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On Healing: Shed Tears at the Asian Market then, Detach…A Perspective Regarding Cravings and Reverse Culture Shock

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My intention behind last Sunday’s visit to the Asian market was stocking up on tried-and-true superfood favorites discovered during my year in Asia. Not outlined in the day’s agenda, my one day off from studying the joys of Physics, Math, and Biology, was ending up a blubbering Beach Girl Abroad crying her eyes out to the ajjashi (elderly Korean man) working the register.

A few words of warning to any one thinking about taking extended time as an expat to work, study, or simply travel the globe, as well as to my friends making their return home after a year(s) away, coming back is not easy.

From time to time, a case of the ‘missing’ for Asia overwhelms and hits me from my blindside. In those moments, my heart longs to explore, embrace the cultural differences and gentler ways of being, treating one another, and continue healing my mind-body via authentic Eastern doctors and their pharmacies fragrant with medicinal herbs instead of ‘check-out on aisle three, ma’am’.

My Grandmother Jean warned me of the harshness of return. She herself spent the early years of her marriage in Sendai, Japan as dutiful wife to my Surgeon Grandfather Chet, who cared for our troops during the Korean War. Did I listen to Grandmother’s warning? Of course not. Guess the ‘missing Asia thing’ is genetic. Thanks, Grandmother Jean. Perhaps I’ll preach our now shared gospel with your Great-Grandchildren. Conceivably, they’ll heed our advice, and stay put. More likely, I’ll encourage them to take the journey that’s undoubtedly shaped my true authenticity and path today.

Back to the ‘missing’. In those blindsided moments, mostly, I miss my friends. The ajjashi and I began speaking about the details of longing for one’s homeland, which I knew well over there, missing California. Funny enough, I’m here now and miss the land I called home for a year, and the people who breezed in with it. The longer the ajjashi and I spoke, the faster my photographic memory flashed back through late, laughter-filled nights at the makgeolli bar, summertime hiking and beach trips, singing and dancing with my pre-school class, freestyling in the subways while Koreans looked at us while we were crazy, traipsing through snow and below-zero temps to make it to yoga training on Saturday mornings, laying on heated floor eating some tofu concoction with a new vegetable to be excited about. Gawd, the special group I found over there…it was this feeling we were all set out to save the world. (A few of our chingus have done just that; the rest of us, believe me, our plans are in the works.)

Plus, I can’t deny my friendships here in California have changed. They’re not the same. At all.

I’m not the same. At all.

I’m still me, but not.

The past few years have added wisdom to my myriad of talents (as well as my first grey hair(s)). Logic and experience tells me two years have passed since living in Asia, and resultantly the friendships over there have changed, as well. I’m neither the ‘me’ I left in California in February 2010, nor the ‘me’ who left Seoul in March 2011, nor the ‘me’ who left Hawaii homeward-bound in September 2012.

I’m simply ‘me’ today, with some parts of ‘me’ of seasons past intertwined, other iotas left behind. I’m both stronger and weaker in respects; my heart softer, yet weathered in others. Not nearly as naive, but still innocent.

All in all, I’m more ‘okay’ than I’ve ever been. Exponentially more serious about staying on track, even quieter and introspective at the moment. In a good way. Silly in moments with the right peoople. Giving to the right people now, instead of the wrong.

Not only am I on a different page than my past self, I’m on a whole new chapter.

The only place to lean into, a phrase a dear chingu coined, is forward. Going back is not an option. No use in clinging. In Yoga Philosophy, ragas, or our cravings, lead to attachment, which leads to suffering. So, I repeat, no use in clinging. Only looking back on sweet memories with a smile and perhaps a tear to the eye every once in a while. And hope to cross paths with our chingus from around the Globe, or even if you’ve stayed home, chingus from all chapters of your life, one day along the path sooner or later. With no expectations. If we pick up where we left off, wonderful. But if not, we’ll both go our separate merry ways. Sweet sweet memories, a sweet, sweet present to live in fully, and a future for which to be excited.

Coincidentally, nearly one week post-Asian-market-’missing’-catharsis, I’m no longer craving Asian food. Instead, I’ve eaten big ole’ California-style salads with avocado and all the fixin’s, sunny-side up egg breakfasts on beds of swiss chard, and even a steak one day for lunch (shocker: I eat more Paleo-ish than Vegan Yogini Stereotype, more on that later). Yes, I’ve been living large in this present I’ll call the ‘Pre-Med in Ventura County’ chapter.

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My Asian Superfood Goodies. Will come in handy sooner or later. The Haul: Daikon Radish, Fresh Ginger @99 cents/lb., Miso, Dried Black Fungi, Tamari (Gluten-Free Soy Sauce), Korean Citron Tea (for my Dad who had a bad cold last weekend), Red Pepper Paste

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Hanging with my fave chingu around Oxnard Shores, Rio the pup, who never fails to bring one back to the present with his off-leash antics! (His name is Rio and he dances on the sand…)

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A New Chingu…College Physics book. Wish me luck.


Filed under: Adventure + Travel, Asia, California, On Healing, Personal Growth, The Unknown, Yoga Tagged: asia, chingus, Destinations and Thoughts, family, friends, global, growing up, health, homesick, Korea, Reverse culture shock, Seoul, travel, USA, wherever you go there you are, Yogic Philosophy

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