one step at a time

It has been 12 years since I moved away from home, Thailand. I was living in Malaysia for 5 years before I came to New Zealand in 2005.

When I arrived, it was near the end of winter. Coming from the temperature of 30 degree something to 15 degree was a HUGE difference for me. I arrived at Auckland International Airport in the afternoon and was waiting for my flight to Palmerston North, where I will be spending the next 3 years studying towards my degree. When I arrived in Palmerston North, it was alot quiter and smaller than I imagined. Everything shuts after 5:30pm and it was like an empty town. I was not used to the style of living and I started to resent with the lifestyle here. As a result of that, I felt home sick and wanted to go home.

A few weeks later, I came to my realization that being home sick is not going to help me feel any better about my new life. What I need was a change of attitude. What did I mean by that?
Well I stop comparing lifestyles between Asia and Nz. Instead, I started to embrace and appreciate the difference in culture and lifestyle of the New Zealanders. Slowly, I learned to adapt to their lifestyle and seek more opportunities to gain experience as much as I can while living here. That said, the more I learned and live here, the more I fall in love with New Zealand that I now intend to become a citizen of this country :)

If you are feeling home sick or feeling that you can't adapt to the new environment? We all have been there where at times we feel lost. The important thing is we don't give up and give yourself a chance to try. By moving to another country, you have already step out of your comfort zone to another level of challenge so give yourself a big round of applause for that.

Life is unpredictable and random events that we go through. There is no pattern to life where we can predict how we would feel or do in the future therefore we should embrace as much as we can, as long as we live.