As summer approached, I started to understand what Beijing had meant to me all the Summers that I was here. It was protection, and it was Home. I remember taking all the English literature books from my studies at Durham back to the home in Dongdan, Beijing to read over the summers, of which I accomplished very little.
Dongdan was always the refuge I took from parents who were unstable in their behaviour and unsteady in their affection. It was like going from the Garden of Eden to a Hell-like existence, and then back again.
I used to envy other people the steadiness they had in their lives, because I never felt like I had any in mine.