust the cute ones.
Buttercups: Stronger than they look
Buttercups always confused me.
The name sounds soft. The flowers are tiny. They look like something I’d absent-mindedly tuck behind my ear during a picnic.
Yet every time I hear “Buttercup,” I immediately think of The Powerpuff Girls. The toughest one. The one who solved problems by punching them.
Somehow that association permanently changed how I look at buttercups. They might appear fragile, but in my head they’re ready to throw hands at any moment.
A little piece of home
Moving to another country changes more than your address.
Everything feels unfamiliar at first: the streets, the weather, the grocery stores; even the birds sound different.
As international students, we’re constantly learning a new version of everyday life. Sometimes that feels exciting, and sometimes it’s exhausting.
It’s funny how stories travel with us. Long before I moved across the world, books, songs and shows had already introduced me to tiny pieces of this place. I just didn’t realize it until spring arrived.
So if you’re an international student, pay attention to the little things around you. You might discover that the places you’ve only read about, watched on screen or imagined for years have quietly been waiting outside your window all along.
Feature image by Nina on Unsplash
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