A bowl of spicy chicken wontons lands in front of me, each dumpling swimming in glossy red oil. Nostalgia smells of Sichuan, rice vinegar, and five spice. When I was younger, I dreamed of ordering a bowl for myself and inhaling it in one sitting. But this is a meal meant to be shared. I’m splitting a bowl with my partner in Vancouver, the latest city in my long list of places I call home.
At the top of that list is Sydney. My first words—all in English—had an Aussie twang to them. Jakarta comes next with gridlock traffic, sweat, and loud koplo (Indonesian folk-dance music) leading my mum and me to a dim sum restaurant in the city’s southern borough. This is where I first tasted wontons of any kind. She pushes me to ask for toothpicks in broken Indonesian when pieces of green onion wedge themselves between my teeth. I work the chunks out with my tongue out of shyness (and stubbornness) to speak my native language. While I became more fluent in my mother tongue, that embarrassment never went away. My early years in Jakarta made me a stranger in someone else’s home, despite being born inside the house.
I traded my Australian accent for a considered British lilt when I moved to London for film school. I had plenty of wontons after nights out in Chinatown, at tense reunions with distant relatives, or on awkward first dates. They became my “usual.” One gruelling date—an upper-class man and screenwriting hopeful—was impressed by how quickly I knew what I wanted and took timid bites when I offered to share. I coated the back of my spoon with oil to show off—I could take the heat. He wasn’t impressed. We didn’t want the same things at the end of the night, and he wasn’t as excited about the dumplings as I was. Maybe I should have been less excited. Perhaps I should have done more to impress him. I felt a similar pang of inadequacy on an outing with my aunties—my “usual” was boring. Too plain. I second-guessed myself often in London, my voice quivering in and out of an accent. I wanted to be what everyone else wanted me to be. I wanted to be anything but myself there.
I returned to Jakarta wounded and lost. London had chewed me up and spat me out after graduation. I wanted nothing more than to stay stuck in the U.K. COVID-19 brought the wontons to my doorstep, the first meal my family and I let ourselves indulge in after months of social distancing and cowering at our groceries. Restrictions lifted right before I moved to Vancouver for graduate school. A few girlfriends from high school and I booked a table for dinner at that same dim sum restaurant for one last hurrah—no longer teens terrified of phone calls but grown women who make reservations. I was running late, but by the time I got there, my wontons were steaming hot at the table. The girls ordered for me ahead of time—a simple yet loving gesture that made the dinner all the more bittersweet. In Indonesian, we don’t really say “goodbye.” We say sampai jumpa: “until I see you again.” I didn’t know if I would ever share this meal or see this place again. I already felt far away sitting in my seat.
In the three short years I’ve lived in Vancouver, I think about how much London, Jakarta, and Sydney have changed since I moved away. Are the restaurants I frequented with my friends and family still standing? Will I still want to eat there upon my return? Will my “usual” still be on the menu? Will it still be my usual in Vancouver?
“Same same but different.” It’s an ironic chant of my mum’s I repeat to myself as I go through the bowl of wontons in Vancouver. The dish may consist of the same ingredients, but I know they will taste different in Jakarta, London, and Vancouver. I know to expect the burst of chicken and ginger in every bite. The unrelenting Sichuan heat. The green onions lodged between my pearly whites. I won’t know how I’ll feel in that moment. My spicy chicken wontons might not be as familiar as I anticipate, but ordering “the usual” tethers me to the different versions of myself. I’m not quite the same, but I’m not so different either.
I wonder how long it will take for this mental calculus to happen with my version of Vancouver. Keeping inventory of all the changes that happen around me is the only way I know how to stay connected to the places I call home, even if there may come a day I don’t recognize them.
As my partner and I clean out our bowl, I tell him all these stories. Pangsit is the Indonesian word for wonton, and he wracks his brain for the equivalent in his native Urdu. I consider ordering something new. I still get embarrassed about getting food stuck in my teeth. At least I can ask for toothpicks now.
Read more from our Autumn 2025 issue.
