It’s been the kind of week that makes you wonder whether the blur of commuting from work to home and from home to work is why you came to China in the first place.
It’s interesting, this idea of living abroad, and the reality of living abroad. What is it like to say you are in a foreign place when the routines that you have start matching the routines you would have back home? And sure, my commute on a motorized stand-up scooter is definitely not as safe as driving a mid-sized sedan down a highway (but safety is rarely the concern on a Chinese road), but it’s still a commute to an office in a tall building where I get coffee from a coffee machine and eat salads in the afternoon.
I’m realizing more and more that this is not the reason I came to China. There’s nothing wrong with coming to China to replicate a lifestyle back home (but with a housekeeper that comes three times a week) or to get rich quick and leave the country before the government catches on. But more and more I am realizing that that is not the reason why I am here. It doesn’t really matter whether this experience will mean something when I am back home if it doesn’t mean anything now, right?
So yeah, expect some changes. Potentially to this blog, definitely to the rest of my time in China. I haven’t been in the mood to write lately, which doesn’t mean that I have nothing to write about, but rather that I am not inspired to write it down. Over the next few weeks, I want to figure out what this blog is about. Is it about my internal monologue about the good (and bad) of living abroad? Is it about Chinese adapting to Chinese life? Is it about not adapting to Chinese life? Is it a travel guide, a how-to guide, a cooking guide?
I think I’m trying to be all of those things at once, but I am not sure whether I’m succeeding at any of them.
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