“What’s it like living in New York?”
I see the girl with the excitement, the determination and the eyes that literally sparkle as she steps into the building — It reminds me of myself 8 months back when I first entered this city. She has to be thinking of how she is going to conquer the world, how she made it, how she’s going to have the time of her life and how she probably already has fallen in love with the big apple. I think to myself… “You naive, dumb, idiot”.
I want to tell her, that living in New York cannot be just summed up as Life-Changing! An eye-opener! Completely broadened my mindset! I wish to tell her, that if you think you are here for the ‘concrete jungles where things are made of’ or if you think ‘Times Square can’t shine as bright as you’ (Come on, let’s be serious), you really are a naive, dumb, idiot.
Think big? Ok fine, let’s talk about apartments first.
You gotta pay for space. We learnt that in Singapore. But here, you learn the hard way. I want to tell her, when it comes to finding apartments in New York.. think small. Maybe even tiny. Physical space is a luxury many times we cannot enjoy, especially on a tight budget.
And housemates? Think happy family? Hold that thought.
We have all heard that Men are from Mars, and Women are from Venus. What they don’t tell you is that within this species called Men, there are men from Mercury, Jupiter and Saturn. There are also Women from Uranus and Neptune. When 8 aliens from different planets gather under the same roof, it is a concoction of everything that does not work. You speak different languages, you hear different tunes and you perfectly understand why you’re now listed as an ‘Alien’ on your Visa. Now you know why marriage is hard. Or why you shouldn’t have 8 kids.
You think because you have radically changed your surroundings that your life too will change along with it. I want to tell her, that the novelty of staying in a foreign country will wear off. The New York you looked up to will just become every other city. You will realize that the trade-off in living in a city that never sleeps is well.. your sleep.
You will miss home. August 9 will suddenly seem important to you as you subconsciously pick up the red and white clothes in your wardrobe. You suffer from the withdrawal symptoms of not listening to the Singaporean accent and of not being able to order Teh-ping at every corner of the road. You want to call home, but hey look, it’s only 3am there in Singapore.
There are times, more often than not, when you want to throw in the towel. You question your decision to stay in a house with aliens, and you struggle to keep up with the ‘How are you?’ greetings. You hate that you stick out like a sore thumb and you wish you could hide under a rock. You tell yourself time and time again, you’re done.
But you’re not.
I want to tell her that because of who you are, because of how far you’ve come, you will brush it off. You will find a way to adapt and be happy, you will stand up and you will make your way home.
You will be okay with returning with a ‘How are you?’ by the end of the year. You will learn to understand that cooking is your new hobby and dealing with aliens is a survival skill. You learn to love these aliens, regardless of how peculiar they are. You let out a little bit of yourself everyday, you talk about your dreams, your problems, your history and you learn to understand. You fully accept that once upon a shooting star or under a meteorite shower in Rockaway beach, that the clash of the 8 planets is just another story you will tell to your kids.
You will also see that every ‘How are you’ becomes an opportunity to foster relationships with your colleagues. They become your friends. You learn what it really means to immerse in a different culture. You love that even if you are an Asian from a completely different culture, there is no next episode of East Versus West.
As you make your own lunches, clean your own dishes and make your own bed, you are uncomfortably aware of how protected and pampered you were back at home. You love your parents and your friends even more and you regret the times you ever complained of the heat in Singapore.
Through the unwashed dishes, bad decisions, excessive pizzas, dirty rooms, annoying housemates, (extremely) limited budget, incessant bitching, late nights, cold nights, late cold nights, uncomfortable living environments, smelly subways, life-changing card games, cheap beers, you figured that this really is the New York experience. And that deep within, you will do it all over again. It may not be life-changing, but it changed your life.
One day you’ll see that when you’re 3 months away from leaving New York, you will be humbled that you were able to leave a mark.
One day you’ll see that beyond the resume perks, credentials, hackathon wins, travels and successful pitches…. It is the human beings here that you have fallen in love with. And that, makes it so hard to leave.
I probably could tell her all this, but she wouldn’t believe me.
So when she asks me “What’s it like living in New York?”, I tell her,
It’s Life-Changing! An eye-opener! Completely broadened my mindset!
