Going Away...

Study abroad brochures are filled with the smiling faces of clean-cut, acne-less students testifying that studying abroad “changed them forever.” I don’t think Beijing changed me forever. My political, philosophical, and religious views have remained more or less the same since I got here. I have not altered my career aspirations or other life plans as a result of what I have done here. I am pretty much the same Emily I was when I left, albeit with a taste for fine gin.
What studying abroad did do for me, though, was show me who this Emily really was. When you are entirely on your own in a foreign country, you have the freedom to do pretty much whatever you want – hell, I don’t even have to answer to the Constitution anymore! – and the more freedom you have, the more you test that freedom, and that’s how you know what you’re made of.
I liked some of the things I found and disliked others. I was proud that I had the tenacity to finish a grueling bike ride that I never thought I could have completed, and the motivation to finish an academic program I expected to burn me out. I learned about my relationships with people, and what was important in them.
I also became noticeably more materialistic on my trip here, in part due to how cheap things are and in part due to my exposure to more blatant new luxury than can probably be found anywhere else in the world (thanks, Shanghai). This isn’t something I’m proud of, and the lifestyle I live here (a night out, with dinner, a cab ride back, and a couple drinks will set me back maybe $15) will not be sustainable in the US, so I’ll have to wean myself off that one by default, or possibly marry a Rockefeller. And when I look back on the number of school nights I went dancing, or eating, or exploring…oh dear. (However, let the record show that I kept my Chinese grade at a solid A the whole time, and if I hadn’t I would have changed my modus operandi.) I guess I have a little too much of the hedonist in me; Beijing is a great place to be as a college student, and I found it a little too hard to eschew fun for homework.
I will be very happy to get back. I miss my family: my loving mom, my funny, smart-ass dad, my amazing and talented baby brother, who probably will have found out if he was accepted into Brown by the time this goes out, and my favorite puppy, Edison, to say nothing of the extended family I’ll see for the holidays. I miss my friends. I miss Northwestern. I miss learning things that aren’t Chinese. I miss clean air.
But I know that once I step off that plane into the San Francisco airport, the first thing I want won’t really be Starbucks or Chipotle. It’ll be a dumpling.