Mismatched Adventures Carving a new destination from the inside out.

Written 5/8/09

It’s been 3 weeks today since I returned from China and already so much has changed. My entire consciousness shifted during the 5 weeks I was there and I realize now that I’ve returned a different person. My initial reactions when people asked me how the trip was were very very negative. I think that in part, it was due to my circumstances there but also in part it was due to the time frame in which everything occurred. The amount of time I spent there, the amount of time I spent in Hangzhou, being in classes and clinic 5 days a week instead of being able to sightsee and meet people and not having a “real” break from school between quarters.

Since I’ve returned I’ve lost 2 friendships that were very important to me. I have a hard time losing friends. I get attached to people and as my therapist likes to say “I trust people too quickly” so I often get hurt or disappointed or both. These 2 people did not go to China with me, they were people I was becoming very close to before I left for China and people that I spoke to very frequently while I was there. When I returned a few weeks ago they both greeted me with open arms. They were warm and friendly and kind. Then one decided he no longer wanted contact with me and I agreed but the other one, his friend, just stopped returning my phone calls, texts and emails without a word. Maybe she isn’t even conscious of it but for me, it really hurt. And now, I have to let them go. They aren’t trustworthy. Maybe they will be again one day but I am trying to live in the present and for now I have to let them go.

China taught me mostly about myself. I was speaking to one of my supervisor’s last night and she said that the reason she liked China when she went there was because it was so different from anything she ever knew. And I can only agree. As one friend said to me before I went and my supervisor last night said the same thing – it’s like getting in a spaceship and going to a completely different planet. And I think I wrote that in another entry because it’s sooo true. And I felt as though I was looked at as an alien too.

I also realize that everything is about perception. As one of my friends in China says,”there are good China days and there are bad China days”. But that could be said about life in general, there are good days and bad days. In China, however, I personally seemed to have more bad days than good ones – which is completely out of character for me. I’m an eternal optimist. Even when I’m sad and down I’m smiling. I like to joke that I’m always in such a good mood that sometimes I even annoy myself. But in China this was not so. I go through life having 90% good days and happy emotions and 10% bad ones. In China, my overall experience was 60% bad and 40% good. I also like to use percentages a lot ☺

I don’t feel like I need to write why it was bad for me. Many people know, I haven’t been shy in stating my point of view, but I don’t want to harp on the negative – that doesn’t do anyone any good. Instead I’d like to focus on the positive and remember what was so incredible about China. It’s completely different of course. I could get lost in a supermarket for 3 hours looking at all the cool and weird things. I’ve noticed that when people travel we like to focus on the differences and not the similarities. We say things like, here it was totally different due to this or that or – we would NEVER do this or that back home. And I find that I’m no different. Maybe that’s what makes this all so unique, the differences… But you also get used to them and eventually they seem normal.

Like the day we arrived I was sitting in a cab white knuckled holding onto my seat for dear life!!! There is absolutely no way to explain how people drive there but there’s a great youtube video that does the job but I can’t find it but I found this one anyway the point is that I feared for my life for the first week or two and then, I didn’t. They didn’t drive any differently after the first week or two but my fear lifted or my comfort level increased or both.