As the MTR doors slide open to reveal the Kowloon station, I breathe a sigh of relief that, rather than head into the challenge and necessary adaptation of an unknown space, we are making our way slowly, or, from a different perspective, rather rapidly back to campus. Back to campus. I think it just as easily as if I was walking back to Greylock from the Log. I marvel at the the novelty of my concept of Lingnan as a safe space, of my dorm room here as a comfortable place to rest, to know what to expect. I marvel at the speed at which my perspective of the city has changed. The crowds have become groupings or collections of individual people, all at midpoints along intricate pathways through the day. The skyscrapers are the places where individuals work, play, worship, care for and are cared for the people that they care about. The language is still a puzzle but, rather than a frightening jumble of sounds reminding me of my brain’s incapacity to understand, it is the marker of meaning, a reminder that we are all trying to share and understand our experiences.
How do fear and discomfort give way to comfort and confidence?
Is the feeling of adaptation just a survival mechanism for existing in new and unfamiliar spaces?