The restlessness and emptiness she had been running from floated away on the ocean currents, along with those galaxies of silver scales.

After that trip, my whole idea of the life that I had planned for myself was just completely ruined.

[laughs] Um, so I went back to LA and pretty much almost immediately quit my job [laughs] and strapped on a backpack and went solo traveling across, basically for, like, six months straight.

Went to 20 countries across five continents, but primarily spent time in Southern Africa, and this was all by myself with, like, a backpack, trying to challenge notions of what it means to be a, a young Asian woman trying to, like, you know, go on the road.

My mom was not pleased with that, but [laughs] she kind of knew she couldn't stop me.

I was always a very good Asian daughter, I think, in a sense.

You know, I just, like, got good grades, went to a good school, got a really good job, like, kind of was doing what was expected, not just from family or cultural expectations, but also from myself.

And then she had another experience that changed her life.