Since long before the standardisation of the base-10 numeral system in the fifth century, the decade has proven to be a pretty important marker of time for us humans. The century is notable, too, but frankly, as most of us don’t stick around quite that long, the decade tends to be a more meaningful and useful concept. It’s generally thought that the importance of 10 was because of the numbers of fingers we have on our hands, but nobody really knows for sure. Whatever the reason, though, there’s just something meaningful about the passage of a decade. We don’t celebrate anyone’s 49th wedding anniversary with nearly the spectacle that we do when the couple notches their 50th, and even the milestones of our own lives are metered out by decade. “When I was in my 20s…” we begin our stories later in life. We think of our lives in chapters, and more often than not, the decade defines each of those chapters.

Although my time in Malaysia doesn’t neatly cover one specific decade (like, say, the 1990s or the 2010s), as of this month, 10 years have nevertheless passed since I first arrived at KLIA. It was September 5, 2008, and Cathay Pacific had just delivered me and four pieces of luggage to a place I knew very little about, yet had still made the choice to try out as a residence (“probably for a year or so,” I told myself). I didn’t have a job here. I knew almost no one. I just thought it would be a good idea to live in a different country, something far too few Americans ever do.

My journey to Malaysia started out ominously. The first leg was a flight from my home city of Denver, Colorado to Los Angeles. Back then, the first two checked bags were free, and the charge for the third was quite inexpensive, so that’s what I did. The fourth was my carry-on. So I arrived in L.A., all full of excitement and trepidation for what I was undertaking, and headed to baggage claim to await my checked bags. The first two appeared predictably enough, and then the third made its appearance. It was almost completely destroyed. The tough exterior fabric had been shredded, the plastic and rubber elements abraded off. Clearly the bag had tangled with some of the baggage handling system’s machinery, and… well let’s just say my bag lost the fight. Badly. Everything I had in the outer pockets was gone, along with the pockets. All of my snorkelling gear was gone. Two pairs of denim jeans, about the toughest type of clothing around, were ruined solely by friction. It was, to say the least, an inauspicious beginning to my life abroad.

Fortunately, the airline had a supply of new suitcases, so they replaced my bag on the spot. I salvaged as much as I could, and made a claim for the rest. Since I was moving overseas, I had done a meticulous inventory of every single thing I had packed, so that came in quite handy for the claim.

Two flights and 20 hours later, I arrived in Kuala Lumpur, just about as clueless a new expat as possible. I stayed with an acquaintance of mine in Bukit Antarabangsa for just over three weeks while I searched for a job and bought a laughably pitiful used Proton car for the whopping sum of RM3,000 when it became immediately evident that I would require a vehicle here. Slowly but surely, I started carving out a life for myself.

I’m sure quite a few expats have similarly vivid memories of their first weeks living in their new foreign home, especially for that first expat experience. For me, everything was new and unfamiliar, from Tesco hypermarkets to mini-split air conditioners to banknotes that came in several different colours! It was a remarkable sensory journey, those initial few months.

“How long will you stay here?” is a question I’m regularly asked by my local friends. I’ve never put a specific time limit on my life here in Malaysia. I’ve always expected that, at some point, I’d move back. But life has a funny way of turning our best plans and expectations upside down, and setting us on a path that’s quite different from the one we had possibly imagined for ourselves. Even as late as 2005, I don’t think I had ever imagined myself living overseas. And even when I took the plunge, I didn’t have any notion that I’d still be living in Asia a decade later.

Getting back to the things we ascribe to decades, music is probably one of the most common. Even the title of this column is taken from the name of a ‘greatest hits’ compilation by Janet Jackson. We demarcate musical styles and trends by decades. I grew up in the ’80s and still regard that era as one of the very best for music – though of course I’m biased. Fittingly, the opening lyrics to one song from that era (and a group called Toto) came to my mind just recently:

Some people live their dreams. Some people close their eyes. Some people’s destiny passes by.

For me, for my life in Malaysia, for all that I’ve experienced in the last decade… I feel incredibly fortunate that my eyes have not been closed, and that my destiny has not escaped me. Here’s to the next chapter.