Books

Liberation of an American Rocket Scientist: An Overland Journey from Moscow to the Merlion (currently seeking representation)

In 2007, I already had my dream in hand: a job offer at NASA, working with astronauts and engineers. To a starry-eyed kid who grew up in the ‘80s and ‘90s in a middle-class suburban town, I was on a course to live the American Dream. But I wasn’t ready. It was all happening so fast. Too fast, maybe. Did I deserve it, or was I just a product of circumstance? And how, I wondered, could I devote my life to exploring, if I hadn’t explored myself?

So I set off in search of dragons—both in the unknown regions at the end of the map and within myself. I decided to spend my last semester of college in Russia, learning Russian in a language immersion program while living with a family in Moscow. I then embarked on a solo, 13,000-mile overland journey across Asia to its very tip in Singapore (home of the half lion, half fish Merlion).

My journey began in a tiny urban apartment in the middle of the Russian winter where I lived with two Russian scientists and various lizards (because the university didn’t have enough money to keep the biology department heated through the winter). It ended with a bumpy train ride through the rainforests of mainland Malaysia after a long, meandering, hilarious, heartbreaking, chaotic explosion of an experience.

Along the way, I encountered an eclectic assortment of characters that helped transform an inward-looking idealist into an outward-seeking adventurer and observer, only just discovering my own country through the eyes of other travelers, shopkeepers, taxi drivers, writers, doctors, biologists, shamans, farmers, soldiers, and the horn section of a Siberian boys orchestra.

I also asked questions that dug deep into my soul, rattling the things that were loose and jarring free some that were stubbornly glued in place. As journeys of discovery go, the discovery part continued long after I reached the dragons at the end of the map, as I slowly figured out that what I thought was another test turned out to be a different puzzle entirely.

Liberation of an American Rocket Scientist is a modern American story reconnecting a distracted generation with the meaning of exploration, finding wonder in both internal and external worlds, moments that freeze our hearts, and those that stir them.