Possibly the biggest challenge I have been facing in myself is how exciting living in a different country isn't. I mean, yes, I am building awesome friendships with people who have quite different perspectives in life (in some ways, anyway). I am seeing new places, learning new languages.
But I still wake up every day and think about going to work (or other things I would rather be doing). I still get unnecessarily anxious about social situations. I still have to get out of the house and DO things, and it is still just as easy to sit at home on the computer and waste time.
And more than that, it can be lonely. It is harder to start new relationships, though I find the payoff of connection is generally much bigger when friends are coming from different cultures, it is much easier to step on each other's toes by not paying attention to "the things that actually matter" in a relationship-- since we may have quite different ideas about what those are. I don't want to go shopping some days because I don't want to deal with the fear in employee's eyes when they realize they might have to deal with me.
I don't mean to be complaining, really. I know I am very lucky to be here and am grateful for the experiences I am having and the ways there are making me grow. There are just always people now and then who tell me that they are impressed that I can live here, and (aside from just not being very good at taking compliments) I always want to shout "Don't be!" I am dealing with most of the same problems that I dealt with in my life in Iowa.
I continually realize that no matter what exciting scenery I find for myself, I will always be me. I am lucky, but if any of my family and friends still in America (or wherever their home country) moved to a new country, they would very quickly discover that I have done some things well, but that they could do a lot of things better.
Saturday, September 24, 2011
Rooting
Traveling in the Midwest was wonderful. It made me feel 100x more connected to my whole life story, and less like I am in a dangling chapter at the end. I had the chance to hang out with two different friends I hadn't seen in years (one I hadn't seen at all for a couple of years, I think, and hadn't seen satisfactorily for 3 or 4 and the other I hadn't seen for 5 years). Just seeing my family and america-friends was lovely and empowering, but seeing those two in particular made me feel more complete.
Every person I saw showed me a different part of myself. I have friends and family who are pursuing all sorts of different lives, and I feel very privileged to be able to witness them. It also made me feel much better about where I am. Being on this side of the world, it is easy to think about what I 'would be doing' in America, to think about all of the other paths that I have not chosen (ummmm I guess I would be doing this anywhere. Heh). In any case, it was really nice to realize that while I have not figured everything out about who I want to be and what I want to do, I have learned and I have grown. Connecting with old friends helped me to see this, partially by letting me see their successful lives and realize that I have success in the things I want. Partially by reminding me of who I was and who they were the last time we connected, and letting me see how much we both have grown.
I am collecting perspectives and experiences. Learning about myself and about the world, and if that keeps me a little overwhelmed and not quite on my feet for a while, I think that's okay!
I am sitting right now in a coffee shop in 'city hall' in Jeju City. (The city center in most towns is called this. There is an actually City Hall building, but this whole area is called city hall, or sicheong.) It is a beautiful early-fall day outside. I took a long way getting here from the apartment I am sharing with a family. I walked down a road I hadn't before and discovered a lot of little restaurants to investigate, and stopped into a bookstore that just moved from city hall. I bought a korean photo-dictionary. And now I am going to study some Chinese, maybe study some Korean, and do some private writing!
Love!
Every person I saw showed me a different part of myself. I have friends and family who are pursuing all sorts of different lives, and I feel very privileged to be able to witness them. It also made me feel much better about where I am. Being on this side of the world, it is easy to think about what I 'would be doing' in America, to think about all of the other paths that I have not chosen (ummmm I guess I would be doing this anywhere. Heh). In any case, it was really nice to realize that while I have not figured everything out about who I want to be and what I want to do, I have learned and I have grown. Connecting with old friends helped me to see this, partially by letting me see their successful lives and realize that I have success in the things I want. Partially by reminding me of who I was and who they were the last time we connected, and letting me see how much we both have grown.
I am collecting perspectives and experiences. Learning about myself and about the world, and if that keeps me a little overwhelmed and not quite on my feet for a while, I think that's okay!
