Reflections

It looks like I am pretty much back to my life already. There are still many things that happened to me in China that I haven't recorded here. It was hard to find the time to write about the things that were going on around me while they were happening. Fortunately, I have all these photos that sketch out my path and remind me of what I was doing and where I was.

The realities of a busy job and a rich family life are already crowding out this loop of time where I stepped outside of those normal daily activities. It is hard to think of it as more than a dream that I woke from a few days ago. The few artifacts I brought back, a vague sense that my Chinese has improved and the rapidly fading and unreliable memories of this last month serve as evidence that I was really there and experiencing something completely different.

It might sound like I prefer my time away to my so-called normal life, but that isn't the case at all. I missed my family constantly despite the fact that I met many new friends and experienced a lot of new things. At times, I felt isolated especially during those periods when I was travelling by myself. My family endured their own difficulties without me as well. I am grateful to them for letting me go on this adventure without making me feel as selfish and unreasonable as I certainly deserved.