On Top From Down Under

Rachel perched alert and bright on the edge of a big yellow sofa, her blonde hair swept back over one ear. She had tried hard to strike a demure movie-star pose for my camera, but failed each time. Australian-style devilment rather than defeat was evident in her soft green eyes, with each futile effort greeted by her parchment-white face creasing into a wickedly feminine grin. I shot lots of grins and an occasional hint of demure.

"Show me a bit of attitude," I pleaded. An eyebrow arched and she conjured up a stern look. Good try, but still not quite right. The problem seemed to be her skepticism that she could give me the goodies I sought, but I got some shots off before the grin reappeared. It was some time before the penny dropped. This was not a lady a photographer could easily pose. This was a lady instinctively programmed to lead any lensman by the nose, a la Princess Diana. She had been giving me her attitude throughout the session. 'Twas me, not she, who had wanted pretentiousness.

Later, some way into our interview, I got more attitude than I had bargained for. She had been so polite, speaking candidly and quietly, actually seeming to enjoy the grilling I was giving her. "But Rachel, what is really holding you in China? What is the country giving you?" She was incredulous at the question. Both her eyebrows arched to the full as she virtually shouted: "Self-definition! Don't you know what that is? Self-definition! This is where I discovered who I really am!"

Rachel Hutchinson, who might well be described as a "bright spark" with brains, is wholly in control of her life. She knows exactly why she is in Beijing, has a fair idea of how long she will stay, and is firmly established in her career here. She does not view China through rose-tinted glasses, and hopes in time to see far more of the country--warts as well as the obvious attractions. Simply, she has a realistic outlook. Like so many foreigners, she struggles in her Chinese lessons. She lives modestly in a small but comfortable apartment hard by the East Third Ring Road.

Twenty-eight this month, she was born and raised in a small town near Melbourne. Shy and retiring as a youngster despite having outgoing, highly successful parents, she led a very protected life until her elder brother died tragically when she was 19. His loss turned her life upside down. Her chief protector gone, she was suddenly forced to come to terms with her vulnerability.

Having always identified strongly with her late brother's generosity and unwavering protection, she instinctively donned the mantle of "responsible young adult", quickly transforming from her role as kid sister to big sister to another much younger brother. Mainly, though, she took charge of her own life. She quit the legal studies course she was undertaking--a great relief because she hated it--and, as she recounts, "started to live". Her salvation was to embark on an arts degree in English literature, her longtime passion, and she also took a course in creative writing, her strongest natural talent.

Rachel finally found her spark, as she puts it, when she was invited to read her poetry on radio. In her day job, success followed success as she climbed to ever-higher levels of bookshop management. Came a day when she volunteered to teach English to new immigrants to Australia, contacts which triggered a fascination for other cultures, Chinese especially. Soon she was invited to teach the language at a Beijing university, a challenge she did not hesitate to take. Suddenly, it seemed to her, she was here--alone, and like so many before her, a seemingly "displaced, misplaced expatriate".

She found her role unfulfilling, and she had little trouble in finding a better job with the China-Australia Chamber of Commerce. Along the way she gave some help to Beijing's 2008 Olympics bid committee, BOBICO. At the chamber, she was project organizer for a much-needed directory of the many hundreds of Chinese alumni of Australian universities--a contribution praised by the chamber. She is far from the first person to have a sticky start in a foreign land, then to find their feet.

Rachel explains how, as a foreigner in China, she has been constantly confronted with her identity. Although she had begun her journey to self-awareness in Australia, she had no firm idea who she was before she came to Beijing. The challenges she now faces daily are communication and getting to grips with differing core values.

"I still need to know where I stand," she says. "Here you need to grow fast, or get out fast. There is no allowance for the seductive inertia one leaves behind in a safe, comfortable, home-country environment. But it is easier to make friends, possibly because most expatriates have similar problems, or have solved them already. Deeper friendships develop. Friends hold together more closely than back home." A plus is that she enjoys a higher income here than she earned in Australia--a salary that also stretches further.

Where does Rachel want her life to be five years from now? The question triggers another big grin. She already knows that she will not stay in Beijing for ever. "The city is changing rapidly and, for me, is losing its endearing appeal. If I later have children, they would have to be brought up in Australia, in a nice house, with a good man with a good job."

Recently, Rachel brought her younger brother to China for a fortnight. She had taken the initiative to invite him herself, sent him the air tickets (he is still a poor student), took him as far afield in China as time permitted and, in general, gave him the holiday of his young life. "This was my sea-change," she reminisces with pride. "This trip made me who I want to be, at last."

In broader terms, Rachel knows where she is going. She will write it all down in poems and lovely stories as she goes along, and talk all her outpourings through many times with friends to ensure she gets everything right. It seems a safe bet that everything she commits to will reflect her mother's rationale, her father's creativity, her late brother's generosity of spirit, and her beloved grandmother's endless warmth--attributes which pretty well sum up Rachel herself.