I am sitting right now in a coffee shop in 'city hall' in Jeju City. (The city center in most towns is called this. There is an actually City Hall building, but this whole area is called city hall, or sicheong.) It is a beautiful early-fall day outside. I took a long way getting here from the apartment I am sharing with a family. I walked down a road I hadn't before and discovered a lot of little restaurants to investigate, and stopped into a bookstore that just moved from city hall. I bought a korean photo-dictionary. And now I am going to study some Chinese, maybe study some Korean, and do some private writing!
Love!
Thursday, September 8, 2011
Dear Blog, I am sorry for neglecting you...
I just deleted 5 half-written and unpublished posts from this blog. I have had a difficult time writing anything more than ANGST! and CONFUSION! since May-ish, which is odd because since then I have been feeling more and more calm and confident (and have been perceived as such by others, including my adept-at-sensing-bullshit Mother, so probably it's true!).
I love you, blog, and I am going to work on arranging my thoughts so I can share them with you constructively.
In the meantime, have this Symphony of Science video. I love them so much!
I love you, blog, and I am going to work on arranging my thoughts so I can share them with you constructively.
In the meantime, have this Symphony of Science video. I love them so much!
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
In America!
I have been starting and abandoning posts regularly since my last one in may, on my identity as an American and a resident of Asia, on my growing understanding of Korea as separate from China (bringing some more definition to my picture of Asia), and a couple of times just simple "here I am" updates. I have been distracted by the advent of Beach Season on my island, and also just switched over into quieter and more face-to-face forms of mental processing.
But this week is the first of my visit home this year! I flew into Chicago on Saturday and spent a lovely Sunday with a dear friend exploring and am now in Ames. If you are in or near Ames, too, please don't be unhappy with me for not spending time with you yet. I have been almost entirely at my mother's house sorting through and condensing yet again all the belongings I left here. I will be down to a few boxes of books and notebooks and one tub of a few clothes and toys I want to hand down (I think). My mother is moving out of her house, and I am living in Asia for at least another year. So everything I own is future-use-only or coming to Asia, and I don't want to leave much sitting in other people's space.
I am telling you this now because I am also dealing with some jetlag. I did an excellent job of sleeping (only) during the night while in Chicago, but in Ames I have been staying up later working and been more anxious. I find myself now at 5am, with a skype date in three hours, a dinner date eight or so hours after that, and lots left to do in the meantime. I have run into enough walls trying to decide what to keep and ship and give away that I know I can't make more decisions tonight, and all the work that doesn't involve decisions is rather clunky, and I don't want to interfere with my mother's sleep any more than I have. Anyway.
Packing for a year or more (well, I left almost everything in Korea, so it's not exactly packing) always brings a lot of anxiety; I feel like I have to make all the decisions about what I will read and use and do in the next year or so RIGHT NOW. That isn't actually true, of course, but it feels like it.
My life in Korea is good. Christian is probably coming back to Korea a couple months after I go back at the end of August. I am living with a Korean family right now (or rather, my things are) and will probably be finding a new place to live on my own when I return. (My current apartment was supposed to be a sublease and has turned into a homestay, and though the family is all-around lovely I really want to have my own space.) I live surrounded by beaches. I am studying languages (once my books get to Jeju, also hydrology!) and working towards being ready for grad school. I am so grateful to have this stint in the Midwest again to see everyone. I hope I see you soon, wherever you are!
But this week is the first of my visit home this year! I flew into Chicago on Saturday and spent a lovely Sunday with a dear friend exploring and am now in Ames. If you are in or near Ames, too, please don't be unhappy with me for not spending time with you yet. I have been almost entirely at my mother's house sorting through and condensing yet again all the belongings I left here. I will be down to a few boxes of books and notebooks and one tub of a few clothes and toys I want to hand down (I think). My mother is moving out of her house, and I am living in Asia for at least another year. So everything I own is future-use-only or coming to Asia, and I don't want to leave much sitting in other people's space.
