"Why did you choose to come here?"

Every time I am asked this question, I will gravitate towards a templated answer which I will adapt with some slight changes here and there to accommodate to different settings.

It's a perennial question - why are you here?

My answer is standard and maybe strategic and impressive to some. A senior at work in Singapore said to me, she wished she had that courage and the wisdom to make this move when she was my age.

Why am I here?

This question was popped again most recently by a thirteen year old girl from Hunan.

She fired a series of questions at me in a manner that was part old soul and part naivety.

"Jiejie, why did you come to Shanghai? How long do you intend to stay here - indefinitely or a few years? Do you miss your family? Do you think it's important to leave home, to leave your parents at some point? Would you do this again (volunteer)?" 

She probably had no concept of expat living or relocation, yet she quizzed the same questions that were running through my mind the past few weeks.

Maybe she could tell. Maybe my face said it all - a composed countenance, but under still waters were crazy currents waiting to capsize a boat or two, adrift in a strange country that I call my roots.

Between both of us, perhaps she understands the confusion that is brought about by migration more than I do -  she lives in a boarding school away from family, away from love and security... she reached out for my hand more readily when we were walking through the aquarium - she knew what to do.

That night when I was exchanging texts with a friend in Sydney in a world that is completely different from mine, I suddenly came to terms with this - my answer - my standard answer - was a three-quarter of the truth.

It was there all along - I had evaded this reason because it was not cool. It was not cool to admit that in my first weekend here in Shanghai, the feelings i dreaded and loved the most were still there, easily reignited with a few texts.

Because how silly it was to say out loud you left because you would like to escape, shake some demons off, stopped being hit by waves of unrecognisable emotions when you had too much to drink, because you wanted to dot your journal and postcards and posts and pictures with something fresher, new stories, new feelings, a new sort of pain! How shameful it was to say you grew tired of your own unreciprocated love.

How silly it was to say I left because of love or lack thereof even if that formed only a tiny part of the reasons.

Ten months had passed.

In a small room where I once had a conversation with a senior a year ago:

"I know... everyone will have this China or overseas work dream some point or another in their lifetime. I know you are extremely resilient... but you know, it is not for everyone."

"I know, Liz*. But I ask myself, what is the worst thing that can happen? If I like it, I stay on. If I dislike it, I come back. What's the worst thing that could happen?" I said passionately, with that note of urgency, impatience, persistence that my mentors perceive as (a healthy dose of  - my interpretation) defiance.


I knew I had to go before I drove myself crazy thinking about the future and letting the past eat me up.


That’s why.



*Liz: fake name.