MISTI Blogs

When I first arrived in Singapore, I mentally prepared myself to feel like an outsider: awkwardly navigating workplace culture and committing painfully obvious foreigner mistakes. I expected to cling to the comfort and familiarity of the MISTI Singapore intern cohort, finding solidarity in being foreigners exploring the city together. However, I quickly discovered that everywhere I go in Singapore, I am always surrounded by people from all across the world. Whether I’m on the MRT, at a hawker center, or in my lab, I always see such diverse groups of people. There’s something comforting about being a foreigner in a place where everyone else also seems to be from somewhere else.

At the Genome Institute of Singapore (GIS), my lab is almost entirely composed of international researchers, all drawn to a unique opportunity to research while exploring life in a new country. I never expected to be adopted by a multicultural group of bright, chaotic GIS interns. Our intern circle includes students from Canada, Singapore, China, and the U.S., each of us bringing our unique background and stories. 

This summer, being Vietnamese-American has become prevalent in almost every conversation. As both the only American and only Vietnamese in our intern circle, it has been so fun sharing my experiences, culture, and languages while learning about everyone else’s. It feels a bit like starting college again but on a much larger scale. 

Every day, interns from different labs across GIS would gather to eat lunch together, turning our break into a social gathering and cultural exchange. Lunch has become one of my favorite parts of the day. Conversations bounce from planning weekend trips to comparing education systems to discussing the quirks of different languages and accents. Almost daily, one of us experiences culture shock: a phrase, tradition, or food we have never encountered before. Many of us have even started picking up Singlish phrases. Some of our favorites revolve around “can”: “can or cannot?”, “can lah”, “can one”, “can is can lah.” There’s always something to laugh about, question, or learn.

Being around such a diverse community of people has given me a chance to share parts of my identity that I rarely talk about back home, where many of my experiences feel like the norm among the people around me, especially since in the U.S., most of my friendships have formed around having similar backgrounds and interests. But here in Singapore, I’ve found myself connecting with other interns because of our differences.

During my fourth week at GIS, A*STAR hosted a Vietnamese cultural event for all staff and interns, featuring delicious Vietnamese food, like bánh mì and bún thịt nướng. I was surprised and touched that the very first event held since my arrival in Singapore celebrated Vietnamese culture. Although I occasionally hear Vietnamese spoken in certain parts of the city, I didn’t expect to find such a visible Vietnamese presence within my own research community.

Though, I realize that my experience in Singapore as a foreigner might be somewhat unique. This summer I also connected with MIT students and alumni I had never met before, bonding over our experiences in Singapore so far. As interns at different research labs, start-up companies and quant companies, each of us have had unique experiences because of our varied work environments. Hearing their stories made me realize that as an intern at a predominantly international research lab, my daily experience of Singapore has been different from those working in more locally focused environments. My sense of belonging as a foreigner has been greatly shaped by spending my days surrounded by other internationals. It’s been fascinating to see how the same city can feel completely different depending on where you spend your days and who surrounds you.

My summer in Singapore has been defined by funny everyday conversations over meals, bike rides, MRT commutes, weekend outings, and our regular intern gatherings. I didn’t come to Singapore expecting to talk so much about myself and my identity or to meet and become friends with so many people from all across the world. But I’m really grateful I have.

This experience has completely shifted how I think about finding community in new places. Back home, I’ve always gravitated toward people who share my background or interests, it felt natural and easy to bond over our similarities. But being in Singapore has taught me that some of the most interesting connections happen when there are so many differences to talk about and so many unique stories to exchange. Having the daily structure of work and being at work for 9 hours every day certainly helped bring us closer together, but this has taught me that strong bonds don’t always need an obvious common thread, they can emerge because of our differences.