June 3, 2021 | Platform 7 Coffee
As the age-old excuse goes, I’ve been busy the past few months with big life things… Moving countries, leaving a job, those sorts! But this coffee chat took place before all that, back in early June.
This one is special for two reasons: it was the first time getting to do one of these coffee chats in person in over a year. Even more importantly, this was the day after Abby Bu graduated from university. I would have loved to show up to her graduation with flowers in hand and struggle to walk in heels that I only wear once or twice a season. But with the ceremony being virtual, I figured seeing her the next day over coffee might just be the next best thing.
No longer in school
“Yesterday was your graduation. How do you feel?” I ask.
“To be honest, I felt horrible. I actually cried,” says Abby. “The trigger was when someone from my program reached out and said: so what are your plans now? Industry, academia, or your parents’ basement?
People are going to Oxford, starting their PhDs, and seem to have their lives figured out. But I’m confused and stuck.”
Anyone else remember being fresh out of university and feeling all overwhelmed? I certainly do.
It also just wasn’t the same without a traditional graduation ceremony. Her parents, who live in China, missed the link for the virtual graduation and didn’t get to attend the event. Had it not been for the pandemic, they would have flown out to Vancouver for the occasion. They’ve never been to Vancouver before.
Away from home
“I think my mom had been really looking forward to it. But my dad, I’m not sure,” says Abby. “Being an only child and being away, I think it’s really hard for my mom. I think she maybe puts too much focus on me. It’s good and bad, but as I grow older, I start feeling that the attention sometimes becomes a burden and prevents me from doing things that I want to do.
My dad, though, he’s always given me a very distant feeling. As weird as it sounds, when I’m interacting with my dad, I feel like I’m interacting with a colleague or a classmate. When I’m talking to someone really close, I wouldn’t necessarily stop and think about what I’m saying and how I present myself, but I do with my dad.”
Being away from home, Abby does have moments where she wishes that she was close to home. “Maybe on mom’s birthday or around Mother’s Day. All the people I know are posting photos with their families, and that’s the time when I feel like she would be really lonely. And that it would be good if I was there.”
Feeling included yet like an outsider in China
As for when Abby is actually back in China, her relationship with the place is somewhat complex.
“I do feel more… belonged when I go back [to China], even though I don’t necessarily “belong,” says Abby.
“You change when you live in a different culture for such a long time. So when I do go back, I actually feel like an outsider. But not in a bad way. Not like I’m being excluded.”
Feeling included but also feeling like an outsider – I ask to hear more about what that might look like.
“I’m not sure if you’re familiar with WeChat,” Abby says. I’ve never used it myself, but I know it’s a messaging app that is widely used in China. And that you can use WeChat to make payments and all sorts of other things, also.
“So last time I went back to China, there’s already WeChat Pay everywhere. And you barely see paper money, because everyone’s just taking out their phones and scanning to pay with WeChat. You can literally go to a mountain, and the old ladies selling their home-produced things will have WeChat Pay.
This one time, I went to the supermarket and tried to pay for the first time using WeChat. I couldn’t scan with my QR code for some reason, and I could see the cashier looking at me full of judgement! She was like, that’s your ‘friend code!‘”
It turns out, the QR code Abby was trying to scan was for adding friends into your contact list, and there was a separate QR code to pay for things. It’s moments like this that makes Abby realize that the country she’s known all her life is constantly changing while she herself is away.
Personal boundaries
One big difference she observes between the two places she’s lived has to do with the concept of personal boundaries.
“I’ve been thinking a lot about how the idea of boundaries apply in China and Canada.” For some reason, Abby says, this is what she finds herself thinking about whenever she’s doing dishes.
“Here, for example, in general people mind their own business, and there is respect for each other. But you can’t necessarily expect people to go out of their way to do this and that for you. Back home [in China], it’s more like everyone’s meddling in your business. It is, on the other hand, easier to ask for help from others.
Abby says that she herself has come to prefer strong boundaries over no boundaries, though she recognizes that this may be perceived as distant for some people.
“I’m okay with the person that I am”
Looking back on the past five years in university, Abby has noticed that she has changed in more ways than one.
“I think, at the beginning, I just didn’t know myself well. So it was a process for me to get familiar with who I really am. Looking back to my first year [in university], my understanding of myself was how I wanted myself to be. What I wished to be. But right now, I’m okay with being the person that I am. Not fully okay, but okay.”
Some of the moments that prompted Abby to take the time to learn about herself were during times of recent hardship and disappointment, of not being admitted into the graduate programs she wished to pursue.
“After the big setback with the graduate school process, I realized that I’m more adaptable and resilient than I thought that I would be.
I also really started to explore what I really wanted. I’ve been thinking about why I’ve been so unwilling to sit down and work on [graduate school applications]. I’m really trying to listen to myself.”
One thing Abby’s taking with her from her time in university is having the mindset of a team player.
“I used to be really, really intense. But over time, I saw that this could be bad both for myself and also make it hard for others to work with me. I used to complain a lot about my groupmates, for example. I would think, how come these people are so lazy and dumb, and why do I have to be wiping everyone’s butt after them? But then, I slowly realized that if I always find issues working with people, maybe it’s not always them. Maybe I was being hard to work with. It’s really difficult to work with others when you’re always really specific about something, and say my way is the way.
I think nowadays, it’s harder and harder for someone to achieve something really great by themselves, no matter how capable or smart they are.”
Life of a new grad
Though she graduated with an Economics Honours degree, Abby had initially wanted to become an engineer.
“I thought that it would be really cool to be an engineer, especially as a girl. And I thought that it would make my parents really proud.
The other day, my boyfriend asked me a very interesting question. He said: Now that you’ve graduated, if you didn’t have to consider anything in reality and you could go back to school and get another degree, what would you like to study?”
Abby’s answer was to study computer science and go into game development.
To Abby who confesses that she doesn’t really know what to do, I say that figuring out life and knowing exactly what you want to do is probably a myth. Or at the very least, something of a work in progress.
As for considering the realities, Abby’s currently in the process of exploring different career interests and applying for her first job out of university. I remember it to be a freeing, exciting, highly stressful, and scary time all at once.
To Abby and to every new grad navigating the already-overwhelming time in life in an especially confusing time, I wish you all my very best. And I have no doubt that you’ll go on to do the most spectacular things.