I am telling you this now because I am also dealing with some jetlag. I did an excellent job of sleeping (only) during the night while in Chicago, but in Ames I have been staying up later working and been more anxious. I find myself now at 5am, with a skype date in three hours, a dinner date eight or so hours after that, and lots left to do in the meantime. I have run into enough walls trying to decide what to keep and ship and give away that I know I can't make more decisions tonight, and all the work that doesn't involve decisions is rather clunky, and I don't want to interfere with my mother's sleep any more than I have. Anyway.
Packing for a year or more (well, I left almost everything in Korea, so it's not exactly packing) always brings a lot of anxiety; I feel like I have to make all the decisions about what I will read and use and do in the next year or so RIGHT NOW. That isn't actually true, of course, but it feels like it.
My life in Korea is good. Christian is probably coming back to Korea a couple months after I go back at the end of August. I am living with a Korean family right now (or rather, my things are) and will probably be finding a new place to live on my own when I return. (My current apartment was supposed to be a sublease and has turned into a homestay, and though the family is all-around lovely I really want to have my own space.) I live surrounded by beaches. I am studying languages (once my books get to Jeju, also hydrology!) and working towards being ready for grad school. I am so grateful to have this stint in the Midwest again to see everyone. I hope I see you soon, wherever you are!
Thursday, May 12, 2011
Moments
I have been experiencing my time in leaps of realization and ever-clearer days. I know now that I want to live on this side of the world, at least for the plan-able future, and I am slowly clearing away the guilt that clouded my ability to see this and is still weighing me down about it. I don't hate the US, I actually like it much more than I did before I moved to Asia. I love love love my family and friends and would love love love to be closer to them and an in-person part of their lives. But I feel right here, and have an almost unimaginably sweet job: working with kids, working with language, having a LOT of time to study other things and to build relationships on both sides of the Pacific. And I think that a me armed with Skype and happiness makes me a better force than a confused me wherever I'd be able to find a job in the US next year.
I have been putting off finding/buying souvenirs for people. Partially because there is still a box in Iowa with some of the souvenirs I bought the first time I went to China (in 2006) because it is easy to lose momentum in connecting the right things with the right people to mean something. And I don't want to buy more clutter. And many souvenirs are clutter.
But a few days ago I was inspired to go to the beach and pick up shells and offer them to my brother for the business he is starting making t-shirts and jewelry and otherwise using his artistic skillz. I walked barefoot along the seawall and the first two beaches, and put my sandals back on to walk across the field on the way to the smallest beach by the Oreum*, because it's harder to see what you are stepping on in grass and I know for a fact that some weird foreigners like to strap small fireworks to model airplanes and fire/fly them in that field (*cough*). I almost escaped from the tinny sound of music blasting from the restaurant by the biggest middle beach after I climbed down the stairs to the sand, and wiggled my toes through the dry warm top sand to the coolness underneath. I picked up shells and thought about life, and wondered how much time has passed since the first person picked up shells and thought about life at that beach in Hamdeok.
Someone started announcing something over the beach speaker system, but it was far away and in Korean (and didn't seem to be inviting or inciting panic), so I ignored it and kept sidling into the surf and sifting through shells and rocks and sand and seaweed. After a while I noticed that some dark clouds were rolling their way towards me from the west, and decided that perhaps the faint korean buzz was correct, and I should head home. I stopped on the seawall and sat down when I saw a fish jump out of the water, and stayed to watch another 30 fish follow suit (or perhaps the same fish and a few of her pals do a really impressive dance). A dark grey crane stalked slowly from the westmost beach, and a white crane was far enough out in the falling tidewaters that she kept disappearing in the reflections on the waves.
I have had some really good conversations this week and in the last few weeks, and gotten a lot of really good support from all over. I just going to be here for a while. I am going to keep moving on my China plans and other studies, but I am going to try to focus on the moments that happen, and try not to think I must justify my days by what they might build towards in the future.
*Oreum are the "parasitic volcanoes" scattered across Jeju island. They are more or less hills, except that they are 120% cooler than average hills because they were formed by volcanic eruptions.
