I am at a juncture. I am at the end of my planned plans, one of my mental deadline of figuring things out. My original thought was to move to Seoul for a bit to work on my Korean. In the back of my mind, I wonder if this will lead to an eventual relocation.

Working in Korea sounds challenging. I wake up early, 5am early. Recently, it’s been 3am. Jeju-do is filled with tons of coffee shops. There are a few reasons for this, but the big one is that Koreans just don’t sleep. When I go to the coffee shop at 6am, I will see people in restaurants eating Korean BBQ and drinking soju! This has happened multiple times. There are a number of 24-hour coffee shops, and they are bumping. People work odd shifts. They study a lot. Overworking is a cultural phenomenon. Sadly, it’s a tough this to avoid when your life outcomes are so narrowly placed on tests and physical and other life attributes. The sense that you can just design your perfect life in a meandering way here is less prevalent than it is in the U.S. I feel extremely lucky in that regard.

Authority is big. You listen to your elders. This includes your friends who are your elders. This hierarchy makes it difficult for you to express yourself and your individuality. It makes it hard to be wrong. A friend who teaches English here observed that people will rat each other out for the smallest of things in class. This type of competition is real. If not you, then me.

This makes me want to bring my niece and nephew to the U.S., but I think that’s a hard thing to achieve.

So if I’m not going to work in Korea, what will I do here? Is it worth it for me to connect to my roots in this way, or is this a strange exercise in discipline and self-torture? Am I putting myself on a program for the sake of putting myself on a program, or is it a self-fulfilling quest I’m engaged in? I feel that I’ve solved for an answer key in the test of finding myself. Yes, go to Korea – duh. Family, roots, that’s where it all began. But I do believe that finding yourself is about creating and finding your mindspace. Certainly there are things that help facilitate this type of creation, but there are many ways in which your micro-decisions help create this, independent of space.

I guess the question is what do I want to do?

I could continue on to Chiang Mai with this group. I do believe some solitude may be in order though. I kind of want to be in a cabin in the middle of nowhere.

I have so much to be thankful for this year, so much gratitude and appreciation. I wonder if I will be “home” this Thanksgiving.