“Everywhere and Nowhere”
There’s this thing in Psychology called the “Approach-Avoidance conflict”, where you have two conflicting drives to any set goal. The approach drive is always stronger than the avoidance drive, but the avoidance drive winds up peaking as the goal comes nearer, and that’s called the “backing out point”.
For all my excitement of wanting to go back to Singapore, as the day draws closer, I feel less and less assured of it. My aunt flew off to California yesterday so that was the last time I would see her for the next three months. And I just feel… so incredibly sad. I didn’t want to say bye so prematurely, and she was the one who cared for my well being. I’m just so, so, so grateful to her and it just sucks that all I could do was give her a brief hug in the parking lot.
Yeah, yeah, it’s only three months, I’ll see her soon etc., but that doesn’t stop me from actually missing them. They’ve really become my family over here, and they’re the only people I actually know in this country, and… I dunno. It’s so confusing to say I’m going to miss my family here while I go home to my real family. And then it feels awful to compare my real family to anything really, like I don’t miss them enough to go home.
I guess it’s like having two homes you’ve emotionally invested yourself into, and you have to choose. I think I’m just making it overdramatic, but it’s just… I don’t even know how to explain it. I feel so awkward in this family, but I feel like they’ve welcomed me so well leaving them seems like saying “what you did was a huge waste of time”. I’ve actually lived in this dump of an apartment for a year and despite the events of Bigfoot and Psycho Couple, it really pains me to leave it.
Not to mention the practicalities of leaving my apartment empty for three months. I’m still paying the rent for the time I’m away (didn’t sublease it, something that I regret), I still have to deal with the problem of paying the electricity bills (no online/hold option) and emptying my mailbox (I have no friends whee) for the remainder of the time that I’m away.
And it’s the tiny things that make me feel alienated from American culture. Like how they don’t pay that much for their water bills so they do their laundry separately, or even the mechanics of starting a conversation, or how they congregate in the kitchen of all places to start talking about their life, or how a 3 day break means a trip to New York/Indiana/Michigan/wherever, while our 3 day break means staying at home making up for lost sleep. But now I’m afraid that when I go home, I’d have forgotten how Singapore even functions in the first place, and that’s going to make my insecurities even worse.
Not that it’s bad already, seeing as “a sense of belonging” has pretty much been dogging me ever since I got here, and it’s really heightening as my plane trip approaches. The words “culture” and “belonging” have been paraded around so much I only think those who experience it can truly understand what a culture shock is, or even understanding the “dislocation” of one’s identity. It’s not something tourists experience, and it irks me to no end when they come back proclaiming they know everything about [insert country of choice here] after living there for 2-3 months.
It feels like a double identity, and you’re a bit of both but never truly either one. I miss Singapore, but if I go home, I’ll miss it here. I guess that’s the reason why I don’t want to leave. Every time I feel like I’m leaving the life in Singapore behind it always comes back, and I don’t want to deal with gaining something but losing another every single time I have to go back to either place. That, and also just the general exhaustion of needing to travel… I want to stop moving from place to place, and I just want to settle down somewhere. I want my own house, but now the laughable problem is 1. I’m still wholly dependent on my parents, and 2. I don’t even know where I should continue to live the rest of my life.
It’s 4.10 am right now, and I have no bedsheets for my bed, because I washed them this afternoon. I’m wondering if it’s worth the, uh, effort to go put on some sheets and go to bed for only 5 hours. I’ve loaned my PS3 to Ken for the summer, so I’m currently WoWing my way through the night, my stomach’s really hungry, but I have nothing in the fridge… I have to go pay the rent at 10am, deposit some petty cash in the bank, grab a Subway on the way back… I have to pack, print out the flight receipt, and still have to deal with that electricity problem.
Oh God, I don’t want to leave.
