Returning to the mothership

In just over six weeks, my family and I will be leaving Singapore and returning to live in the UK – specifically, rural Anglesey in Wales – after five years in Asia. We set this plan in motion a while ago, but it’s only now, as we enter these last few weeks, that the whole thing has started to feel real. Our kids are young, and so they barely remember life before the tropics. Seasons – and winters in particular – seem like a very foreign concept to them right now. Cold is when the A/C is set to high. They don’t remember the joys of getting up in a dark, freezing house in the dead of winter. Oh, the experiences they have ahead…

For my wife and I, leaving Singapore brings mixed emotions. The last couple of years in the midst of the pandemic have undoubtedly been strange. COVID-19 restrictions have been a constant for us since April 2020. We had to change our lifestyles in order to cope. Writing became important to both of us (I wrote two novels, while she wrote one), as did exercise and focusing more on health and well-being. So there were positives, but the flip side was the sense of isolation that came from being stuck in Singapore. Close relatives and friends were far away. We came to realize that, as a family, we needed to be close to the key people in our lives again, and late last year we decided we would return to the UK this summer, at the end of the school term.

We’re looking forward to many things about going back, but we will miss Singapore, dearly. This ‘Little Red Dot’ (as it’s often called) really has become our home. I anticipate a fairly sombre mood as we head to the airport ahead of our departure. But the sadness reflects the good times we’ve had and the memories that we take with us. Life is full of change, and often it’s the emotions that signal to us the value in the decisions we make.

One peculiar observation about our relocation is that we are moving across the world from one small island to another, and did you know that both of them are more or less the same size? Singapore has an area of 728.6 km², while Anglesey has an area of 714.8 km².

Why the Welsh countryside, you may ask? Well, Anglesey is where I am from originally, and we wanted to return to a place in the UK where we would have lots of space and wilderness around us. Wales has both in droves. I haven’t actually lived in Wales since I left for university in the 90s. I am quite aware that a man returning to live in the rural countryside where he is from after so many years away, living in cities around the world, sounds like the premise of a TV show or a film. Hopefully, more of a fish-out-of-water light-hearted comedy than, well, a horror film. Alternatively, I might start solving crimes in my spare time. Perhaps I could start walking with a cane and start wearing an eyepatch. All options are on the table right now.