I have been putting off finding/buying souvenirs for people. Partially because there is still a box in Iowa with some of the souvenirs I bought the first time I went to China (in 2006) because it is easy to lose momentum in connecting the right things with the right people to mean something. And I don't want to buy more clutter. And many souvenirs are clutter.
But a few days ago I was inspired to go to the beach and pick up shells and offer them to my brother for the business he is starting making t-shirts and jewelry and otherwise using his artistic skillz. I walked barefoot along the seawall and the first two beaches, and put my sandals back on to walk across the field on the way to the smallest beach by the Oreum*, because it's harder to see what you are stepping on in grass and I know for a fact that some weird foreigners like to strap small fireworks to model airplanes and fire/fly them in that field (*cough*). I almost escaped from the tinny sound of music blasting from the restaurant by the biggest middle beach after I climbed down the stairs to the sand, and wiggled my toes through the dry warm top sand to the coolness underneath. I picked up shells and thought about life, and wondered how much time has passed since the first person picked up shells and thought about life at that beach in Hamdeok.
Someone started announcing something over the beach speaker system, but it was far away and in Korean (and didn't seem to be inviting or inciting panic), so I ignored it and kept sidling into the surf and sifting through shells and rocks and sand and seaweed. After a while I noticed that some dark clouds were rolling their way towards me from the west, and decided that perhaps the faint korean buzz was correct, and I should head home. I stopped on the seawall and sat down when I saw a fish jump out of the water, and stayed to watch another 30 fish follow suit (or perhaps the same fish and a few of her pals do a really impressive dance). A dark grey crane stalked slowly from the westmost beach, and a white crane was far enough out in the falling tidewaters that she kept disappearing in the reflections on the waves.
I have had some really good conversations this week and in the last few weeks, and gotten a lot of really good support from all over. I just going to be here for a while. I am going to keep moving on my China plans and other studies, but I am going to try to focus on the moments that happen, and try not to think I must justify my days by what they might build towards in the future.
*Oreum are the "parasitic volcanoes" scattered across Jeju island. They are more or less hills, except that they are 120% cooler than average hills because they were formed by volcanic eruptions.
Sunday, April 24, 2011
Reading novels in Chinese
I have had some realizations in the last month about who I let myself be, and some about who I actually am and what I want.
I have been telling myself that it is too hard, too lonely, too far away to keep living on this side of the world. And I have been feeling maybe not guilty but goaded by some peoples' voices in my mind who ask what's wrong with America?, or my own voices in my mind that whisper I may just be trying to run away from relationships before they get too complicated. That I may not be running towards anything.
But I am. And I have realized that I simply don't want to move back to the US. I want to let my whole being move to this side of the world, and not be standing a mental step back towards Iowa because I know I'm moving 'home' before too long. I want to stay here.
I do miss 'home.' I miss my friends and my family and have dreams about the skies in Iowa. To drive on a highway with radio blasting and see a thunderhead rolling towards me across the plains. Ah.
I have got to stop telling myself that I am afraid, though. I have got to stop being afraid of challenging myself. I have got to stop being afraid to belong. (I know that last sentence is angsty, but it's an honest and dominant fear of mine, I think. So there you have it: I'm angsty.)
One excellent thing I learned last year in China was just to go. Just to read, just to talk. I have been reading novels in Chinese, though I don't understand anything close to everything. I am just reading and getting from it what I can.
I have been telling myself that it is too hard, too lonely, too far away to keep living on this side of the world. And I have been feeling maybe not guilty but goaded by some peoples' voices in my mind who ask what's wrong with America?, or my own voices in my mind that whisper I may just be trying to run away from relationships before they get too complicated. That I may not be running towards anything.
But I am. And I have realized that I simply don't want to move back to the US. I want to let my whole being move to this side of the world, and not be standing a mental step back towards Iowa because I know I'm moving 'home' before too long. I want to stay here.
