Last night we held a party at a bar in Dili. Believe it or not, there is a party scene in Dili. On one side you have local parties organized by Timorese for Timorese, with lots of dancing. On the other side there are the expat parties, the quiz nights, the karaoke nights.

The party last night went all right – it wasn’t a failure by any means – but I didn’t enjoy it. Part of the problem – and here comes a long, personal digression – is that when we do these parties, my friend and I play music using software on our laptops, which just doesn’t feel right.

Ten years ago I got my first pair of turntables. Buying vinyl every week is something that, unless you’ve done it, you wouldn’t give a second thought. My records are long gone now – some in storage, the rest at friends’ houses around the UK. It’s something I miss dearly. Playing music on a laptop is easy: you push a button and the software does it all for you.

When I was in school I’d save all my money just to buy one record, whereas now I can download 100 tracks in a few minutes. I used to have records that other people wanted and couldn’t find.

This morning I woke up in kind of a reclusive mood. I uninstalled the software and made the decision not to do these parties any more. It sounds trivial, I know, but there’s more to it than that. I just don’t vibe with or enjoy the expat scene here.

My spiraling thoughts last night were multiplied when a light from a projector flashed in my eyes and I had a really strange migraine. I went completely blind for a few minutes and spent the next couple of hours in a daze. I felt terrible. At the end of the night I just wanted somebody to ask me if I was OK, but nobody did.

It made me think long and hard about what I’m doing in Timor and what I want to get out of being here. I’m not going to be in this country forever. My work situation is acceptable. I make more money than I did in Thailand, but the flipside of that is that the work I’m doing isn’t always the kind I feel passionate about. It takes time. Being a freelance writer is damn hard work.

I’ve also been thinking a lot about how you are supposed to split your time between experiencing one culture and holding onto your own. All of us here do it to an extent.

Thanks to organizations sending over their well-salaried employees, the cost of living in Dili can be ridiculously expensive. Yesterday a guy told me he had been searching for a two-bedroom apartment, nothing fancy, just somewhere to live. He said he’s looking at $2,500 a month rent, which works out about 85,000 baht.

It just gets to me that after spending time with people whose lives are so different to mine that I’d then try and fall back into this expat safety net.

I’m still naïve and impressionable – I know that – but I’m finding it hard to come to grips with elements of life here. I’m leaving on Tuesday for a month-long trip to Bali, Bangkok (maybe), England and France. It will be a good time to think about what to do next.