anita:

Innsbruck! I have not been around that side of Germany, my parents and I used to go for a skiing trip to this quaint little village called Filzmoos. The residents are as beautiful as the scenery and I would love to stay there, but if I were to go on a tourist visa I would only be able to stay for a short while.

Thank you for sharing about your relationship with your mother. I am currently in that position. I do feel a lot of love for my mother, since whenever she is not being manipulative and overly attached, she does everything she could for me. I could say that growing up and even now, my mother spoils me and still wouldn’t let me do things such as renewing passport or making a new bank account by myself since she worries I couldn’t.

I’m also getting the idea that she feels since she has sacrificed a lot of her youth for my sake, she wonders ‘why won’t you make sacrifices for me too?’ I don’t want to have to cut her off yet, although I have considered it many times. It just seems less stressful that way, but I don’t think I have the heart for it. All I want is for her to understand that while I love her more than anything in the world, I also need to find myself. If I were to tell my dad or any of her family about this, they would go off about how ‘ungrateful’ I am being.

Have you found that place, someplace you felt made your life worthwhile, anita? I’d like to know your experiences, too.

Joe:

Thank you for your response. You asked what is holding me back… as you said, I literally could take off this very day if I wanted to. However, this is not the first time that I’ve done something like this – I’ve ‘escaped’ to three different cities in my country in the past 2 years, one of which is Bali. Each of the times I did this, either my mother or her relatives would ‘force’ me to return. You see, I’m the only child. My mom is emotionally dependent on me, although she has her job to keep her busy. She goes to work at 6 in the morning and comes back at 8 at night, and yet she expects me to be home that whole time, and welcome her on the doorstep. Whenever I decide on going somewhere for a while, she cries a lot and confides in her brothers/sisters, who would then tell me that I’m a ‘bad, rebellious daughter’ because I make my mom cry. So it’s been hard for me to get some independence.

I just want to plan this one right, because I want this one to last for a while. At least until my mind is sane enough to return. Thanks for wishing me luck! I really hope I make some great experiences on this escapade. My life has been too mundane, it’s almost like living in a cell.

anita:

Thank you for your insight. I somewhat envy Western people – individuality is very highly regarded there. Over here every little thing you do would spark questions such as ‘think about what your neighbors might say about it’, ‘the family wouldn’t like that’, it takes a toll on someone like me, who doesn’t want to care about what people think of me and the things I do for myself.

I had in mind somewhere like Thailand or rural India, although I’m worried about the latter since I’m a woman (and you hear all sorts of news…). I’m from Indonesia, Jakarta to be more specific. It’s a very busy city, with traffic jams everywhere. Locally I could ‘escape’ to Bali, which is about an hour flight’s away, but I’m undecided since it’s a bit too close to home and my family might decide to either drop in or call me back when they feel like.

I haven’t considered the US mainly because flight tickets are so expensive from over here – I think it’s close to 1000 USD one-way. As you said, I wanted to go somewhere with fresh air, not so busy but not deserted either. Just a simple small town somewhere would probably be nice. For example, I would love to return to this one village in Austria, I love everything about that place. But unfortunately it would be too expensive for me in the long run!