I do miss 'home.' I miss my friends and my family and have dreams about the skies in Iowa. To drive on a highway with radio blasting and see a thunderhead rolling towards me across the plains. Ah.
I have got to stop telling myself that I am afraid, though. I have got to stop being afraid of challenging myself. I have got to stop being afraid to belong. (I know that last sentence is angsty, but it's an honest and dominant fear of mine, I think. So there you have it: I'm angsty.)
One excellent thing I learned last year in China was just to go. Just to read, just to talk. I have been reading novels in Chinese, though I don't understand anything close to everything. I am just reading and getting from it what I can.
Saturday, April 9, 2011
Beginnings and Endings, right?
The end of my two-and-a-half-year relationship last Saturday was not out of the blue or in anger, and though I have had some pretty low emotional points about it in the last week, overall I'm feeling very positive that it was the right decision and I am moving in the right direction.
This week has been an explosion of options. I realized that boyfriend-man was a major, though not the only, thing pulling me back to the US. I think I am not moving back this year, and I am re-exploring options for the next few years. Here are some of the options on my mind:
For the rest of this year and the beginning of next:
1) Stay in Korea and keep earning my Native English Speaker dollars and paying off my student loans
2) find a job in the Midwest to be close to family and friends, and keep paying off student loans
For the year after next:
1) Move back to the US and pursue grad school/teaching certification. This has been the plan I've been building most of this year, though I've been having trouble deciding whether to pursue Montessori or a state teaching certificate, or both.
2) Move back to the US and pursue grad school in Environmental Science or Engineering. I could still make tutoring a regular part of my life, and perhaps have the more individual affect on their lives that I would not be able to have if I only saw students in classes of 30.
3) Move to China under a Chinese Government Scholarship and pursue Environmental Science or Engineering at a Chinese University. This would put me in China with some long-term stability, and I could make/continue solid friendships and start a life as an international science liaison.
4) Move to China and get Montessori certification at the teaching center in Hangzhou. Teach in China and return to the US when/if the job market increases with enough teaching experience to be competitive
5) Other things yet unthought of that will give me opportunities to teach, travel, and keep involved (even vicariously) in scientific studies.
I posed a couple of these on facebook the other day and got a lot of excellent feedback, much of which supported my feeling that I don't want to teach in the US right now. I really, really would like the right answer to bring me closer to home, but I also don't want to move home and feel stuck. So, right now I am leaning towards things that will keep me on this side of the globe for a while longer.
This week has been an explosion of options. I realized that boyfriend-man was a major, though not the only, thing pulling me back to the US. I think I am not moving back this year, and I am re-exploring options for the next few years. Here are some of the options on my mind:
For the rest of this year and the beginning of next:
1) Stay in Korea and keep earning my Native English Speaker dollars and paying off my student loans
2) find a job in the Midwest to be close to family and friends, and keep paying off student loans
For the year after next:
1) Move back to the US and pursue grad school/teaching certification. This has been the plan I've been building most of this year, though I've been having trouble deciding whether to pursue Montessori or a state teaching certificate, or both.
2) Move back to the US and pursue grad school in Environmental Science or Engineering. I could still make tutoring a regular part of my life, and perhaps have the more individual affect on their lives that I would not be able to have if I only saw students in classes of 30.
3) Move to China under a Chinese Government Scholarship and pursue Environmental Science or Engineering at a Chinese University. This would put me in China with some long-term stability, and I could make/continue solid friendships and start a life as an international science liaison.
4) Move to China and get Montessori certification at the teaching center in Hangzhou. Teach in China and return to the US when/if the job market increases with enough teaching experience to be competitive
5) Other things yet unthought of that will give me opportunities to teach, travel, and keep involved (even vicariously) in scientific studies.
I posed a couple of these on facebook the other day and got a lot of excellent feedback, much of which supported my feeling that I don't want to teach in the US right now. I really, really would like the right answer to bring me closer to home, but I also don't want to move home and feel stuck. So, right now I am leaning towards things that will keep me on this side of the globe for a while longer.
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