Last week, Juliette went back to France. The population of “les blancs” in village is now down to one – just me. Several friends and I accompanied her to the airport. On the way there, I noticed that I felt nothing and became alarmed by the lack of feelings. Starting at age 12, I’ve had to say many goodbyes to people whom I don’t know if I would ever see again. Some are easier than others to part, but there are also some sort of sadness. There were times when I sat on the floor of my apartment crying all day or when I had to say goodbye at the airport and the crying made you thought I was filming a movie. In the past six months, the frequency of these goodbyes has increased dramatically. And perhaps I have peaked. All I felt when I send off Ju was, “here goes another”. In a way, it’s easier. I’m not sad or happy to see her go, I’m just very glad that our friendship occured. This is probably the mentality I ought to have if I plan on globetrotting for the rest of my life.
Speaking of globetrotting, my family has recently decided to meet up back in Taiwan! It began with just my parents going taking care of business, then my aunts family in the US is meeting up, then my sister is stopping by before her summer job begins. When I heard all this, I couldn’t stand missing out on this once in a decade family reunion, even if I am in Africa. I haven’t been back on the island of Taiwan in four years. The last time I was there was the summer that began my addiction to globetrot. I name this blog Round II partly because I feel a need to reconnect to my past and so much of moving to a new continent and learning new ways of living mirror to my experience 10 years ago in the US. This time, going back to Taiwan will allow me to connect the dots even more after having experienced aspects of life here that matched stories of my parents’ childhood in the Taiwan that was still developing. Once again, life falls into places in the utmost mysterious and fascinating ways.
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