Growing up as a Taiwanese, I always dreamed of the American dream: the American English accent, baseball, McDonald's, Silicon Valley, and wealthy white people. However, the first time I arrived in San Francisco, our school placed us in Tenderloin, the poorest district in San Francisco, which completely shattered my American dream.
In front of the Twitter headquarter, I saw people dying on the street with the smell of urine everywhere. It was terrible. Is this what the promised land looks like? That's what I thought.
But it wasn't until I went to my German founder's house that I saw a successful American dream. He is white, tall, and handsome, and has been working at LinkedIn as a PM for six years. While I was struggling to pay my rent (because SF is so expensive ~$2,000/month), he had already bought a quiet house in SF with a beautiful city view showing the sunset in Twin Peaks.
"When I bought the house, it was so dark. There were big, dark trees hovering. But I cleaned up year by year. I don't mind because I like to build. That's how we got the beautiful yard for kids today."
Having a yard to barbecue in San Francisco? Only crazy rich people can afford that!
He designed the interior of this house while his kids were crawling around, and it looked like a house from a European movie. His elegant wife intelligently talked about how to handle married life while raising two kids without giving up work.
Look at what kind of life he has! A charming and funny founder, a beautiful wife he has been dating since they were 21 years old, two cute little German kids running around, a self-designed house in San Francisco, a personal studio for bike and carpentry work, and a cup of latte with art in the morning. And look at me, for instance, my current standard for my partner is... "someone with whom I can communicate properly and love me" (???)
…
…
…
All of a sudden, I realize that my standards and imagination for family, marriage, and work are hilariously, stupidly, and sarcastically low. I have always been one of the oldest and mature ones in our school, and I felt unsure setting my life bar much higher compared to others. But now I see...
Don't laugh at me, my weirdo friends! I'm expressing this in the most serious sense. I know I'm not white, but I can definitely get into any big tech company and climb to a powerful position if I want to. So his future can be mine? 🤯🤯🤯 I'm mind blown!
His life opened my eyes, and I realized that all my experiences in relationships, work, and life only account for 10% of his. So many kids in school laughed at me for wanting stability, but yesterday I saw that when you finally settle down and commit, that's when you can build something in 10 years.
I aspire to build, to build a home for myself and the people I love.
this post gives me warm and fuzzy feelings (in a good way)
(and makes me wanna move to SF hahahaha)