Seeking New Soil
This project is largely a shameless opportunity to share my conversations with very cool international friends.
But it also stems from a deep and enduring interest in the experiences of people navigating life far from home. I’ve had the privilege of meeting people from all over the map, each with unique stories about adapting to new places and cultures.
This site is for people curious about living abroad, but I hope it also serves as a place to reflect on our experiences of home, and the barriers we place between ourselves and newcomers.
This site was further inspired by Robert Louis Stevenson’s poem Foreign Lands, which opens with a cherry blossom tree - a symbol of new beginnings and rebirth that often thrives far from its native origins.
Foreign Lands
by Robert Louis Stevenson
Up into the cherry tree
Who should climb but little me?
I held the trunk with both my hands
And looked abroad on foreign lands.
I saw the next door garden lie,
Adorned with flowers, before my eye,
And many pleasant places more
That I had never seen before.
I saw the dimpling river pass
And be the sky's blue looking-glass;
The dusty roads go up and down
With people tramping in to town.
If I could find a higher tree,
Farther and farther I should see,
To where the grown-up river slips
Into the sea among the ships;
To where the roads on either hand
Lead onward into fairy land,
Where all the children dine at five,
And all the playthings come alive.