A lot of people we have met here are our age or older and yet I feel like a bit of an elderly aunt watching over a happy bunch of children chirping on the playground. I don't think I have a heck of a lot to show for all the things I have done in my life so far, but I have most certainly done a lot of things.
The people I meet here are experiencing my 2001 at the moment. I don't mean 9/11. I mean the first experience of being on their own, with a job, in a new country, dancing all night, taking taxis everywhere, spending nights sitting up soaking up the feeling of being somewhere totally new and different, living the life of an expat, although I must say even that has declined in quality. An young expat is really like a middle class singaporean who lives in a condo rather than an HDB flat. I think it's high time the cushy imperialist lifestyle has ended, but the point is that being an expat here is really nothing special and not that different from life back home wherever that migh be. Only the weather is better.
My enthusiasm for having conversations revolving around just how different it is to be in Singapore and how special and how lucky we all are to live "abroad" and how this is totally life changing because, wow, it turns out you can't plan every detail of your life ("at least I still got married at 27 as I planned it") is limited. I spent about 3 hrs a day back in 1993 talking to my dear friend from 9th grade about just how different and awesome we were. And I am happy to say it is resolved now. I don't want to navel gaze and discuss our specialness (which of course evaporates just as soon as you set foot in Heathrow or JFK and everyone looks just like you) but rather meet people who through their experiences, whatever those might have been, have actually become more interesting people and don't need to talk about that the whole time.
Maybe I am no longer as open minded to meet new people? Or a bit tired of it? I don't know, but strangely in NY and London (EDIT: and Boston, where I stumbled upon an unexpected gold mine) I have always met really interesting people, and different kinds of interesting people at that, not all are nomads, but artist, writers, thinkers, wine driners, engineers - people who are passionate about what they do. This crew who enjoys dancing in a plastic palace (Clarke Quay) with Asian hookers (oh my dear, how craaaazy is that?) and discussing whether it is daaaangerous to go to Thailand right now (It's NOT) makes me want to go home by midnight and watch pirated movies instead and mildly pat their head "there, there, you'll be fine".
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2 comments:
hey, grumpy grandma, what about all those interesting people you met in Boston? you left us off the list ;)
Fixed! I mentally had you in the New York category, you know, same same really, but I realize that is very bad of me. Afterall I did have the pleasure enough times to take a bus through the ever changing landscape between Boston and NY to know there is a weather and a cultural divide...somewhere around New Haven.
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