boring, sort of introspective stuff

Pouring outside…Typhoon Glenda (yes, Glenda) is has already reached Taiwan, but she’s still drenching the northern Philippines.

There are two main communities I have access to here – Local and expat. Within each of these are, of course, many sub-communities. After my last trip home, I had my usual couple of dark, scowling weeks at work. I miss the community of friends I have at home. Not just the friends themselves, but the community that they help define. (And I do recognise that I get a skewed view when I flit home for a week or two and spend every day just hanging out, eating and drinking).

Lately, though, I feel I haven’t really fit into any community here. As a non-Filipino (and as a westerner who isn’t searching for a way out of western culture), I’ll never truly fit in to a local community. And I don’t really feel at home in the expat communities I’ve experienced.

I’m certainly not lonely – I have plenty of friends here. But, bar a few exceptions, I don’t have the depth of connection I have with my close friends at home. And, given the transience of expats here, I get the feeling that developing that sort of closeness is even rarer than it is back home – despite the fact that the shared experience of a different culture can bring you together quite quickly.

More on this later, perhaps…