Self narration.

        If you ask the three-year-old me about my future career, I think the answer could never be a researcher or an artist. I was not even sure about what research was half a year ago. However, things changed rapidly, especially in recent years.

        When I boarded the plane to New York City to start my first year as an undergraduate student at New York University five years ago, my parents wished me to get a degree in economics or finance. Furthermore, in their imagined career path for me, I would enter a big firm on Wall Street, earn some money, and go back to China and stay with them. That was also my initial plan, which is much similar to a three-year-old’s dream: earn a lot of money, and buy big yachts and fancy cars.

        However, in my sophomore year, things were slightly off track. I did not know if it was the vibe of New York City or if it was just my nature being released; I felt a creative impulse in my heart become stronger. I had been taking pictures for years before that, but I had never thought to express anything with my photos. But the inner creative impulse encouraged me to speak with pictures, and thus I transferred to the photo department.

        If things had gone on smoothly like this, I might have become an artist and probably be selling my photos in some galleries by now. But then Covid started. I returned to China in my Junior year and never returned until graduate school. This pandemic was indeed unexpected, yet it brought some opportunities I had never thought about.

        During my two-year stay in China, I completed four road trips across China to places far away from big cities. At first, I was inspired by Robert Frank and Garry Winogrand and thought I could also use photos to record what I see. But as I dug deeper into the cultures of different ethnic groups in China, I found them more fascinating than I had ever read in any book or seen in any picture.

        I think simply being a photographer is not enough anymore; it does not fulfill my true need of expressing. In other words, photos are still superficial. Although I had tried to live like a local during my road trips, there were still many things I did not have time to think about or ask. That is when I wanted to do research in the future.

        These two big turning points in the past several years influenced me dramatically. The CCT program is a new starting point. As for the future, I would like to continue digging into different cultures of different ethnic groups in China and truly present their gorgeousness of them.