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Hot humid air shook me awake as my feet graced Thai soil. How many hours had I been awake? I was too excited to care. We waited patiently for our transport, ready for the last part, the part where the new chapter was supposed to begin. Here I was, a foreign language, sticky skin and 11 strangers whose names I was yet to learn. The highways were desolate and barren, like something out of a Stephen King novel. It was nearly 1am on a Tuesday so the fact I was expecting chaos is merely a projection of what I was feeling. As we approached a bridge that would lead us to the village of Si-Satchanalai, orange flashing lights caught my eye. “What was going on?!!” I thought to myself. A glimpse ahead showed a car had broken down. Things break all of the time. Wine glasses break, hearts break, cars break. The breaking of something wasn’t a new concept however, I was mesmerised by how normal things were. A large tow truck with three men had pulled up beside the car, just as we passed it. This didn’t shock me because I thought it was abnormal, it shocked me because for a slight moment I was too ignorant to realise that places exist out of my own bubble. That Thailand was another country. That people were living, breathing, existing. As they normally would. How could I be so negligent? Falling into the trap of misconceptions and assumptions of a place. I made a promise from that moment forward, my own biased eyes were to shut, and a new set were to open. Otherwise, I would be dragging myself through the next 3 months, instead of skipping delicately through the finish line. 5 hours later, the bus pulled to an abrupt stop. The air was crisp and dry as it engulfed me. It felt different from before. The fatigue of travel began to creep into my bloodstream but before I could surrender to it, I could feel something pulling at the pastel pink pants I had been wearing for the past 60 hours. I looked down and dark brown eyes stared up at me. They glistened with the morning sun and stared into my soul like a Cheshire cat. Before I could blink, my hand was interlocked by a small child, as if she had decided on me. Or maybe, I had decided on her. Mew, a name I would never forget. Mew, whose only words of English were stating her name over and over on repeat like a broken record. Mew was six, and along with the four stray cats she liked to feed, lived with her nan Anipya. This was my new family. Although I had only been there five minutes, I already felt more at home than I had my entire childhood. Mew never let go of my hand, but I didn’t mind at all. She walked me to school for my internship as if she were an adult, and I was the child. Even though she was six, she made me feel safe. We communicated through pictures and hand gestures. She spoke in Thai, and I replied in English. There was a disfluency between us, but it never stopped us from smiling. The local school was 20 minutes away, and was intricately crafted out of wood and steel. There were 44 students. Mew was one of them. I was welcomed with a song, and greeted individually with a wai, respected as if I were one of the elders in the village. I could feel the happiness of the children all the way to the marrow of my bones as it radiated outwards. They all wanted to be there. They all appreciated my existence, something I had never felt before. They wanted to learn, God, they wanted to learn. In this moment, my biased eyes had been shut, and this time I was locking them into a box and throwing away the key. How dare I make assumptions of a life I knew nothing about. I hadn't realised how homesick I truly was, until Mew grasped my hand, stared into my soul and welcomed me home.