Understanding Freedom in China

Everyone abroad says there is no freedom in China,

but after living there for six years, I have never felt more free.

This is episode one of three ways China has

completely rewired the way I think about freedom.

The first, money.

While I was working in China, I had two teaching jobs,

one making 1,900 pounds a month, and then the second 2,700 pounds a month.

So I felt like I had cracked the code of life.

Because the cost of living there is so low,

I had enough money and enough time to do whatever I wanted.

And it was during that time that I realized all the stories

that we have been told about money growing up were absolute bullshit.

I started to see that there were infinite ways to make money

and to live your life.

And of course I recognize my privilege in that situation.

Like as a white woman with a British passport, doors open to me

that would not open to other people who were born in another place, that is not lost on me.

However, it has not been three years since I quit my second teaching job.

And in that time I have had anything from 30 grand to 100 pounds in my bank account.

So I have experienced China as someone who has money and someone who doesn't.

And honestly, the experience was not that different because the cost of living in China means

that whether I was earning or not, I could always afford to eat, to get a taxi,

to buy myself a bunch of flowers if I was a bad day,

whereas comparatively in the UK,

regardless of how much money I have in my bank account,

I feel the weight of the cost of everything there.

So in China, I still felt free even when my bank account was almost empty,

but money was just the beginning.

The real freedom for me came from something that nobody warns you about

when you move somewhere like China.

Follow along for part two.