Going Home … Only to Come Back Out

Abstract

In a conversation a year after their holiday in Ibiza, Nathan and Jay can clearly recall the ‘great moments’. In doing so, they confirm the perception that what they experience in Ibiza — and for many Brits in this book and on holiday elsewhere — is a kind of constructed ‘freedom’. For most, however, the feelings generated by the return to home life are sour and existentially penetrating, and this is evident in their admissions that they wanted to stay and that, despite everything — even the most bizarre moment of the holiday when Nathan was sucked off and shat himself — the feeling of coming home was more depressing. The perfect life it seems is one without these home pressures where they can engage in this kind of hedonism on a daily basis.