TL;DR Family moved to Seoul, will be flying out soon. This past weekend, I went to visit my old house in San Jose, just to see it. My neighbor was putting up Christmas lights, while also giving me the side eye for being a random stranger taking pictures of my dads house. I guess I looked different. The streets are the same quiet streets; even the smell is familiar. And the trees are beautifully colored, as they are at Stanford, although Ive been too preoccupied with classes to notice. I walked down the street to my elementary school and sat on the playground for a while, thinking about all the moments and conversations I couldnt remember, and how lonely the place looks when all the kids go home and were just left with vacant classrooms and empty hallways. Although Im pretty sure these kinds of thoughts become more dramatic when they are written down (or typed up). In an hour I will be getting on a plane to Seoul to go home. When my family moved (yes, again) from Portland to Seoul in August, I didnt make a big announcement. Wasnt sure what to say, mostly, and being abroad myself I was also a bit disconnected from people here in California. Anyhow, the short story is that my dad got a job offer he wanted, to work for Samsung as a VP for around three years. My brother is in his junior year in high school; he started at a Korean international school in August and will be applying for U.S. colleges next year. But for now they live in an apartment near Seoul, in a high rise on the twenty-somethingth floor, and I have no image for it in my mind other than a shaky webcam tour my parents gave me a few months ago. Home for me is where my family is, even if that means coming home to an empty room in a country Ive never visited. But home is also Stanford. And San Jose. It can even be Switzerland for a summer or Korea for a few years. Thats okay; my definition is flexible. Onto this plane I am carrying the tiredness and unease and homesickness accumulating in the back of my mind since June. But I am also bringing with me excitement and anticipation, because at the other end of this flight will be new experiences, good Asian food, and most of all, my family.
Posted on: Sat, 13 Dec 2014 18:36:05 +0000
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