Solo Traveler: Reflections On Life in a Non-Traditional Asian Family

Growing up in a non-traditional Asian family, I have always loved travel. My mother lived in Hamburg, Germany for 13 years. During that time she backpacked all over Europe, most of the time solo. When she got married, she and my father often went camping together, packing tents sometimes in sub zero weather.

I like traveling alone. That is not to say I haven’t encountered the weird, the strange, and the hilarious. When I went to New York for the first time, my friends couldn’t understand why I would go alone. Their fears ranged from boredom to personal safety.

When I travel alone, I’m able to think clearly. Going to New York alone for the first time, I was able to feel Central Park, take time with paintings at the MET, watch people passing by me more clearly.

Sometimes, when you are with friends, you are so engaged in conversation that them that new sights become a blur, a memory before you even go home. You don’t take the time to look or really see. Because I had three days left and I had already poured over the whole city, I decided to take the Chinatown bus to Boston and Washington D.C. Upon coming back, my mind was filled with anxiety. It was after midnight when I arrived and I guess I thought, coming from a small town, that the streets would be empty with shady people lurking around corners. Myth! When the bus stopped, the passengers unloaded. I was relieved to see the streets bustling. As I begun to walk to the nearest subway, I thought like a child of all the possibilities of things that could go very wrong. Then a voice whispered, “excussseee meeee?” My heart jumped into my throat and I panicked, and okay, I ran. And then I turned around. It was a lost and confused tourist. I shook off my embarrassment and walked back and helped her.

In Japan, I spent some days traveling by myself. In a super market, this lady offered food samples. Tiny crackers inside a cup- that’s Japan for you. Unassumingly, I took the whole tiny cup. She then shook her head furiously, gave me a disapproving frown, and gestured “one only”. Embarrassed, I gave back the tiny cup and took one tiny cracker from the cup. But if you saw the tiny cracker, you would have done the same. In America, the whole cup IS the sample.

My hope is to travel around the world, alone. I would bring two essentials- a journal and a camera. I reevaluate my goals and dreams when I travel and realize what I really care about back home.

-by Rebekka Lien former Girl on the street “GOTS girl”

Friday • May 30, 2008 • by WWM Contributor

Category: Blog, Essays, Fashion, Rebekka Lien, Taiwan, Topical Thursday