Beyond the Borders: Musings on the expatriate life

Across the world, for whatever reason, millions of people are living outside of their homeland, just as millions are living the same hometown in which they grew up, maybe the same as their parents, and their children.

People immigrate for all sorts of reasons: the promise of a better life, forced circumstances, a job, a family, the need for adventure, whatever it may be. Over Christmas, when I was in America, I found myself thinking about this phenomenon, which is so daily -- but really, it's interesting to me, why some people leave their own country for other shores. 

I was thinking about it for a number of reasons. The first is probably that it's been a year and a half now that I've lived in Cambodia. The second is that I knew that trip to the States would be the last in awhile -- the ticket is just too expensive and I can think of some other places to use extra money. Although I don't necessarily see a long-term future in Cambodia, it had become quite clear that I no longer have any interest in living in America. 

Of course, my beloved family is there, and I would spend time in Colorado for their sake -- but not to live. Living is different. 

So why did I leave? It's not the easiest question to answer because right now, I can say that, simply enough and for whatever reason, it's just not my country. It's not "home". It's familiar, but not home. But that's not why I left when I did -- I left and came to Cambodia because someone asked me to come here and teach. 

And so I did, and that's that. It's just that living abroad has agreed with me, and now I can put words to it. 

It's not always easy. I'm quite convinced that "cultural DNA" is a thing. I spent my childhood -- a very, very impressionable time -- in America. All of my cultural references, societal rules, history, background, etc, was programmed into me from birth to adolescence. In Cambodia, there are very few common "genes". It's the West, not the East, third world, not first, and those are just the big labels. 

As you can see from the progression of posts on this blog, sometimes I don't understand, sometimes I really have no clue why I'm here, sometimes I feel like an unwelcome and unneeded observer, sometimes I'm ready to pull all my savings from the bank, buy a one-way ticket to wherever I can afford, and flee. Some days it's just too far and my family is gone and I'm alone on the other side of the world.

And on the other side, sometimes everything is so rewarding, sometimes I'm accepted and welcomed more than I can believe, sometimes I just can't imagine leaving.

It's a choice I make, every day, and when things go wrong, I always make myself wait at least a couple days. Talk to a friend or two. Just keep living, day by day, and I never regret it.

Sometime last year, I was talking to another friend, who said that people like us who travel a lot and live elsewhere start to belong nowhere. It's true, in a sense. I no longer belong in America, but nor do I belong here. Even in France, the place where I've felt more at home more than anywhere else in the world, I don't belong fully.

But I look at it differently. Now, these days, I belong everywhere.

For me, that's enough. 

Gillian's Adventures in Wonderland

Some days I think -- stop the world, I want to get off! 

Except I don't, and I'd probably be bored.

My life in Cambodia has descended down the rabbit hole, and down there is a Wonderland -- but I do not mean in the sense of Disneyland. I mean, in the words of Alice herself, "Curiouser and curiouser." Things move in waves here, separated by periods of still water, but when they come they come like tsunamis.

This is abstract, because as usual I don't have the words to begin, wouldn't even know where to begin. I rarely write on this blog exactly what I'm doing or working on, and the backstory alone would take me longer than I care to spend. Writing is stupid anyway when life is so full, but with the waves of Wonderland literally driving me to distraction, I'll give it a go.

I'll try to put it as simply as possible: Somehow, some weeks ago, the world of fashion/film/glitz and glamour in Cambodia decided to notice I exist.

I couldn't say why and I'm not even going to pretend I had anything to do with it. A meeting here, a recommendation there, the collective unconscious suddenly getting the idea at the same time and transmitting it to several different people.

It's not substantial right now -- a few discussion, a few requests, a shoot here, the waffling possibility of a commercial and a movie dancing in the background. In fact, I'm quite convinced I shouldn't even be talking about it, because tomorrow everyone might get distracted by the next set of pretty lights and all these doors will slam, and I'll quietly go back about my business. If people say "you'll be famous," my first instinct is to be skeptical. Promises and prophecies are nothing until life makes them real, and only then.

Of course it's not just that, because that alone would be enough to deal with. CTN has opened another door for me which leads into a whole other house (I don't know what to say about that except that it involves branding my team and building it into "something"), and in the meantime I'm still attempting to pretend I'm a professional choreographer and trying to build something that looks like career in that regard.

It means -- to use yet another metaphor -- that I seem to be carrying three separate trees, all of which are growing like time-lapse videos and branching off in a million directions, while I am the gardener trying to water them, choose which branches to cut and which to keep, which to follow.

Enough metaphors -- but in the end they're the best I can do. To return to Wonderland, I find myself in a world somewhere beyond the looking glass where things are curious and lovely, mad and uncertain, and I'm not sure at all what of it really exists when the dreams all fade.

I suppose I'll just have to follow the White Rabbit to find out.

A random collection of thoughts for a Saturday morning

Because I can't think of anything else to blog about and because I sort of want to pretend like I still update and run a blog.

Actually, I'm just not finding words easily these days. My journal notebook is busy collecting dust and I haven't dared to write anything remotely poetic recently for lack of anything poetic to say. In short, all my usual methods of pulling crap out of my brain in order to clear it up have not been working so well. Maybe that's why I can't sleep properly right now, and my dreams are insane, night-long epics that vanish in the daylight.

Okay it's not that bad, really, but I have noticed it.

Anyway, so here are your Random Thoughts for a Saturday morning:

1: In English, you have six question words: Who, what, when, where, how, and why. And then you have these: Someone (who), somewhat, sometime (when), somewhere, and somehow, but there is no somewhy. Why is that??

2: Even my doodles aren't as crazy as usual. My brain, last night:

3: People ask me a lot what's the craziest thing I've seen on a motorbike in Cambodia. But you know, that's an old story -- 4 people, a baby, and a stock of something, or a pile of half-alive chickens hanging from their ankles, or an entire pig, or an enormous bundle of bamboo, or a few hundred cartons of instant noodles. Yes, everyone sees that. 

But the weirdest thing I've seen in Cambodia is a random carnival ride on the side of the National Road. It was one of those things that's like a carousel but the horses are actually suspended off the ground and kind of fly out to the side when it spins. It was literally just on the side of the road one night when I was driving to CTN, with a couple of people riding it -- and next to it was a smaller version, for the kids I guess. A couple weeks later, it was gone. 

But how does that happen??!!! Those things are big, they can't just fit on a motorcycle. Where the crap did it come from, how did it get there, and how did it go away so fast???? 

I don't understand. 

Ponder that on your Saturday, my friends.